A Life Saved, A Love Found

Chapter 4: Scars and How to Heal Them

After watching TFIOS and Guardians of The Galaxy until 1am me and Shawn finally said goodnight to Hayes, Nash, and Cameron and headed back to 'our' room and argued over who got the bed. I said he should get the bed and I could sleep on the floor and he said I should get the bed and he should take the floor. He won.

When I reluctantly climbed into the bed instead of Shawn and flicked off the bedside lamp I heard a small *thump* and a groan of pain. I flicked the lamp back on quickly to see Shawn on the floor tangled in a blanket looking back up at me. I blushed and quickly apologized for making him fall and he chuckled. 

"It's fine Star, really. No big deal," he smiled as I blushed and teared up. 

"Why are you tearing up?" Shawn asked, his amused expression quickly turning into a worried one.

"You called me Star," I replied smiling sadly, "my mom used to call me that, no one's called me that since she died." 

Shawn looked at me with an unreadable expression on his face before smiling back at me and saying goodnight. Taking that as a cue to turn off the light and try and get some sleep, I said goodnight and flicked the light back off before turning over in the bed and closing my eyes and fell asleep thinking fondly about Shawn and my mother. . . 

*Nightmare. Again.*

I was standing in the hotel room with Shawn and we were packing to go somewhere when the door slammed open. I jumped and hid under the bed but before Shawn could hide as well I heard my father's voice start yelling at him.

"Who are you? Where's my daughter?" He was playing the caring father act but I could tell Shawn knew better than to believe him. "Tell me where she is!"

"No."

"You tell me where my daughter is now!" He pulled out a gun aiming at Shawn and I jumped out from under the bed. I couldn't let Shawn get hurt. 

"What are you doing Star!?! Get back under the bed!" Shawn said but I shook my head no and turned back to face my father. 

"You want to shoot him then you'll have to go through me first." I said.

"Gladly bitch." My father replied readying the gun. I closed my eyes ready for the pain, but when I heard the gun go off I felt nothing. No pain, no blood, I was still alive. I heard the door slam shut and I opened my eyes to see that my father was gone. Ecstatic, I turned around expecting to see Shawn standing behind me, but he wasn't there. I spun around searching the entirety of the room, but I still didn't see him. I looked down at the floor and there he was, blood dripping from his forehead where a distinct red spot stood out against his now ghostly pale skin. I screamed as loud as I possibly could and fell to my knees beside Shawn. Tears were now cascading down my cheeks, sobs escaped my lips. I felt like a million pieces of shattered glass and needles pierced my heart as it was ripped in half. 

The door burst open and Hayes, Nash, and Cameron ran in the room. As soon as they saw Shawn and I on the floor surrounded by blood they knew what had happened and looked at me with pure hatred.

"This is all your fault! It was your dad who killed him!" Hayes said.

"I wish Mari had never sent me that DM on Instagram, then Shawn would still be alive." added Nash.

"We never should have come." Cameron said.

At that they told me to leave and never come back, but as I left I turned back.

"I'm so sorry"

*End of Nightmare*

I screamed and shot up in bed when I woke up. I looked around and saw that I was in the hotel room, but there was no blood, no suitcases, my dad had not been there, and Shawn was not dead. In fact, he was awake and scrambling to get untangled from his blanket and over to me. When he was free of his blanket Shawn stood up and walked over to the bed with a worried expression on his face.

"Sorry Shawn," I told him, "I didn't mean to wake you up. It was just a really, bad, dream."

"You wanna tell me about it?" He asked, he had an expression on his face that said he wasn't mad at all, just worried and sorry for me having a second nightmare in one night. So I told him every last detail of my dream, and by the end I was sobbing even harder and Shawn had tears in his eyes threatening to spill onto his cheeks.

"Well, although I can't guarantee that I wouldn't jump in front of you like that, I can guarantee that the others would never say or think that. We care about you and not one of us thinks what happened to you is your fault." Shawn told me.

"But it is my fault, Shawn!" I replied, "If I hadn't texted my mom about the Halloween party she wouldn't have crashed! If she hadn't crashed my dad wouldn't have turned to alcohol to make him feel better, he wouldn't have become abusive, he wouldn't have raped me, and I wouldn't have these nightmares! I would have never met you, I would never have become a burden on you guys and Mari and Georgie and my dad! I deserve what he did to me! I am all of those things he said! I AM a whore and slut because the day before I met you he brought home 2 other guys and they raped me and I went along with it! I'm weak because I have these nightmares, I am dependent on you and Hayes and Nash ans Cameron for a home and to keep me safe now because I'm so weak to the point that I can't even sleep without nightmares and I cry nearly every day now! I don't deserve your help Shawn, I deserve my dad. I deserve to die, to be beat, to be bullied. I don't deserve to be happy." 

I told him what I had come to 'realize' over the past few days as true. I had expected Shawn to agree with me because when I looked back up at him he was looking at me with anger and frustration clear on his face. I must have looked scared or something because Shawn's expression immediately softened into a look of sympathy and disbelief. What we didn't realize was that while we were talking Cam, Nash, and Hayes were standing in the doorway because they had woken up to my scream, and of course they took that moment to notify us that they were there. 

When Cameron cleared his throat me and Shawn snapped our heads towards them and my eyes widened. 

"How long have you guys been standing there?" I asked.

"Since you screamed, Star." Nash told me and I must have paled because Hayes said, "We aren't mad about the dream if that's what you're thinking."

I shook my head no. I was more worried that they heard what I had just said, and as is on cue I heard Shawn ask if they had heard what I had just said.

"Every word." Nash told us and walked over to the bed, sat down next to me and looked me in the eye. "We heard every word of a lie that your 'dad' got you to believe. You are a good person that doesn't deserve any of what you just said. You made us hide and took a beating for us, you almost got raped again so we wouldn't be hurt. No one who does something as honorable and kind as that deserves to be hurt or die. Especially not you. It's not your fault that your mom died, she made a mistake, that's her fault. Your dad chose to start drinking on his own, you didn't shove it down his throat or make him go to the bar every day. You didn't tell him to hurt you. You didn't tell us to help you, or Mari to DM me, or Georgie to care. We all chose that because we love you. You didn't want to get raped, or have nightmares about your dad. It's okay to cry, and you are not weak. You deserve to be happy again."

When he finished talking I didn't know what to say, so I just hugged him as tight as I possibly could. I grabbed Shawn's arm and pulled him into the hug too, then waved over Hayes and Cam and hugged them too. 

"Thank you. For. . . everything. I don't know what I'd do without you guys." I said through my, or rather our, tears. 

When we let each other go I wasn't the only one with bloodshot eyes from crying, and Nash, Hayes, and Cameron went back to their room through the combining door. When Shawn started to get up to go back to his blanket on the floor I grabbed his arm and he looked back at me. 

"Would you, er. . mind, maybe. . . staying, with me? In the bed?" I asked blushing and Shawn chuckled. 

"Of course, Star." he responded climbing under the covers on my left as I scooted over a tad. As he flicked off the light I could see the large smile on Shawn's face. 

"Thanks." I said.

"For what?"

"For caring." I could see his bright smile through the dark as he pulled me close to him.

"Goodnight Star."

"Night Shawn"