Save Me

Chapter Seventeen

"It's nice to look back on your life and see things as lessons, and not regrets."

-Rihanna

♔ Chapter Seventeen ♔

The winter had fully set in now. The snow was heavy, and it was only going to fall heavier, people were saying. It only snowed this far south every so often, but it was always an unpleasant surprise to me. I hated snow, the wet and cold trudges to and from everywhere, and the biting chill that stiffened the end of my fingers, the tip of my nose, and my ears, stinging from the cold, and inflamed a rosy red, most likely.

When I looked up, I saw an empty white sky, covered in clouds. It grew shaded by a patchwork of darker grey in the horizon, but was mostly an all-white sheet of sky. The streets were grey, gritted down and graveled, and the white of the snow had mixed with brown and black along the roads, and turned to a thick sludge.

I trudged through it anyway, holding the collar of my coat up close against the wind, and I carried on. Since I'd came back to Penryn, I knew I would've missed more than a few lectures, so I started trying to catch up on my studies before I fell too far behind. I found a desk in the back of the university library, and worked until the hours melted away, until time was a far off notion, and I'd lose track of my hours, then days, and it was easy. I became used to it, after doing it day after day - focusing on my studies, to just forget about anything else I had going on, and it felt good, slipping back into a routine.

I spent much of December in the library. I didn't speak to many people either, other than Evelyn, but I hardly listened to what she said anyway. I'd let conversations fly right over my head, and I didn't care. Most of the other students went home halfway through the month, to celebrate Christmas with their family around a fire, with a tree nearby, or some other bullshit image like that. I stayed at my uni flat, and spent most of the holidays alone.

The flat was empty, and deadly silent - it felt strange, seeing as I was used to trying to avoid my flatmates. I lived with five other students, two boys and three girls. I didn't make any attempts to get to know them, and I think they picked up on it very early on. I'd stride in and out without saying a single word to them, and I preferred it that way - not speaking to people, or outwardly ignoring them. I never cared enough to be polite, or to even be nice, and certainly not to people I barely know - and more importantly, wouldn't care to know either.

It was a lonely way to live, though, I knew that. Only having one friend, and even then, barely a friend. Sure, there were guys, and certain entanglements, but I always made sure to keep them at arm's length. It was lonely, yeah, but I brought it on myself, and I guess I preferred being alone a lot of the time. Even when I'm with people I like, and maybe even when I'm having fun, I'll still think - I'd rather be at home right now, by myself, in the darkness of my bedroom, away from the rest of the world. Fuck them, I'd think. They're all such fucking cunts anyway.

I knew I was a lot more negative in my own head. I was cynical by design, but I would have rather been a cynic than an unrealistic optimist, living in ignorant bliss. I resented them anyway. To me, hate was a much easier emotion to feel than love. Pushing people away was easier than letting them in.

Whenever I would get lonely lately, I would start to look inward, and I'd start thinking about the past again, about Tom, and then straight to Luke. I'd sit in my empty flat, the TV on in the background just so the silence wouldn't get to me, and I'd wish Luke was there with me, more than anyone else. I'd look to the empty space near me on the sofa, and I'd imagine him sitting there, I'd imagine feeling all of his skin at the tips of my fingers, and the warmth of his body close to mine, the feel of his hair running through my fingers, all of him. I couldn't stop myself from wanting him, the same way I wanted Tom.