Knight In Leather Armour

(37)

TONI POV:

"Cheryl, I hate it here." I tell her trying not to cry. "I'm sorry I shouldn't have made you. I'm sorry." I can hear the panic in her voice. "Cheryl it's for my own good." I look at my nurse and she tells me to hurry up. "I have to go, I love you." I sigh biting my lip holding back tears. "I love you." She hangs up. I put the phone down and start crying. The nurse walks over to me. "Come on." I stand up and go to my room. "Your therapist will be here in a minute." The nurse walks out. Is she even a nurse? I don't know, I just want to go home and be with Cheryl. I never wanted to do this to her. But I guess there is a breaking point and me almost dying because of the alcohol in my system what it for Cheryl. I only am doing this for her. The therapist walks in. "Hi Antoinette-." I stop her. "It's Toni!" I say pissed off. I quickly realize that I shouldn't have yelled. "Sorry." I say softly. "It's ok." She sits down next to me. "So I heard you have a girlfriend." I nod. "Yeah, that's kinda why I'm here." She writes something down. "What do you mean?" She looks up at me.

"I never wanted to do this to her, she has been through so much." I tell her after a hour of talking to her. "Your 18. And your drinking." I nod. "Yeah. I don't want to I went months without drinking and than my birthday came around and I had just left Riverdale and I broke." She writes that down. At first I was pissed off at everything and now I'm just crying.

After a few weeks of therapy and everything I'm finally able to leave. I pull up to Cheryl's house. I knock on the door, no answer. I wait a few minutes and knock again, still nothing. I remember that when we lived here she left a key under the mat so I get it. I walk in. "Cheryl?" I don't hear anything. I go upstairs. She is in the corner of her room. "Cheryl." She looks at me. "I couldn't do it." I walk over and see what she is holding. "Cheryl."

Once I get her cleaned up and dressed we go downstairs. "Toni, I never meant to do this to you." I take her hand. "It's ok, I needed it." I kiss her hand. "We are both two very damaged people-." My phone cuts me off. "It's my mom. This can't be good." I pick up the phone.

"Go inside, I'll park." I nod and go inside. "Mom." She looks like she's been crying. I see Miles for the first time in a year. My mom I haven't seen since I was 10 when she dropped me off at the hell that is called my uncle. "Is he ok?" I ask. She shakes her head. I sit down and start crying. I feel a gentle hand on my leg, I look up and see Cheryl, she rubs my back. We don't say anything I just cry while she comforts me. "And who are you?" My mom ask. Cheryl stands up and puts her hand out. "Cheryl her girlfriend." My mom doesn't shake her hand. "Antoinette I thought you were over girls when you were with Sweat Pea." My eyes widened. That is the last thing I wanted Cheryl to know about. "1) it's Toni. 2) that was the biggest mistake I've ever made. And maybe if you didn't listen to dad's dying wish maybe you would finally be ok with me!" I yell at her. "Toni, calm down." Cheryl stops me from punching my mom. After my dad died she became a homophobic pile of crap. My mom walks out. I noticed that Miles is been fairly quiet. He stands up and walks over to Cheryl and shakes her hand. "Hi, I'm Miles." Cheryl nods. "I know." Miles walks away awkwardly. Cheryl looks at me. "He's on the spectrum everything he does like shaking your hand every time me meets you is very trained." The nurse walk over to us. "Are you guys here for Thomas Topaz?" I nod. "Well I'm sorry to tell you that Mr Topaz died from a heart attack." If today couldn't get any worse. Cheryl places her hand on my shoulder for comfort. "Thank you for telling me." The nurse nods. "Do you want me to tell the rest of your family?" I nod. "Yeah. Please." The nurse walks away. "Baby." She pulls me into a hug.

"Wait so why did you date Sweat Pea? He has to me the dumbest person ever." Cheryl ask. I laugh. "It was so my mom would shut up, we didn't actually date, I just brought him over for dinner and said he was my boyfriend and I paid him 20 bucks to help me." Cheryl laughs. We've been up for the past few hours talking about anything an everything. "Cheryl can I ask you about something that you said today?" I ask because it's been bothering me since. She nods. "You called me baby." She looks down. "Toni it slipped." I move up to her. "Cheryl it's fine, it just took me back. I didn't hate it." I hold her chin. "I love you Cheryl." She smiles. "Why are you so happy right now?" I laugh. "Because It's 3 in the morning and I feel high." She cups my face. "I love you too." I kiss her. "Can I tell you something I've been thinking about?" I ask. She nods. "I don't want to go to college, I know you and I were talking about moving to LA and have you go to UCLA and I was going to go to the community college there. But I don't want to go to college, I just want to move out there after graduation and get a job and support you, and maybe start a family. I just want to get out of this town, leave are past in Riverdale." I confess. Cheryl sits there for a minute thinking. "Ok." I looked at her shocked. "What?" She nods. "Ok, I don't think there is any stopping you, or talking you out of any of this." She smiles. I sit next to her against the wall.