The Fear Of Faith [2]

25. Bethan

The night I left my apartment was the worst night of my life. It didn't feel like a typical row; it felt different. I wasn't going out for a few hours or just spending the night with a friend until things cooled off; I was leaving, period. My whole world fell apart the second Cal told me to enjoy my new home. That feeling when the person you love most in the world looks at you with dead eyes and shrugs it off when you leave without another care, that feeling is indescribable. That hurt more than anything I'd ever felt in my life.

I was well aware that I deserved the way Cal had reacted. I should have known that lying to him about Brodie would come out and I could have kicked myself for not even thinking that Tori would mention that she'd saw me there. Even so, that was nothing compared to the secret I had been keeping about Archie. The fact he had found out from Archie himself made this a million times worse. I had fucked up big time by visiting that jerk and I should have told Cal the second I got home; I'd just never thought it would come up again and had pushed that visit out of my head the second I'd driven away from the prison.

I was mad at Cal for staying at Tori's; I knew that he was probably looking to do anything to piss me off but I didn't think he would go for something that he knew would upset me a lot. She had been the topic of one of our biggest arguments not so long ago and to go right ahead and stay the night at her place was shitty of him. What he did wasn't as bad as what I did; I could admit that, but he was no better than me by trying to gain some sort of payback.

The second I saw his uncaring expression when I walked to the door with my case, I knew I'd lost him. What I had done had really got to him and clearly it had made him have a change of heart about me. He didn't care that I left. He was probably going to head right into work on Monday and tell Tori and then she'd seize the opportunity to work her way in there.

'Bethan?' Penny's voice broke into my thoughts as I lay on the spare bed in her room, staring at the ceiling deep in thought. I had called her and asked her to let me stay, arriving there and falling into her arms in tears when she opened the door. I'd told her everything and she'd said I could stay as long as I want providing we keep it quiet with me not paying for the dorm.

I had cried to her all day then we attempted to watch a movie to distract me and I'd fallen asleep. When I woke up again, I automatically looked to my phone for a message from Cal but I knew before I looked that there wouldn't be one. I'd spent the rest of Sunday lying in bed crying and Penny had been doing her best to comfort me.

'Bethan, do you want me to go get some food?' she asked, softly, as she sat cross-legged on her bed on the other side of the room.

'I can't eat, Pen,' I sniffed, my voice deep and raspy from all of my crying.

'Okay,' she whispered. 'I'm guessing you'd just prefer to stay in bed the rest of the night, right?'

'Right,' I replied. 'I feel like shit.'

'I know you do,' she sighed. 'I wish there was something I could do to take your sadness away.'

'I just fucking hate myself,' I croaked. 'I fucked up and I can't blame him for wanting me to leave. It was one mistake too much for him.'

'He just needs time,' Penny said.

'I don't know,' I breathed. 'You didn't see his face when he came home from that bitch's place. He said he couldn't even look at me; his eyes were different. He looked different, like he had changed overnight.'

'He was probably just confused and hurt and pissed off,' Penny said. 'A combination of a bunch of emotions that he just needs to get his head around. You said sorry; there's not much more you can do until he reaches out.'