Lust // John B // Outer banks

Chapter 25

John B's POV

I unentangle our hands after about 20 minutes of her falling asleep, so I can get up and get ready for bed. She fell asleep with the lights on and all, and I wanted to offer her another shirt to sleep in, but she fell asleep too quickly, and now I don't want to wake her up to offer.

I go to my bathroom to wash my face and brush my teeth, and look in my trash can because I see red out of the corner of my eye. Another nose bleed maybe? I look closer, and see several big bandaids soaked in red, and I'm talking the HUGE ones. The patch ones, and some gauze. Where the hell did that come from, what the hell?

I shake it off and try to come up with a logical explanation. Maybe it was JJ, or Kie or Pope. They were here earlier today, and JJ gets hurt all the time. I'm just overthinking. Laila's fine, no issues. I take off my shirt and toss it into my clothes bin, along with my shorts, leaving me just in my underwear.

I walk back into my room and get a good look at her before I turn the light off, and I begin to freak out when I look at her. She'd tossed and turned while I was gone, and her shirt has ridden up a little bit, exposing TONS of cuts on her stomach leading to her chest that could only be from one thing, and that's self harm.

I'm 100% positive that's what it is, even though I've never done it before. I've thought about it, but I've never been able to bring myself to do it. I'm a pussy. The cuts towards the bottom are rather deep, looking exposed but not bleeding. Maybe I wasn't just seeing things earlier, and that WAS blood on her robe.

This can't be happening, there's no way. No. No, no. This is bad. I get onto the bed and kneel next to her, shaking her almost aggressively. "Laila what the fuck???" I ask hurriedly, while her eyes flutter open and she rubs her hands over her eyes sleepily. "Hmmmm?" She groans, obliviously.

"Get up, c'mon" I say, dragging her to the edge of the bed and carrying her to my bathroom. The sight and thought of her doing something like this to herself makes me want to puke, cry, and comfort her all at once. I had no idea she'd do this, and now I feel even more terrible than I did in the first place for mistreating her. There's no doubt that she didn't do this because of me.

She begins to cry almost emotionlessly when she realizes what's going on as she completely wakes up, and I sit her on my closed toilet seat. She doesn't say anything, and I try my hardest not to yell at her while attempting to lecture her. "Can you take off your shirt?" I ask her, anxiously tapping my foot against the ground.

Laila's POV

Tears roll down my cheeks as I sit in this bathroom, wanting nothing more than to just go home right now. He saw what I did to myself while I wasn't thinking earlier, and now he probably thinks i'm psychotic or something. Great.

"Can you take off your shirt?" He asks me, looking concerned and ready to help. Fear crosses my face, making me think of when my dad used to touch me as a child, making me cry even more. He seems to catch the drift, and pulls me to his chest, holding me tightly.

"You don't have to talk about it, but has somebody done something bad... Like y'know?.. Touched you.?" he asks me awkwardly, trying to get a better understanding. I nod my head against his chest as I let out a bigger sob, and he curses under his breath and holds me tighter. We stay in that position for a few minutes, and then he leads me to the couch and instructs me to stay there.

He comes back with multiple medical supplies, and then looks at me with a sad emotion plastered across his face. "You don't have to, but it'd be a lot easier for you to take off your shirt. I'm not going to hurt you, I promise." He tells me, opening a first aid kit. I nod and inhale deeply, lifting my shirt over my head.

Thank god I chose to wear a sports bra, because if not I would've gotten even more uncomfortable and probably freaked out even more. I squirm in pain as he dabs a cotton ball of antibacterial stuff into the cuts, and he ends up taking his other hand and gripping one of my sides to steady me, which relaxes me slightly.

He cleans and properly bandages my stomach and cleans my wrists up, given that they weren't bad at all and didn't even need bandages, and then looks at me like he already knows the answer to the question he's about to ask. "Did you do it anywhere else?.." he asks, looking disappointed the second that I timidly nod.

Five minutes later I had slid off my leggings for him to take care of my thighs, laying in nothing but a bra and underwear before him, wanting to get it over with. The situation was so awkward, but oddly enough I trust him enough in this situation. When he's done he lies down next to me and pulls me into his arms without even asking, wrapping me in a comforting embrace.

As soon as I've calmed down, I take it into realization that we're yet again skin to skin, but this time more than we've ever been. I was too busy freaking out to notice earlier that he was only in underwear, and now I try my hardest not to squeal when I realize that we're both nearly naked.

His grip around me tightens, and he whispers to me.

"God, I fucking love you."

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