Dreams of 18

Tears fall down my cheeks. I shouldn’t cry, I know. It fucks with his head and I don’t wanna do that.

But look at him, he’s keeping his promise to me. He’s working on the roses.

While all I’ve done is lie to him ever since I got here.

All I’ve let him think is that I’m this normal college-going girl who’s vacationing. When nothing could be further from the truth.

I’m not normal. I’ve never been.

I’m a liar.

“I’m lying to him.”

I say this into the phone as soon as Willow picks up the call.

“What?”

I’m sitting on the couch and it’s morning. Graham has already gone to work and I’m holding what he left me on my pillow.

A rose.

Fresh and full and velvety. Peace, lemony yellow petals with pale pink edges.

So now I’m crying, sobbing almost because I’m a liar and he’s giving me roses for it.

“I’ve been lying to him ever since I came here and I don’t know what to do,” I say, wiping my nose with the back of my hand.

“Oh, Vi. What happened? Why are you crying?”

I sniffle, trying to control it; it’s ridiculous the amount of tears I’m shedding as I hold his gift to my chest. But it’s just so sad. It’s so sad that he keeps being so wonderful to me and I can’t even tell him the truth.

Everything about my life is so sad right now because I’m a liar.

“He thinks I go to college, Willow. He thinks I’m vacationing.” I bring my knees up to my chest and smell his shirt that I put on last night. “And I’m letting him think that. I’m letting him think that I’m this normal girl whose whole life is ahead of her. When I can hardly get out of my house. If a random stranger even looks at me, I go crazy. I start to hyperventilate. I’m so… weak. And defective and a loser, and he thinks I’m going to college and I’m going to meet someone and I –”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, okay. Stop,” Willow cuts me off and I go silent, sniffling again.

Then she sighs and says, “First of all, you’re not a loser. You’re not weak or defective. You have an illness. You’re struggling, Vi. You’ve been struggling ever since you got out of Heartstone. Like the rest of us, and that’s okay. But you’re struggling more because you keep insisting everything is fine. You keep denying it. You keep pretending.”

I keep pretending.

She’s right and I’m too emotional right now to admit it.

Yeah, I pretend.

I pretend that everything is okay. I pretend that I’m handling things my way.

I pretend that it’s okay for me to use crutches and slip in notes to strangers and hide when someone knocks at the door.

I’ve been pretending ever since I got out of Heartstone and doing that in front of everyone and even to myself was easy.

Pretending to him isn’t.

Not when he looks at me in that special, protective way of his. Not when he looks at me like he’ll kill and destroy everything and everyone who hurts me.

“He said I was beautiful,” I rest my forehead on my knees and whisper.

“Really? He did?”

I’ve been texting on and off with the girls. I told them about what Brian said and how Graham kissed me the other day. But I haven’t shared any intimate details with them.

I didn’t want to.

They were mine.

I guess, I’m a true loner. It’s hard for me to share things. But I can share this with Willow. Maybe because we have things in common. Things like eighteenth birthdays when our worlds kinda blew up. Plus she’s in love like me.

“Yeah. He said I deserve things. He said I deserve someone to hold my hand and walk with me on the beach. He said I’m made of moon and magic.”

Willow sighs; it sounds happy and dreamy. “Oh, Vi, that’s wonderful. Ah, I’m so happy. Why are you crying?”

I frown. “Because didn’t you just listen to what I said? I’m lying to him. He doesn’t know about… about my illness and everything else.”

He doesn’t know that I pretend.

He doesn’t know that I do it because it’s so easy to deny things. It’s so easy to deny because the alternative is dealing with my doomsday brain.

It’s so hard to do that. It’s so hard to fight anxiety. To distinguish between rational and irrational thoughts when every single insecurity of yours is heightened.

Not pretty. Not worthy. A slut.

I know I shouldn’t believe these things – especially after everything he’s said to me, and there are moments when I do believe him.

I do.

But sometimes it’s so hard. Like right now.

And I’m so weak.

He doesn’t know that.

He doesn’t know that I drown in insecurities and anxious thoughts every day. And the only way to survive is to pretend everything is fine.

“Then tell him.”

“What?”

“Yeah. If you’re lying to him and that’s giving you so much grief, just tell him the truth.”