California Dreamin'

“Dean—”

“He told me, Fallon, how I hurt that girl when I left her two years ago. Because I didn’t know how to handle my fucking feelings for her.”

My hands still on his face. They go stiff and so does my body.

I remember that time when he left me. I don’t like to think about it but it’s there, stored in my memories.

It hurt.

It hurt so much when he left. When he just… vanished. He wouldn’t even call or text. There would be weeks when I heard nothing from him.

It was hard. Harder than my illness, him being gone. With my illness, I knew that I had to fight through it. Even though it didn’t feel like it, I knew that if I kept fighting through it, I might come out of it.

But with him being gone and my realization that I loved him, that I’d always loved him, I didn’t know if I could recover from that.

I didn’t know if I could live, let alone be happy or be able to laugh, because he was gone and he didn’t love me back.

I feel his fingers on my cheeks, bringing me back to the moment. He has moved his hands away from the door and he’s gripping my cheeks now, with passion and violence and intensity.

“Tell me, Tiny,” he whispers roughly. “Tell me how much I’ve hurt you.”

Tears spill down my cheeks and plop down on his fingers, the colorless water merging with his skin, wetting it.

I shake my head. “It’s over. It’s in the past.”

He clutches my face tightly. “I need to hear it. I need to hear how much I’ve hurt that girl. The girl I’ve loved for as long as I can remember. I need to hear how much of a coward I am. A fucking asshole to leave her like that. To make her cry for me when I promised that I wouldn’t. That I’d always keep her safe and protected.”

“Dean, please.”

“Tell me. Tell me how I broke my promise to you, Fallon. I need to know.”

I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone this torn and broken up, let alone him.

Heaviness drapes every part of his face, every part of his body.

He’s so heavy with guilt.

I’m not sure what rehashing the past will accomplish but I can’t refuse him. But if I have to tell him then I’ll say everything, all the things that are in my heart.

“It hurt,” I whisper, and he winces. “It hurt so much when you left, Dean. I thought I was going to die. I wanted to die. Everything felt so lifeless and colorless. I couldn’t get out of bed for days. I didn’t wanna eat anything. I didn’t wanna… do anything. I’d just sit by the phone, waiting for your call. And then, I’d call you but you wouldn’t pick up. There were days when I just… didn’t know what was going on around me, you know? Because when you left I realized how much I loved you and just like that, I’d lost my best friend and the man I loved, the man I didn’t even know that I loved. I lost so much in one shot.

“Anyway, I missed so much school. My friends and my teachers, all of them thought I was going through something really serious. I worried my mom and dad a lot too. But I didn’t know how to get out of it, how to make it stop hurting. But then…”

My vision is blurry but I blink back tears so I can see him clearly. So I can tell him that the hurt I felt because of his absence made me even stronger.

So much stronger that now, I can lend some of my strength to him.

He’s always protected me. All throughout my life, Dean has been my champion. And now it’s my turn to be his.

“Then I realized something.”

His eyes are glassy. “What did you realize?”

“I realized a thing about love,” I whisper. “I realized nothing can cure the sickness caused by love.”

It’s true.

Nothing can cure the illness brought on by love. Not science, not God.

Only he could cure it.

This man in front of me. The love of my life.

And I had to fight for him.

“I realized that I had to fight for you,” I say out loud and I say it with a smile. “I realized that if I loved you, then I had to pull myself out of this despair and fight. And I had to do it myself. I had to do it without the help of my pills or therapy or my parents. I knew that I had to fight alone, Dean. All my life I’ve fought with my illness and as terrible as it is, I’ve been super lucky to have so many people standing by me. My mom and dad. You. I always just followed what you guys told me to do. I always walked on this narrow, straight path. You’re right. I’ve never broken a rule or forgotten to take my pills. During really dark days, I’ve logged my thoughts into a journal because Mom always told me it helped her. I’ve made lists like her to cure my anxiety. My dad gives me books and articles to read and I read them cover to cover. I’ve always known that I’m not alone, that I have an army of people to fight with me, to fight my mind.