Center stage. The lights were low, except for the color-changing stage lighting, and the fog machine behind me was making a low cloud on the stage floor that flowed over into the audience. The cable connecting my hard-earned vintage Fender Mustang to the sound system disappeared into the mist.
I was playing a cover of Sweet Child O' Mine since most people knew it, and I had a recording of the rest of the parts playing through the wall speakers. The stage lights were in front of me so I couldn't see Mom and Dad in the dark auditorium seats, but I knew they were out there. Probably in the front row. They'd never miss me performing in my last high school talent show. It was my senior year, and I had a reputation to uphold. I was respected and admired, not really popular, but everyone at school knew who I was, and what I could make a guitar do. That was enough for me.
I was three minutes in, the solo was coming up. Sweat was dripping off my nose. I took a breath. My fingers were flying over the strings, years of calluses the only thing keeping them from tearing apart. My heart was pounding. Everyone was watching. I couldn't let them down.
Okay, here we go.
You got this.
Don't fuck it up.
Yes yes yes, good.
The audience of my peers, their parents, and the school staff all jumped to their feet and started cheering, screaming, pumped up. I couldn't help grinning. I played it perfectly, and the music was flowing through my body, my soul. I put everything I had into learning guitar; blood, sweat, and tears from practicing every chance I got. I earned this.
But as I played, I felt a tiny twinge of pain in my fingertips, but I didn't stop. I looked at my left hand. My fingertips were turning gray, and it was slowly moving up my whole hand. It was turning to stone. I was horrified, but I had to get through the whole song. I had people who believed in me; believed I could do something incredible with my talent, and with my life. It was getting harder to play, But I was two minutes from the end, I had to endure it no matter what. The grayness consumed my whole arm, up to my shoulder, and my fingers were cracking from the effort of smashing into the strings. It hurt so bad I wanted to cry out, but I just gritted my teeth. Almost there.
My brittle fingers were crumbling, and a huge crack ran up my arm. The pain was incredible.
Sixty seconds left. The crowd went silent.
Thirty. The background music stopped.
Ten. The stage lights clicked off and the auditorium plunged into darkness.
A scream ripped out of my throat.
My entire arm broke apart and the pieces fell into a dusty pile of rubble at my feet.
I didn't make it. I let everyone down.
It hurts so bad. It fucking hurts! Someone help me!-
Someone called from the back of the audience. "Cosmo, wake up!"
~
"Wake up!" I opened my eyes, startled. Hex was standing over me, his right hand raised.
I put my hand on my stinging cheek.
"You slapped me." I said, confused.
Hex and Anderly were both looking at me with scared expressions and tense postures. Anderly was gripping her jacket to her chest and wringing it like a wet towel. Hex let his hand drop and fell to his knees next to the couch, collapsing his upper body on top of my chest with a huge sigh. His face was buried into my shirt and his arms were slung over me, his shoulders were rising and falling as he took several shaking deep breaths.
"You fucker." He said, quietly and with no malice in his voice at all. "You can't do that to me. You can't."
I pulled myself up a bit so I was half-sitting. Hex sat back on his bent legs, still slouched over. One hand was flat against his light pink t-shirt, right over his heart. His other hand was slack on his knee. He looked like a statue with a blank face.
"What's going on?" I asked, looking between them, distressed. "What happened?"
Anderly hung her jacket up on the hook and came over to sit on the couch next to me.
"What were you dreaming about?" She asked, her hazel eyes caught the sunlight from the window and looked a little more green.
"...Why?" I asked, frowning. Why did that matter? Hex just slapped me in the face and they both looked like they'd seen a ghost.
"Because you were having a night terror. You were screaming and thrashing and grabbing your arm like you wanted to tear it off." She looked exhausted. "...You wouldn't wake up."
Hex wouldn't look at me at all, he looked catatonic. I looked at my left arm. There was a small round bruise forming on the inside of my upper arm, and four others in a row on the other side.
Suddenly the memory of my nightmare rushed back, and everything fell into place. Shit.
"Ah. Uh, I don't... I-I'm so sorry." I looked from Anderly to Hex, horrified.
Anderly sat back on the couch, shrugging and closing her eyes for a moment. "You're awake now. It's okay." She seemed to say it so Hex could hear it as much as me.
She smiled, just for a second. Hex just stood up with his gaze locked in front of him, brushed his flowy black maxi skirt back into place with his hands, then turned and walked straight towards the front door. I stood up in a panic. Shit shit shit-
"Hex, come back! I'm sorry, please wait-" I pleaded, taking a step towards him.
He just toed his bare feet into his black flats and left, the door shutting behind his retreating back. I started to follow, but Anderly grabbed the back hem of my shirt, holding me back.
"Let him go, Cosmo."
"Ah fuck." I said, staring at the closed door. "I can't even keep my shit together in my goddamn sleep?" It was a statement and a question at the same time.
Why do you always hurt him?
Anderly just went into the kitchen and took two white paper cups out of a cardboard carrier. I saw steam escaping the lids.
"Tea?" She asked, her voice was steady, but she sounded like she'd been holding her breath and had just let it out.
"I guess." My mouth was pretty dry.
Hers would be jasmine with two sugar cubes, and mine would be Earl Grey with one.
She always asked anyway. "One cube of sugar, right?"
"Yeah, thanks." I smiled for about a millisecond.
She leaned back against the counter, offering a cup to me. I sighed and took it from her, sitting up on a barstool at the island. There was a white box from a bakery on the counter next to her. That's when I realized I was still just wearing only my t-shirt and black boxers, and Anderly and Hex were fully dressed. They must have gotten up before me and let me sleep in. I wondered how Hex had snuck out from under me, because we had been-
Oh, yeah. Last night happened too.
"Shitballs." I pushed my steaming mug of tea on the counter away to make room for my stupid flushed face.
"Uuuugh..." I groaned massively. I didn't know anyone as fucking dumb as me.
"You alright there?" Asked Anderly.
"Nope." I mumbled.
Oh my god, I did not want to tell her that Hex and I got too high and almost boned like ten feet away from her last night.
"He'll be okay, you know." She said, unaware. "It just scared him when you didn't wake up right away. I told him you shouldn't try to wake up a person having a night terror, but he... He kind of dissociated."
I knew what that was. I've done it before too. I shuddered.
"I figured. He's never hit me before." I sat up and put my hand on my face. My cheek didn't hurt anymore, but I kind of wished it did. "God, I feel so bad."
She blew across the surface of her tea. "You didn't do it on purpose, so don't beat yourself up too much. I mean, I know you're going to anyway, but try not to let it ruin your whole day."
She took a sip, pausing, then spoke softly. "...He's been going to group therapy for PTSD, you know. For almost a month."
I tensed up and my eyes widened as I stared at her. "What? Why didn't he tell me? Why didn't you?"
I felt even shittier now, if that was possible. We had that huge conversation last night about my problems, meanwhile he's still been suffering this whole time? And they had both been hiding it from me? My heart squeezed painfully.
"He didn't want me to tell you." She sighed. "He knew you would blame yourself for it. He doesn't want you to hate yourself."
"Too fucking late." I felt nauseous. I took a sip of tea and burnt my tongue. I took the lid off so it could cool down.
"I agreed with him, Cosmo. He knows you so well, we both do. Please don't get stuck in your own head about this, think about how that would make Hex feel."
"I'm apparently pretty crap at thinking about the feelings of other people." I stared into my cup, watching the dark liquid swirl around and around.
"I think I just... get absorbed, fighting my own feelings, my mind, all the time. It's not an excuse, it's just-"
"I get it." She interrupted. "But you're working on it. You're trying to get better, to heal, just like him. You guys both made up already, too. You worked through your feelings together. He's not upset all the time, you know? He just gets these flashbacks when something reminds him of... back then. It takes him a minute to get through it."
My heart hurt so much it felt like it was being run over by a truck.
"How often does this happen?" I asked quietly, afraid of the answer.
"...He told me it's happened three times in the last month."
"Fuuuck." I groaned, miserable.
I dropped my forehead onto the counter with a dull thud. Anything more than zero is too many times.
Anderly took a deep breath and let it out. I wanted to have a talk about her feelings soon, too. But I had to talk to Hex first.
She opened the box and pulled out a chocolate glazed donut for herself.
"You should eat something." She slid a plate across the island to me.
"Here." She said, "A cinnamon roll for my precious little cinnamon roll."
"Thanks, but..." I stood up. "I gotta take my drugs before I eat."
I was not hungry in the least. My stomach and heart felt all twisted up. I grabbed my pill box out of my duffel bag and took today's meds with a long swig of tea before chucking the box back in the open bag. I got some clothes out too, socks, my belt, a white 'Ramones" t-shirt with their name and logo in black that actually almost fit, and the same pair of jeans from yesterday. I pulled my old shirt off and got dressed right there in the living room.
I stuck my phone in my back pocket and went back into the kitchen. Anderly had wrapped my cinnamon roll in parchment and was putting it in a brown paper bag.
"Here." She smiled, handing it out to me. "I put his favorite in there too."
I looked at her for a second like she was psychic. She probably was.
I took the bag from her and kissed her loudly on the cheek at the same time, spinning on my heel and running towards the door. I tugged my combat boots on and didn't bother tying them, just stuffed the laces back in. I threw my denim jacket on and grabbed Hex's coat before yanking the front door open. I turned to look at Anderly on my way out, not slowing.
"I love you!" I called, taking off at a run that I knew would hurt like a bitch later.
"Love you too! Go get our better third back!"
The door swung shut, but I was already gone before I could hear it.
~
[Here's the song Cosmo played in the talent show! Just skip to about 3:50 and listen to the end to hear just the part from his dream :) Remember to turn your volume down so you don't blast your face off on accident like me.]
https://youtu.be/hcv06If8jXE
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