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Maybe it’s his good looks that are getting him the endless attention, his golden blond locks flop over the side of his face in a very laid back, at ease with his sexuality sort of way. Beside him is one of the prettiest girls I have ever seen, and she almost looks too young to be in this place. Her hair is long, wavy and sapphire red. She’s wearing a tight silky black dress and her eyes are so startling that even though she’s a good twenty feet away from me I can still make out their emerald green colour.
My friends are chatting beside me, not bothering to include me in the conversation. I suppose they still aren’t expecting me to be my usual self just yet. Loneliness sets in and I try to blink back the tears and look away, back at the beautiful girl with the emerald eyes. A wave of shock flows through me when she turns in my direction, as if she’d sensed I was watching her. Her eyes lock with mine. The second seems to last an eternity. I quickly look away, but I notice her smile out of the corner of my eye, then she turns back to continue her conversation with the blond man.
“Are you okay Tegan?” Nicky asks, hearing my stunted breathing.
“Yeah, it’s just hard to get used to this many people.”
“I know honey, listen you let me know
if it all gets too much. You’ve done so well, I’m really proud of you.”
“Thanks, but I’m fine, I need to do this.”
“Yeah,” she replies, putting an arm around me and rubbing my shoulder. “You do.”
Thank God for Nicky, I wouldn’t be here right now if it weren’t for her support. As she strokes my hair away from my face and looks at me sympathetically with her huge brown doe eyes, I see a man standing at the bar across the way checking her out. A pity. Nicky is gorgeous, with short bleach blond hair and a curvy figure. Unfortunately she doesn’t do men. Tonight she’s wearing a faux fur leopard print coat and a black mini dress. Men have been eyeing her up since the second she walked into the club.
Susan suggests that we all get up to dance when the Eurhythmics’ “Sweet Dreams” comes on. I decline and get left minding the table. I sip on my drink and look around me, my friends attracting attention with their display on the dance floor. I’m more jittery now that I’ve been left alone, and every glance that comes my way makes me want to get up and run straight out of the club as fast as I can. It’s a weird feeling to have eyes on me after staying inside my apartment for so long.
I was the one who found him you know - Matthew. Wrists slit and in the bath, topless but wearing his favourite grey slacks. His note was all manic and crazy ramblings, his handwriting almost unreadable. I have a history of trying to fix that which is broken, and I still don’t think I’ve fully learned that people can’t be fixed, they have to fix themselves.
I tend to fall in love with men who have issues, the sort of mental health problems related to a bad childhood experience or what have you. The very first time I saw Matthew I was doomed, his entire presence screamed, I am sensitive, I have problems, but I’m also clever and have potential, if only some generous young woman could help me get past what I’m going through I could be great, I have such wasted potential. It’s like a calling. If I see a man like that I can’t help but to be drawn to him, to want to repair the damage that will always be there. It’s a hopeless mission and I’m hopeless to forever fall for it.
He had messy brown hair and the deepest black eyes that spoke a pain that could never be articulated in words. He asked me for a lighter and I asked him to play me a song on the acoustic guitar he was holding. He might have asked me for my mortal soul and I would have willingly handed it over. I can’t say no to a man like that, and now I’m paying the price. My heart feels like it’s been beaten to within an inch of its life and it aches continually. The hurting has not yet subsided and I don’t think it ever really will.
The dancing in front of me slows down when the DJ switches the Eurhythmics for Hole’s “Doll Parts”. As Courtney Love sings about aching it makes me feel a little less alone, because God knows I ache right now. All over. I wish he’d loved me enough to want to live for me. I wish he’d loved me so that our love was enough. Obviously it wasn’t.
We were together for eight months, I’d only known him three weeks before he’d moved into my apartment. Everything had moved so fast. And despite him being the one who needed help, I think I needed him more than he needed me. I need a cause that isn’t my own, because that way I can ignore the causes that are my own. I still can’t use the bath even though I’ve bleached it twenty times over. I rarely even shower. Nicky washing my hair today was the first time it’s seen water in almost two weeks. It’s pathetic really.
I down the rest of the drink Nicky gave me and make my way over to the bar for another. The bartender gives me a frustrated look as I try to get his attention and then grudgingly takes my order. I hand him a twenty and he gives me change. When I get back to the table I think that my friends have returned from the dance floor, but then I realise that it’s not them at the booth we’d been sitting in. There’s a group of guys chugging on pints of beer, and my friends’ coats and handbags have been shoved onto the floor.
I quickly run over, putting my drink down on the edge of the table and trying but failing to pick up all of our things.
“I’m sorry,” I say in a nervous voice, “but I was sitting here.”
One of them turns to me and casually remarks, “Not any more honey,” while the rest of them have a good laugh about it. I go to pick up the coats and handbags again and when I stand back up I find the girl with the red hair from the VIP section in front of me. She’s smiling at me as a cat would a mouse.
In a voice like silk, she asks, “Need some help?”
“Oh, no that’s all right,” I shrug.
But before I know it she’s turned to the men and is glaring at each and every one of them.
“I believe you are sitting in this young lady’s booth gentlemen,” she says, in a loud and confident voice.
I wince, expecting them to give her cheek just like they’d given me. But instead they come over all anxious, nodding like idiots and getting up from their seats. The red head stays until each of them has gone.
“Thanks,” I manage. “You’re very kind to do that for me.”
“No problem,” she replies, her eyes boring into mine. “You can pay me back some other time.” Then she strokes a hand down my hair and glides away into the crowded night club.
“Who was that?” asks Nicky, coming up from behind me.
“I have no idea.” I reply. “I’m going to use the bathroom. Will you mind my drink?”
“Sure, work away.”
I rush to the toilets and splash some water over my face. I tip the attendant and she gives me a lollipop which I unwrap and stick in my mouth. Instead of going back into the club I walk down a long hallway at the end of which I see a fire exit. I need some air, so I traipse my way towards it.
