I see her sprint towards the bathroom but there’s a small queue. She skips it, earning her a few grunts, and runs into it before the next person can even open the door. I get to the front of the queue, and I stand next to the door.
“Hey, what are you doing?” the guy at the front of the queue garbles. He’s clearly drunk and too far gone but I apologise anyway.
“Sorry. My girlfriend is in there and I need to check on her. Can you wait a few minutes?” I say, trying to open the door handle. He groans and walks away. The rest of the queue slowly follows after they realise that this might take a while.
“Wren!” I shout through the door. “Can you please open the door? I need to see if you’re okay.”
I don’t get a response for a few beats. I lean my head closer to the door, trying to hear better but all I can hear is my heart hammering against my chest.
“Miles,” I hear a small sniffle from the other side of the door. “You’re just going to laugh at me.”
“Wren, are you okay? Why would I laugh at you? Can you open the door? Please,” I plead, trying at the knob again.A few seconds go by as I wait by the door, thinking of a way to get closer to her. Would it be insane if I tried to break down the door?
Finally, I hear a click and I push the door open, slowly.
The bathroom is all marble and the bright lighting is startling compared to the dark neon lights on the other side of the door. The music is almost completely muted this far into the house so I can hear the trickle of the tap and the sharp breaths Wren takes in. She’s stood, her back to me, her arms tight around her middle, looking out the window as if she’s completely immobile.
I walk towards her cautiously.
“Wren. Are you okay?” I ask quietly. I put my hand on her shoulders and they drop with a shaky breath. “What happened?”
She turns around, her eyes filled with tears that haven’t fallen yet. She blinks up at me, tears slowly falling down her face. Instinctively, I swipe my thumb across her cheek, a futile attempts to help ease her pain, resting my hand on her face for a second before dropping it.
“I think… I think I'm having a panic attack,” she says over ragged breaths. Her head drops to her shoes as I place both my hands on her shoulders, steadying her. “This is, like, my third or fourth one this week. My second one today.”
Her hands shake when she brings them to her face, rubbing at her cheeks. How can she still look so beautiful even when she's crying? I try to bring my hands to her face, but she backs away again, moving her hands frantically. She walks away from me until she’s sat on the toilet seat, shoving her face into her hands. I sit down on the edge of the bathtub, looking at her with sincerity.
“Wren. Talk to me,” I plead, trying to peel her hands away from her face but she doesn’t budge. "I've got you. Can you take a deep breath?" I watch as her shoulders rise up, her voice shaky when she exhales. "That's it." I breathe in again with her and back out. I lower my voice and whisper, "What do you need from me? How can I help?"
She takes a few more breaths in, still covering her face before saying, "I don't know yet. It usually depends on who I'm with that makes it better or worse."
"What do you think? Do I make this better or worse."
"Better." She takes another deep breath. "The breathing is helping."
"Good. Keep doing that, Wren." I continue to breathe with her, doing what she needs to relax.
“What is wrong with me?” she says with a sigh, her voice muffled by her hands. I don’t know if she wants me to answer that or not, so I wait to see if she’ll continue. “I can’t see my ex without panicking. How am I supposed to compete in the championships? How am I supposed to doanythingnormal?”
She lets me take her hands away from her face and I hold them in my hands. She doesn’t look at me, just staring at the way our hands mould together. Her hands are a lot softer and smaller than mine, so I turn them in my hands.
“There is nothing wrong with you. Everybody panics and has anxiety, but people just deal with it in different ways,” I begin. She looks up at me now and a part of my wishes she didn’t. I’ve never seen her like this before and it breaks my heart. “I used drink until the tightness in my cheat went away. Which I’ve learnt isn’t very healthy.”
“You have anxiety?” she hiccups. I nod.
She turns over my hand in hers, tracing her fingers across the lines in my palm. It’s a new sensation I’ve never felt before. She runs her slender fingers through each line, focusing on the way my hand opens more to let her do whatever she needs to do to relax. Her delicate fingers against my rough ones send a pang of belonging through me.
“Since Carter, I’ve had this heavy feeling in my chest. I only recently braved it to Google it and I found out it is really common,” I admit for the first time aloud.
“I never would have guessed with how extroverted you are,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper. I just nod, not knowing what else to say. “How am I supposed to deal with it?”
“Do you know what triggered it? Was it seeing Augustus? Being here? Being with me?” I ask, almost afraid to hear the answer. I just want her to be okay. I want all of her pain to go away.
“I don’t know. Maybe it was everything. Seeing him, the party, the people,” she trails off, her eyes darting around the room. “Us." She waits a beat before swallowing. "Everything is just overwhelming. I thought that this part of the plan would be easy.”
“I can take you home. Is that what you want? Will that make you more comfortable?"
“No. If I go home, they won’t let me live this down. They’ll think I’m not trying hard enough to make this work,” she says.
