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Why I even thought he was different is beyond me. Why I even care is a mystery. It’s not like we were going to become friends. He’s fourteen years older than me, and clearly wants nothing to do with me.
I really am just some pathetic kid in his eyes.
I suddenly feel so much smaller, smaller than I have in a long time. Canaan messed me up, sure, but this…this is different.
This is like being back home listening to my parents argue about what to do with me.
This is like being back in all those doctors’ and therapists’ offices listening to everyone tell me how I feel and why I do what I do, while I could do nothing but sit there.
Like then, my tongue won’t work. I can’t speak. I don’t know what to say. It changes nothing.
So I just…shut down.
Withdraw.
Retreat.
“…first world problems mean nothing here. You—”
“Nolan.”
It’s the quiet I tune into first. As if I was underwater, I breach the surface with a quiet gasp. It’s quiet, so quiet it’s loud, grating on the nerves.
Lifting my gaze, I take in the wide, darting looks coming from all around us.
Some look pitying.
Others look exhausted.
One glares, but not at me, at the man sitting across from me.
“That’s enough,” Kevin says softly from where he stands over Nolan, hand clasped around his wide shoulder. Something twinges in my chest at the sight, but I don’t know why. I just know I don’t like it. I feel…tight and itchy inside.
Kevin,I recite inwardly.Irish origins. Means handsome…
I forcibly drag my gaze up to Nolan’s green eyes. They’re nowhere near as vibrant as they were when I walked over here.
His lips part, but nothing comes out this time. Some emotion flashes across his face, but it’s there and gone far too fast for me to make sense of.
His gaze drifts down my chest and I follow it to where I furiously tap my fingers together in my lap. When I realize what I’m doing, I stop, clenching my fists until my nails dig into my skin.
I need…I need to go. I can’t be here.
I barely hear Kevin speak as he draws our session to a close.
My knee bobs, and as soon as Kevin says we’re dismissed, I bolt without a backward glance, barely cognizant of the people I push past in my haste to get out of this stifling room.
Like yesterday, as soon as I’m free, I make a beeline straight for my room in the dorm portion of the building.
But this time, instead of going for the window, I cut into my private bathroom.
Leaving it dark, I shut the door behind me.
Surrounded by nothing but blackness and the sound of my heart thudding fast in my ears, I fall into a heap, curl up into a ball as tight as I can, press my hands to my ears, and let the storm ravage me from the inside out.
It starts in my toes, then zips up my legs. Prickles my fingers, and tightens my muscles.
Everything’s too much. Too loud.
