This is part one of my third chapter. I realized it's like freakishly long so I've put it in two parts. I really hope you enjoy it 
Tell me what you think Chapter 3 - Sunflowers
Sun. Breeze. Peace.
I didn’t know where I was. It didn’t really matter. It was nice here. At first there was nothing but blinding light, but with many other things, that slowly started to shift into focus. Small details became clearer in grainy pieces. Fragments of a memory, maybe?
I was on a road, walking. There was no destination in my head, but my legs kept on moving. My back didn’t ache, my feet didn’t ache, and my heart didn’t ache. It was the sweetest breath of fresh air. There were no emotions baring me from breathing or being happy. My chest no longer felt heavy and wrapped in thick chains. All that existed was the sturdy ground under my feet, the royal blue sky up above and the vast spans of perfect nothingness ahead.
I didn’t realize at first that I wasn’t alone. Jay was here. I guess this meant I was dead. Or maybe I’d finally lost it.
I tried to ask him if he was okay or happy where he was, but no sound would come out. He smiled. I think he understood.
Memories came ambling back of us in a living world, but it didn’t hurt now. I’d have given anything for my whole life to be as effortless as it was in this strange corner of nowhere. If I were lucky (dead), maybe this place would become my new home.
Several hours rolled by easily as we held hands and walked. I looked at sunflowers growing alongside the road; thousands of them, each more beautiful than the last. I tried to speak a couple of times, but no words emerged. Jay always seemed to decipher what I was trying to say though, and answered with an according nod or gesture.
The sun was high in the sky now. I realized the heat along with everything else felt good. I could have stayed here forever, just walking. Left, right, left, right.
He inhaled deeply and finally really looked at me. “It’s beautiful out here, isn’t it?” He said, the words forceful against the silence. His voice was so much like the way I remembered it, I could’ve sworn it wasn’t a memory, or a dream, or whatever this place was. I’d never been here. Sunflowers don’t grow for miles and miles, and especially not where I’m from.
“I’ve missed you.” He spoke again.
I stopped walking for the first time in hours, realizing that I could, and smiled.
The sunflowers swayed in the wind, bustling about and intertwining peacefully. Their brilliant yellow petals complimented the cloudless blue sky perfectly.
Jay took both my hands in his now and kissed them. His lips were baby soft and his kiss a little shy, just the way I remembered. His eyes flashed up to mine and they gleamed the deepest shade of gray.
“I love you.” He whispered.
I woke up. Groaned. Remembered.
I held the covers to me tight and turned my head to check the time.
3.47 A.M. Great.
My hair was still slightly wet from being out in the rain the afternoon before. I was hoping I would get a cold from going to bed with damp clothes.
I used to love sleeping. It was one of the few times it was easy to forget I was a killer. When I first began to have dreams about the past, or things of the past, I dreaded even the sight of my bed.
This dream was different though. It was so surreal, and pleasant even. The rule: These dreams were always excruciating. There were no exceptions, and then this. Jay and I were never in love. We loved each other, sure, but never in that fiery way that makes you want to actually say the words.
This dream made me wonder what it might sound like, those words rolling off his tongue. Maybe it would sound just like it had in my dream. It made me want to have that passionate kind of love normal people dream about; that crazy kind of love that no matter how much we fought, we couldn’t possibly stay away from each other.
God, you’re realistic, I spat at myself internally. Only an idiot would love such a monster.
I cried. It was the first time in a while. I really cried; shaking violently, choking back the tears and everything. My heart pounded on my chest cavity with iron fists. How could a dream so flawless have such horrific consequences? I wanted my boyfriend back. It had been more than a year, but I was still flinching at his name and suffocating at his memory.
I sobbed until five, at which time I decided to properly get up and have a shower. I stripped down my damp clothes and avoided the mirror, hoping, praying that the water would wash away my puffy, bloodshot eyes.
It was no shock to me that it didn’t work. I looked a hideous mess when I finally faced my reflection. My eyes were two red monsters in my face, thick veins tainting the white. It was difficult to look at without cringing away. I used to be so pedantic about being presentable. How priorities change…
My hair dried into its usual brunette waves. I hoped my macabre-looking face would stop anyone from confronting me that day, as I realized maybe I couldn’t actually avoid school forever. Maybe they’d see the monster eyes and that would distract them from how much weight I’d lost or how I generally just couldn’t give a shit about anything anymore.
Mom was exceedingly surprised when I came downstairs before noon that morning. Before breakfast even. She immediately asked me what was wrong and grabbed for the phone. It saddened me that anything outside of my usual nocturnal behavior meant something was seriously wrong. I wanted to be over this. I was sick of feeling sad and guilty, but the truth was that I wasn’t over this; I feared I may never be over it. I wished I had the strength in me to face what I’d let happen, but I knew I wasn’t ready for that.
“What do you mean, you’re going to school?” Mom spluttered, a piece of apple in her gaping mouth.
I looked out the window at the still rising sun. “Dressed, having breakfast, going to school.”
She put the apple down and pressed her palm to my forehead. “I think this is a sign of post-traumatic stress. You know, rash decisions, not acting like yourself.”
“Mom, I haven’t been at war in Iraq. I don’t have Post-traumatic Stress Disorder. You told me I had to go to school today anyway. What’s the problem?”
“I was just trying to get a reaction, any reaction out of you!” She yelled.
She gave me weird sideways glances until the second I left the house. She kept writing things on my ‘Progress Chart’. It looked like a star chart for eight-year-olds. You can guess whose idea it was to give my mom one of those. I hated psychologists.
Any ‘abnormal’ behavior had to be documented. Sadly, my emotional wellbeing had deteriorated to such an extent that any sudden signs of recovery were considered abnormal, and if they happened too soon, distressing. That was the word she used. Infuriating is what it was. It’s not easy living in a world where if you’re depressed it’s bad, but if you’re acting okay all of a sudden, it’s worse.
A million faces turned and gawked at me I skulked down the hallway. Their gossip reflex kicked in immediately, and it didn’t take much to guess what they were saying. So I fixed my eyes on the ground and channeled all my energy into walking.
Step on a crack, break your mother’s back, I joked pathetically with myself.
I was surprised though when many of the girls – even guys – smiled at me. But I soon realized it wasn’t a good kind of smile. It was the type of smile you give a person whose father and boyfriend and best friend have died. Quite fitting, I suppose. But I wanted to be treated like nothing had happened at all, not like some pitied freak.
Maybe having so many pieces of my life die had screwed me up, I’d give them that much, but it didn’t make me a someone else; didn’t make me inhuman. How hard would it be for my classmates to treat me the way they had before? Would that come with time? Would they smile genuinely and “Hey Rory” me in the halls ever again? Or would death be permanently etched on my face? It would stick to my heart like superglue, that much was certain, but could they at least see past it in the end? So many questions I couldn’t answer…
I set my books down at the back of the class before the first bell for History and waited. Kids slowly filed in talking and laughing. When they saw me they all stopped and gulped.
Mr. McKenna with his stony, sarcastic demeanor and atrocious comb over even did a double take when he saw me.
He cleared his throat awkwardly. “Ms Lovett, so glad to see you’ve returned to us.” He smiled momentarily and I sank deeper into my seat.
“We will be starting a new section today.’ He said, gathering the attention of the class. Everyone groaned. “Yes, yes, you all hate me, school is a waste of time, we’re ruining your lives, et cetera. Just turn to page one hundred and six.”
I got my scruffy-looking history textbook out of my backpack and paged distractedly to where we were reading.
“So, let’s take a journey into eighteenth century France!” Mr. McKenna yelled with dripping fake enthusiasm. The class groaned in unison again and he laughed. “Oh, the joys of teaching.”
He had just finished explaining the general happenings of the French revolution when no one other than Theo Murray burst through the door, tripping over his own feet. He looked an utter mess.
“Ah, Mr. Murray, how considerate of you to embrace us with your presence.” The teacher looked down at his watch. “And only twelve minutes late. Oh, happy days!”
Theo grimaced at him and dropped his books on the way to sit nowhere other than next to me. Mr. McKenna continued to babble on about French things as Theo tried to clean himself up. It didn’t take me three seconds to figure out what he’d been doing before he slammed through that door. His chocolate brown hair was bustled chaotically and the fly of his tight jeans was down. The buttons of his plaid shirt were done up wrong and the laces of his Converses were dragging along the floor behind him.
Nothing had changed.
After he’d re-buttoned his shirt, he glanced vaguely in my direction, the front, and then his head shot back. His mouth dropped to form a comical ‘O’ shape. I saw this out my peripheral vision, of course, as I pretended to listen to the teacher. I stared intently at the three strands of grey hair plastered to the wrong side of his head, praying for the seconds to tick by faster.
“Hey!” Theo shrieked excitedly, “You’re back!”
Everything went still and silent. The entire class twisted slowly, in a clichéd movie moment to stare at the two of us. I sank as low as was possible in my chair.
“Theodore, you were late for class as it is, do not push me any further.” Mr. McKenna’s bushy eyebrows wiggled as he spoke. “Would it be possible for you to not interrupt my lesson for three minutes?”
Theo stifled a laugh and saluted the teacher like a complete child. “Sir, yes, sir!”
Things really hadn’t changed.
Mr. McKenna continued with the lesson, now highly annoyed and snappy. He turned the pages with violent vigor as he spoke.
I took notes to avoid eye contact with anyone, not because I was particularly absorbed in anything Mr. McKenna was saying. Theo pretty much stared at me for a whole five minutes straight and it freaked me out.
Suddenly I heard a ruffling of paper at my side and I turned to see Theo smiling brightly at me with a note in his hand. It took me a second to remember what to do with it. I grabbed it from his hand and unfolded the scruffy paper grumpily.
Rough night?
I stared at the two words, flabbergasted. It was the rudest thing I’d ever expected to see when I looked down. I stared at him for a second too. My jaw dropped when I realized he wasn’t joking. I scribbled back my response and threw the paper at him.
Very. I’ve decided to go lesbo with your sister. She’s great, by the way. She says hi.
His face dropped dramatically as he read. It was obviously not how he’d wanted me to respond. Served him right.
He didn’t look at me for a while as his ego recovered. Seems he had about a five minute rebound rate. I had no idea how anyone could tolerate this moody, pathetic childishness.
For the third time, nothing had changed; Theo was still having sex with Amy in a closet somewhere before classes, and teachers were still teaching the same trite crap. The grass was still green, the sky was still blue. Everything and everyone was the same as before.
Except me.
“What’s your problem?” Theo’s voice came out of nowhere as I fumbled through my backpack for the keys to my car.
“My problem?” I gasped as I turned awkwardly to reach into the front pocket of my bag, trying to walk, talk and search all at once.
“Yeah! What you said, in that letter? It was uncalled for.”
I finally found the keys and clutched them in my hand. “And what you said wasn’t? Seriously, what do you even care?”
“It matters to me, okay? I feel bad about how things have been going for you. No offense, but you look like shit.”
“Gee, thanks.” I scowled and unlocked the car. “You don’t know a thing about me. But you’re smart and there are some things you do know. You know why I look this way and you sure as hell know I don’t want your pity.” I wrenched the door open, ready to get in. “So could you please tell me what you’re still doing here.”
He closed his eyes and his face twitched. I’d given up, gotten in the car and was about to close the door on him when he finally spoke.
“I wasn’t trying to insult you. You know I think you’re beautiful,” he said calmly. I most certainly didn’t know that. “All I meant was that you don’t look like you on the inside anymore, and it shows on the outside. Not on your beauty, but in the way you carry yourself, in your emotions, in your smile.” He trailed off. “Before your dad and Jay and Blakely you used to smile, really smile, like you meant it.
“I know your eyes are red because you’ve been crying, I’m not an idiot. I know you’re so thin and pale because you’ve given up on everything. I know you feel broken and alone. I know all that. All I’m saying is that you’re not alone, or you don’t have to be, or-” He sighed, frustrated and something in his face changed. “I’m sorry, this was stupid. Just forget it.”
My hands were white from gripping the steering wheel so hard. I moved my fingers and the blood rush made them tingle with cold.
I could not believe it. Something meaningful had just come out of Theo Murray’s mouth. He’d meant all he said. Did this happen often? Was this how he really was while I was avoiding him? If he was, I never thought I could be so wrong about a person.
I closed the door weakly. I’d forgotten why I was even going home. He said something that I couldn’t hear through the glass and I opened the window.
“You’re really leaving?” He asked, looking positively shot down. I glanced at the keys in the ignition. “And you have nothing to say to me?”
I turned the key and avoided eye contact. I wasn’t sure I even wanted to leave.
“Wow.” He breathed bleakly.
But I did.
