Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 90075 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 450(@200wpm)___ 360(@250wpm)___ 300(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90075 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 450(@200wpm)___ 360(@250wpm)___ 300(@300wpm)
Fuck it.
I didn’t need to look after myself, not when a broken heart would kill me.
I didn’t need to worry that dairy was bad and red meat was bad and fried foods were definitely bad. Working in pharmaceuticals had stolen every bit of pleasure out of my life, all because I studied collaborated data that said all of those things were bad, bad, bad.
But tonight, science was wrong.
Sometimes...bad could make us feel good, and I really, really needed to feel good.
I didn’t switch to a more intelligent channel or surf until I found a documentary. Instead, I shoved the dripping, delicious burger in my mouth and watched trash television.
Three weeks in this place wouldn’t be so bad.
Just twenty-one days and then Nicholas would be gone.
I would get another housemate, and then...I could finally be free of him.
“He’s such a jerk,” I mumbled at my drunken reflection as I cleaned my teeth with a toothbrush I’d bought from the supermarket on the way here. I hadn’t gone home to get an overnight bag, and tomorrow, I would have to buy at least one other work outfit and some underwear because I had absolutely no intention of going back to that house where Nick existed.
No way.
Nuh-uh.
Never in a million years.
I tapped my toothbrush against the mirror, smearing minty paste everywhere. “He’s such a stupid jerk!”
My eyes unfocused as the bathroom tilted.
“Uh-oh.”
The burger in my belly did little to soak up the two bottles of tiny champagne I’d sucked back or the four miniature Jack Daniels, courtesy of the minibar.
I hadn’t looked at the price list.
I figured it was either alcohol or therapy, and alcohol would be cheaper.
Didn’t matter that I also knew the statistics of alcoholic organ dysfunction and why governments kept increasing taxes on liquor to try their best to stop people from drinking the stuff. Didn’t matter that I’d personally dissected livers that’d given up from too much drinking, doing our best to formulate a drug that reversed such damage.
Right now...I wanted to be smashed.
Because if my brain was pickled, then my thoughts would be nonsense, and I could go to sleep without thoughts of him.
Him.
My blue eyes welled with angry tears as I looked at my reflection again.
Damn him.
Screw him.
Good riddance.
Go to stupid Singapore, you stupid jerk.
Stay alone forever.
Find some stunning Singaporean girl.
See if I care.
Spitting out minty froth, I rinsed my mouth, tore off my skirt and blouse, ripped off my bra and knickers, then padded naked back to bed.
No lights glowed, only the harsh blue flickers of the TV.
I’d never felt so sorry for myself.
Never allowed myself to slip into such a sorry state of affairs.
Even when my parents died, I kept my chin high and did what they would’ve expected me to do. They always called me their little scholar. Always rolled their eyes at my determination to learn all the things instead of playing.
They’d wanted me to have a childhood and be reckless. To climb trees, swim in lakes, and make mistakes. But even as a young girl, I preferred to sit on the shore and read heavy texts. I spent Friday nights in my room watching YouTube and subscribing to cardiologist channels and naturopaths, chiropractors and brain surgeons, studying medicine in all facets so I was prepared for when it came time to go to university.
I’d never snuck out.
Never drank underage.
Apart from losing my virginity because I was sick of it classifying me as a kid, I never did anything rebellious.
They’d encouraged me to have a life outside of study, of course, but I was happiest with pages spread and words jumping from the paper. When they died, I buried myself even deeper into books because I was their little scholar, and knowledge would protect me from the emotional fallout of losing them.
And it’d worked...until now.
Now...I felt their loss far, far too keenly.
Books couldn’t save me.
Words held no power.
Whatever Nick had done to me had succeeded in ways my parents had failed in my youth.
They’d wanted me to feel.
To experience.
To fall and grow, try and fail, live and laugh and...love.
Damn you, you stupid jerk.
Curling into a little ball, I hugged the spare pillow and let sobs wrack me.
Sobs I’d choked on ever since my parents died.
The two people who made me and then left me all alone.
I’d unwittingly let Nick drag me out of the metaphorical library where I’d hidden my terrified heart and made me exist. Made me human and not just a recipient of knowledge.
He’d made me feel. He’d bruised me, marked me, consumed me...and now, he’d tossed me aside, all because he was too much of a coward to love me, despite death coming for us all.
I’d been brave enough to love him.
I let him change me.
I cried harder.
I could never go back.
Never turn it off again.
Never stop wishing for the more that he’d given me.