Pretty Black (Pretty Broken) by J.R. Gray

Author:J.R. Gray [Gray, J.R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: GrayBooks
Published: 2023-05-24T16:00:00+00:00

I met eyes with Caspian.

“I thought you weren’t speaking to me?” he said under his breath when I fell silent, casting a look to either side to make sure no one else paid us any mind.

“I don’t think that was speaking.” I broke the eye contact.

“Singing to me is okay?”

I lifted my shoulders. “I don’t know what’s okay.”

“Me either.” He put his head back in his hands, and there was profound sadness there. My chest ached. I wanted to take it away, but I didn’t know how. “Baby, it’s gonna fade. The lights will come and go, but baby, I swear to you this will fade.”

“Why are you singing my own lyrics at me now?” I asked.

“Because I think when you wrote them, you believed it.”

“I did.”

“I think you’ll feel them again.” He took a step closer to me.

“I don’t think I’ll feel anything again.”

“Anything?”

I hunched my shoulders and shook his head. “No.”

“Do you feel my love for you?” he asked.

My head snapped up, and tears welled in my eyes. “No.”

“Not at all?” Caspian asked, rage pulling his features tight.

His anger felt better than sadness. I understood anger. Anger felt like home. “I think I felt it once. But I haven’t felt it in a long time. Most of the time, I think you don’t even like me.”

“I’ve never not loved you.” He sobered, and his words were dry.

“But you’ve not liked me?” I looked at my hands.

“You’ve blocked me out and everyone else. Kind of hard to like you when you are bent on destroying yourself.”

“Then how can you say you love me?” I asked, my voice getting too loud.

“Because it’s true. It’s not my fault you rejected it.” His words carried an icy spite.

“I didn’t reject it, I—” I stormed off stage, barely containing myself as I sprinted to my dressing room. I slammed the door and screamed.

I emptied the metal cigarette case, doing a line, then another.

I paced, but my rage built. I popped a pill, but it didn’t work. His words played over and over in my head.

Like he threw his fucking love in my face.

No remorse.

He had no idea what he did to me.

Another line.

We played the show, but it was only a couple hours of reprieve from my intrusive thoughts. I tried everything to break the cycle.

Nothing worked.

I couldn’t get out of my fucking head.

I wanted to go scream at him. Tell him he took away my only safe space. But I was destroying myself? I wasn’t trying to destroy myself; I was trying to survive, trying to breathe.

I took out my lighter and lit a cigarette with shaking hands.

I sat, moving my bracelets to press the tip to my wrist. Blinding white pain took over my senses, but my body calmed, and my mind quieted.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Caspian snarled.

I opened my eyes to find him standing in the doorway. “Get the fuck out.”

But he didn’t heed my words; instead, he slammed the door and was on me, grabbing my wrist as I stumbled to my feet.

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