Ego's Trap | ✔

63 | Cheap

☆☆☆ Chapter 63 ☆☆☆

Cheap

I didn't know where to put my hands, and they were getting awfully clammy. Sweat was inevitable, all over. Even if the air conditioner was all the way up, even if my hands clutched onto the supposedly-cool gemstone on my collarbone as a last resort, it did nothing to me. And looking at what was in front of me, a simple wooden door that just so happened to have the letters T-E-R-E-S-A carved on it by a knife my sister had taken from the kitchen a whole decade ago, didn't make it any better because I had to knock it and face the person it belonged to, that's why. All because I couldn't handle being in my lonesome, in the dark... even if the TV was on at one point, which is weird. I've been used to that same thing for ages. It's how I went to sleep last night. It's how I go to sleep almost every night. Never in a million years would I have ever thought that I was so scared of what I've always done.

I could've gone to my parents' room instead, but it was too far from my bedroom. I would have to walk past the living room and kitchen, which would leave me completely helpless to the dark, and my sudden fear of being by myself would become one with me. Or take me over. But I also have to admit, it's all mostly an excuse that stood for something else: I was compelled to face Teresa, to talk to her. Be in her company. Sleep with her. I know, I know. That's weird. But I couldn't ignore it.

I was in the middle of psyching myself up to knock on the door when the knob turned and pure light flashed before my eyes.

Reality slapped me right across the face, and I froze right then and there, on the spot. All I could do was swallow. I wanted to leave.

"Well?" My sister rolled her eyes. "Are you going to come in or not?"

How did she know? "Uh... um." I felt my eyebrows furrow.

"You were standing here for a whole minute. Had a whole creepy vibe. Who wouldn't notice?" She opened the door a little wider. "Come on, hurry up. I'm turning off the lights. You can sleep on the floor."

I rushed in, with my pillow and blanket in hand. I threw them to the clearest spot I saw by her bed, and made myself comfortable. She then turned off the lights and went to her bed. I had the nerve to speak by the time I heard her ruffle through her bedsheets.

"Why did you let me in?" When I noticed that only silence replied, I tugged on the velvet around my neck. "It's okay, you don't have to reply. Sorry. Goodnight── "

"I don't know," she interrupted. "Well, I mean... you used to do that when you were five?"

"I did?"

"Yeah. You would stand outside my room. Sometimes, I would find you sleeping there the next morning." In the darkness, I noticed her head show up in my view, from above. "Mom and Dad, they used to think I made you do that. I got in trouble for that a lot, so I always did my best to check outside before I went to sleep. You would think the easiest solution was to leave the door just a tad bit open for you, but things weren't as simple as that. I was too scared of monsters coming in to eat me in the middle of the night."

"Well," I said. "It's a good thing that I'm already here."

"You're going to eat me?"

"A monster's gotta do what a monster's gotta do."

She scoffed. "Wow, okay."

Silence. Silence that my heart refused to follow through. "Teresa. I'm sorry," it quickly breathed. "For everything. Not... not just for what I said last night."

She scoffed again. "Wow. Are you serious? Are you kidding me?"

"No, I, I mean it," the caged beats of my heart said, supported by a fierce rush of adrenaline I couldn't put down. "I'm sorry. You never deserved any of it. I'm a pure piece of shit, straight out of an asshole."

"This is a cheap way to do it." Once again, I froze over. "Do you expect me to forgive you, just like that?"

"Uh... no?"

"Good, because I don't. Don't get me wrong, I love you── I care about you and all, but I'm through with you. You've stepped on me for far too long." Her head left out of my view. "Also, quick word of advice, actions speak louder than words, alright? Goodnight."

And just like that, I had the nerve to thaw out. "It's hard, you know. Change. Sometimes I'm still blind and can't tell what's right from wrong until it's too late."

"Not sometimes. How about most of the time?" She gave me no time to answer. Must've been one of those ray-torical questions she talks to others about. "Also, also, whatever you just said doesn't excuse you. You still chose to do every single thing you've done. Remember when you threatened Daniel and I with a knife?" she hissed. "Told me to kill myself? Told me that I'm ugly, a stupid whore? Stabbed someone eleven times? Called Daniel out on something that had nothing to do with you, made it personal; a part of your ego? Called me out on it? Told me to kill myself for the upteenth time? ...Talked to a therapist? Complimented my natural hair? Held me when I shook from fear? Ran to my arms when you needed me? Opened up to our parents? ...Called me Tess for the first time in years?" She wasn't crying, she was just breathing too fast, too hard. I got up from the floor, sat on her bed. Brought her to my arms, rubbed her back. "Yeah, that's right. Turn... turn away," she mumbled on me, shivered from tears that refused to form. "Fuck you."

"Goodnight, sis," I mumbled back.

Sorry.