Parole (Hypernaturals 7)

Group Hug

"I got lost in my head again." I told her, into her shoulder.

"I came as soon as I could." Rachel replied.

"I was so angry at myself. I thought I had it all together. I mean: it's been years! Then I pull some dumb headed shit, and I am back where I was. I could not find my way out of it all night. I couldn't come home. I couldn't fix it. I couldn't take back the dumb shit."

I cried. 

Rachel held me. "Adrian. You are going to have bad moments. You never know how it is going to come back up. It's complicated. People are complicated. It will sneak up on you. It's not always nightmares. Sometimes it's like this: where you are not acting the way you ARE, as a person. We all know you would not normally treat a person you care about that way. That is not who you are, and do not think for a second that it is. I was like that too: I veered around. I had bad days and good. Hell: bad YEARS. Depression is like that. I told you, no matter what the reason, always call me. I am always here, on the next plane"

"I know. I. I didn't think of it. All I could see is how I broke their trust in me. That I failed them. I treated Holly the way I was treated when I first turned. Not the way Jessica did: she did it right. The way others did. The way I treat Tommy now. I turned into a piece of Vampire garbage and never saw it coming. I don't want to be like this. I hate this guy. I hate me. It's not me, but I just DID it. I did it, and I have to own it and take responsibility for it and I can't see how to get back to where I was. Morgan was mad at me. She has never been mad at me before. Not like that. They all hated me. They should." I shrugged in Vampire strong arms.

I heard a sob that is not mine. I looked up. Jessica and Morgan held each other, their shoulders heaving, and Helen stood alone next to them looked like she is about to lose it too.

Rachel gestured at Helen to come over to us, and she tapped Jessica on the shoulder and then crossed to us. Jessica nodded and pulled Morgan along to join.

Rachel began sobbing and crying along with us because it is contagious. The pain raw. I hurt again as I hurt back then.

Even though I know I didn't do it and I didn't deserve it, I hate me again. The HPA broke me on that cross. I wanted to die, and it was hard to learn to want to live again. What made me want to live was my family. The ones I just betrayed.

Holly said she has been raped too. I wish she is here, and part of this. I don't know. Maybe different people deal with trauma in different ways. I suddenly saw, with clarity, how I had been trying to put bandaids on the pain and cover it up and become a hard ass. It isn't me, and I need to find my strength in a different way.

I thought about Bulgaria and all the shit that went down there. The killing and the being all fake Adrain. I could be more me with the Siren head of hall there, Kuzman, than with Larry at 'The Firehouse'. I was still faking it till I made it. When the HPA kidnapped me in Turkey I dived for cover so hard, and I ran so fast than no one could find me. I reached France and then I suddenly had to be all OK again to deal with it. Helen gave me a winery and a new identity and suddenly I am Adrian Claremont and I have all these employees and people counting on me to get it right. If I did not have Fiona there to run things, I would have jumped off the roof. Not that I ever told Helen that. Or myself. I stuffed it all down deep.

Layer upon layer, adding up.

"I am so, so sorry." I finally managed. "I fucked up. I see it now. I understand what I was doing. I have been lost for a while again. Ever since Turkey. I was so happy we finally got Morgan to be part of us, and we had little Rachel, but there has been this rot in my soul too."

I laughed, a hard bark. "When I couldn't kill those women, in Bulgaria, and Vera kicked everyone's ass over it, it was part of it. I... Hell. Even Vera understood me better than I did. I should not have taken on this parole. I was not ready."