what you can't have (b.e.)

lark

inspo: lark, angel olsen

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~TWO WEEKS LATER~

If only we could start again, pretending we don't know each other...

Mila's POV:

Nothing's been the same since that night. The door we fought and pushed up against just to keep it open, slammed back shut. And now we're on opposite sides, but no one's saying anything, no one's knocking. Usually one of us admits we were wrong and we toss the blame back and forth like it'll burn our hands if we hold it for too long.

We don't talk anymore, we don't even touch, we're ice cold when we're in the same room. And I think I'm getting used to the silence, and I'm scared of adapting to a situation I should be working on getting out of.

I know I blew up over nothing; I know everything is my fault. I've been holding this guilt for so long the skin has scarred over and over on my palms. It's my fault Billie canceled the rest of her tour. She fought so hard to bring me with her, only for me to turn everything I touched to stone. I turned her to stone; she doesn't speak, she never went back to school, she never leaves her bed. I'm afraid her vocal cords snapped, I'm afraid she'll stay quiet long enough for the world to forget about her, turn her into a one-hit wonder.

I'm miserable. I go to school just to leave the house and not have to see Billie in pain. I hide in the library at lunch and skip breakfast and throw up my dinner. The parts from the past I wanted to leave there came back and the memories I held close faded to gray.

The city's changed, it's not what it was back when you loved me...

I jump off my skateboard and hold it close to my chest. I try not to look up, but I do, to the overpass where we had what we didn't know was our first date. What I would give to turn back the clock and go back to the start, and do everything right this time. It's so lonely walking to school with just my shadow. It's just me again. I don't know how to be okay with just me. How do I live with myself? How did I get here, laughing at the mistakes my parents made, only to unconsciously repeat their behaviors, succumb to their same addictions?

I feel like I'm being watched, the paranoia washes over me and I keep my head down for a few seconds, then glance behind me. A beaten-up black car rolls behind me at a slow pace. Fear kicks in and I jump back on my skateboard, moving so fast, wind blowing my hair, I think for just a second, I can forget everything.

Hiding out inside my head, it's me again, it's no surprise, i'm on my own now...

Billie's POV:

I breathe a sigh of relief when the front door clicks shut and Mila's gone. I jump out of bed and run into Finneas's room, and warm up my fingers on the piano. This is the best time of the day, when everyone's left the house and I sing so softly but the words echo like I'm shouting against the cramped four walls.

I work on the same song again, hoping I'll be able to open up the wounds long enough to find the right words to fill in the missing pieces.

"Don't you know I'm no good for you?"

Fuck. I don't know what's next. I have the rest but I haven't been able to finish this verse. I think I'm afraid of finding out what I want to say. I'm afraid of offending Mila, to make something that people will listen to that she'll know was made because of her.

I flip through my notebook and find a page full of scribbles and words. I can't shake this underlying story of leaving, of how it feels always being left. Of knowing I'm the type of person that watches the door close. It's like I've learned how to deal with the pain of loneliness, of giving everything to someone and watching them take it with them when they shut that same door.

"I've learned to lose you, can't afford to..."

I write it down fast before I forget it, feeling euphoria with the usual depression. I love the act of creating something out of the pain, like maybe it was worth it in the end. Maybe we're going to work out, me and her, but along the way, we made some beautiful things with our beautiful mistakes.

I grab my shirt and grip the fabric tight. I want to rip it open and expose my chest and rip out my heart just to prove that it exists somewhere inside me. I would tear it just to freeze if Mila had even a papercut. My eyes flash and I find the keys with my eyes closed.

"Tore my shirt to stop you bleedin', but nothin' ever stops you leavin'..."

And that's the facts. What I was afraid of finding out: there's nothing I could do or say to keep her from leaving me. I can't make decisions for anyone else except myself. I can't hold her hostage like I thought I could before. I don't want to have to lock her up to get her to stay with me. I want to leave the door wide open and watch her walk past it instead of out of it.

And I'm so, so fucking sick of this cycle. I'm tired of thinking about the past every day, but you can't look back and you can't plan too far ahead into the future. They save live in the moment but what if I hate the moment?

I shut my notebook, sulk back to my room, and crawl under the covers.

Every time I turn to you, I see the past, it's all that lasts...

Mila's POV:

The school day drags on and I've forgotten the names of everyone around me by now. Every day is the same and it's just like coming down from a high and falling into the boredom of reality. Life has changed so much in the past few months because of one person. Sometimes I wonder if I could go back to the day we first spoke, would I still step into that coffee shop? There's no erasing time, not now. I just have to figure out how to make time go forward again, because right now it's stopped, and not in the good way.

When I make it outside Billie's house, the anxiety of what's gonna happen when I go inside makes me want to walk past the door. I sit on the front lawn for a few minutes, and look across the street. My heart races when I see the same car from the morning. Pushing past my fear, I find some shred of confidence and march up to it. The engine starts as I get up to it, but I catch it first, knocking on the window.

There's a pause, and the window rolls down. I stop breathing.

"Mom?"

Billie's POV:

I wake up to darkness outside my window. I slept the whole day, and I know I'll stay up all night with Mila next to me, sound asleep. I turn over, expecting to see her writing in her journal in the corner or scrolling on her phone at the foot of the bed. But she's not there.

I check my phone and don't find any messages. I debate whether or not I should text her first. But that would break the silence, and I don't want to be the one to do that.

So I pull the blankets over my head and try to make myself fall back asleep. I'm so tired, all the time. I have one burst of energy in the day and then it fades and I can't move more than a few inches. All I can think is:

She's gone again.

Say your heart is always mine, what about old times? You can't erase them...