Not Like Him

.1

Snuggling deep into her bed covers, she closed her eyes and sighed. Please, she prayed, let this headache go away. She had lain awake the night before, unable to sleep with the pain in her ankle. The pain seemed to have moved up her body, settling in behind her eyes. Four Excedrin Migraine pills had done nothing but leave her stomach unsettled.2

Moments later she opened her eyes wide as a wave of nausea passed through her. Oh God, don't let me puke, she chanted silently; she knew she'd never make it to the bathroom in time. 3

And then her eyes settled on her computer. He would be online, she knew. She signed on, hoping for some sympathy. She was not only cursed with a migraine, but she felt very unsettled, and longed to have someone say they cared about her. 4

Yet, when they began their conversation, he couldn't tell anything was wrong. He chattered on and on about the most mundane things, not noticing her half-hearted responses, slow typing, spelling mistakes, all of the signs that she wasn't herself, that there was something wrong. Little things, to be sure, but telling all the same. He didn't notice, this person supposedly in love with her. 5

How was she supposed to love him? He knew nothing about her, none of her little quirks, though she knew his. She could tell when something was bothering him, knew what he was going to say before he said it sometimes. 6

She thought back to the last person she had loved. Oh, God, but he had been wonderful. He knew her mood from the way she greeted him, could detect subtle differences in her typing and knew what they meant. One word or smiley was enough to show he cared, he didn't need to say it and neither did she when he was upset, they didn't need to come out and say it, they could tell. But not with this guy.7

This guy didn't know that she had tears streaming down her reddened cheeks, that the pounding in her head was becoming unbearable. He didn't seem to care even when she said she was upset. He gave her a frown and moved on in the conversation. 8

Her tears seemed hotter as she gently closed her laptop, sliding once more between the sheets. There was no one to talk to, no one who gave a damn if she was hurting, crying, depressed, or restless. Her family cared not, the man who loved her cared not, and her friends...her friends didn't know. Why shatter their happiness with her depression, when they had worked so hard to be happy? Neither of them wanted her to drag them down. 9

"You're all I have," she whispered, turning off the light in her room and holding a pillow as she cried herself to numbness.10