Chapter 2:
Noel sat silently in the apartment that he once shared with Hope. They had been inseparable for the longest time, until Hope decided that he would listen to his family's suggestion of checking himself into a mental hospital. Noel threw his palms to his head to quietly think. What had he done? Was this all his fault? He kept replaying their first kiss in his head; he remembered the meaning that it held. He thought that if he never kissed Hope that day then nothing would have happened. He would've still been on talking terms with his boyfriend and they wouldn't have been able to hurt each other the way they had.
Noel reached for the things that kept them apart. His fingers slowly curling around the bottle of alcohol on the bed stand. He had gotten into underage drinking after their first fight. His lips parted as the contents reached his lips. Was any of that worth losing Hope over? He wished that he paid more attention to his boyfriend when he had the chance to. He wanted to call Hope again, but he knew that he didn't want him to call again. This was a mistake that he couldn't fix; that was the part that bothered him the most. He knew that Hope hated every bone in his body now.
-0-
"Hope, please just listen to me. I'm sorry that I let this get in between us. I should've paid more attention to you instead of these damn drinks and drugs. It messed with me, especially that one night."
"Which one night, there were plenty of nights where it went to your head? Are you referring to the night you smacked me into the coffee table, the night you ignored me, or are you talking about the night you forced me to-?" He couldn't bring himself to finish the rest of his sentence.
"…I regret… no, I wish that I didn't do any of those things to you Hope. You are way too beautiful; I just want you to forgive me for everything."
"I… we've talked about this before Noel."
"Hope, I'm not the only one who caused this simple relationship to go sour. What about you, huh? Are you really going to stand there and tell me that you are innocent from hurting me?" Hope didn't answer him, but instead just went silent. He knew that he had to share the blame, but he just couldn't bring himself to it.
"You lied to me over and over again; I couldn't believe anything that you told me! Honestly, I still can't believe a word you say to me. You cheated on me; you cut and told me it was my fault. You can act innocent all you want, but this is not all my fault."
"Don't ever call me again. I'm tired of listening to you, Noel. "
"See you're doing it again. You cut me out of your life, even though we are supposed to be there for each other."
"I have to go."
"Hope wait-"
The phone line went silent. Noel threw his cellphone across the room; it hit the closet with a loud bang. At that moment he didn't care if it broke. "I love you," he whispered as the tears crept down his cheek; hitting the floor with quiet drops.
-0-
He thought that he could convince Hope to come back home, to him through that phone call. Instead, Hope had told him to never call again. Noel prayed that he didn't actually mean that, but was just saying that in the moment of the argument because he was angry. The bottle that he clenched was now completely empty. He looked down at it. Losing Hope over that seemed stupid to him. He threw the bottle at the ground, thousands of little pieces of the glass shattered. He glared at his reflection in each shard. He looked at how dull he looked now. He barely went outside anymore since Hope left. He just sat inside and drowned his sorrows in whatever he could get his hands on. He grabbed a cigarette and lit it. Instead of smoking it that day, he just stared at it. He watched the butt burn and become black. He watched as it broke off into the ash tray after it became small. He ran his fingers through his hair.
"It looks just like our relationship, huh Hope?" He laughed slightly; it was forced, but the noise was audible. He wanted to change for himself, his family, and for his Hope, but he didn't know how to quite do that.
A/N: I don't quite know why I never posted this it was literally sitting on my computer for like the last year… I'm super sorry for the long wait. Thank you for the reviews even though I haven't been here!
Yay for being done with basically what you could call background information/ present day shit. I'm just so glad, now we can move on to what actually happened the last few years that led them to this time. I just thought since I wrote a chapter about how Hope was that there should be one about Noel.
