Lily's POV
Oh what just a fan-fucking-tastic day today has been. I got to watch the guy I like be taken by someone else, again, my only couple of friends I have ditched me at lunch to go hangout with some new boy, and I got a C+ in a test I thought I would get an 'Easy A' in. Granted, the last of those probably isn't massively serious. I still passed, but I thought I'd do far better, so it ruined any last motivation I had to be in a good mood.
I sighed as I slipped my phone back into my pocket, Lego House by Ed Sheeran playing through my earphones. The sunlight reflecting off a puddle on the pavement and through my glasses lenses brought me from my thoughts and back into reality, yet also reminding me I hadn't taken my glasses off. The glasses were a few years old and the lenses had many scratches in them, which just reflected more light into my retinas. I swung my bag off, opening it and taking my glasses case out. I opened the case, and slipped my glasses off my face, then suddenly got pushed over into the grass.
My belongings fell out of my bag as I had let go of it from the sudden shunt. My glasses had also fallen onto the pavement, the a lens gaining a crack through it as it hit a small stone.
"Whoops, sorry," Jillian said in a sarcastic tone, giggling to her friends, "Here you dropped your glasses," She continued, picking them up and holding them out to me as I started to sit up on the grass. I reached out to grab them, only having them be dropped back onto the pavement and stomped on by Jillian herself. I tried to speak, but only little breaths escaped from the my lips.
"W-what's your problem?" I asked.
"Your existence is my problem," She replied, bluntly.
"W-why do you h-hate me so m-much?" I asked, my words being stuttering.
"Lily, you don't get it don't you?" She said, "There are many reasons. You're so ignorant, so boring, and so unbelievably hideous. Like come on, how well do you think snow white fucking hair is working for you? Even worse your god damn eyes. How can anybody look you in the eye with the miserable purple? Nobody likes you. Everyone thinks you're a worthless piece of garbage," She finished, stomping on my glasses once more for good measure.
"Come on girls. I'm done looking at that abomination for today," She said and she started walking off.
Jillian looked back, shaking her head and continuing to walk. I looked down at my belongings that were strewn across the ground in disbelief. 'Is that really what people think of me?' I thought to myself.
I picked myself off the ground, tears welling in my eyes as I picked my belongings off the ground. I slipped the remains of my glasses into the case and put the case back into my bag, slipping the bag back onto my shoulder and I continued walking.
The walk was silent, the music having stopped playing for a reason I had yet to identify, nor wanted did I want to. A few tears slid down my cheeks as I walked, eventually meeting their inevitable fate on the pavement. This day just had so many things going wrong for me, almost like it was evilly planned by some super-villain in a kids movie.
I turned down my street and eventually into my driveway, seeing my sister's car in the driveway, along with my mum's. I gripped onto the door handle of the front door, taking a deep breath and then turning the handle. I entered the house as the door swung open, shutting it behind me and heading to the stairs to my room.
"Hey honey," Mum said, walking out of the kitchen, "How are you Lily?"
"I'm fine," I said, continuing to walk up the stairs and towards my room, entering and shutting the door behind me. I dropped my bag onto the floor and sat down on my bed. I dragged myself up to my pillows, pulling my legs and arms into a fetal position as tears started to escape from my eyes and soft weeps escaped from my mouth. I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, pulling it out to see a newfound crack across the screen. I turned the phone on, seeing it was a text from Liam. I chucked my phone my beside table and dumped my head into my arms as I continued to cry.
Jillian's words echoed in my thoughts. I just couldn't get them out of my head, and the more I thought about them, the more tears ran free. 'Do people really hate me that much?' I kept asking myself. It was like my thoughts caught me in a bear-trap and I couldn't escape. I was trapped, and my thoughts were beating me down while I couldn't move. I felt like the tears just wouldn't stop flowing.
I heard my phone vibrating. I looked over to see someone trying to call me. It was a call from Liam, so I just let it go to voicemail. I wasn't in any mood to speak to him right now. I felt like being alone at the moment, let alone talk to the person that broke my heart... without even knowing he did.
'Why am I getting upset AT him? It's not like he did it to hurt me..." I thought to myself. My thoughts were right. It's not like this was a malicious act or anything. My thoughts were interrupted by my phone sounding a notification. It was a voicemail. I grabbed my phone and opened my messages, pressing the number for the voicemail.
"Hey Lily. I doubt you want to talk to me. I don't know what I did but I would like to know. I'm sorry. Please get back to me, I just..." He said, there was a long pause followed by a heavy sigh, "Please just talk to me. Chat soon..."
Although a short message, I could hear worry in his voice. I felt guilty.
I opened my contacts, scrolling till I saw Liam's name and tapped on it. I tapped on the call icon and listened to it dial, until I heard him answer.
"Hi Liam," I said, followed up by a sniffle as I stopped some mucus escaping my nose.
"Oh thank god you're okay," He said.
"I'm actually quite the opposite at the moment," I said, feeling tears start to build up again.
"Was it something I did?" He asked, his voice softening.
"Why do people hate me?" I asked, starting to cry again, "Am I that unlikeable?"
"Lily, would you mind if I came over?" He said.
"I don't want to waste your time..." I replied, sniffling.
"Lily, I asked. If I'm asking you're not being a burden," He quickly responded, "Now, would you like me to come over?"
"Please..." I said quietly.
"Okay. I'll be there in a few minutes," He replied, hearing him pick up his keys.
"Thank you," I said, before I hanging up the phone. I put it back on my bedside table, and returned to my fetal position on my bed as I awaited his arrival.
Liam's POV
I arrived at Lily's house soon after our call. I shut off my car and locked it behind me, heading up to the front door. I knocked on the front door, and waited for someone to come to the door. After a short while, I saw someone open the door, and it so happened to be Kate.
"Hello," She said.
"Heya Kate," I replied.
"What's up?" She asked, leaning on the door-frame.
"Lily invited me over, so as per request I have arrived," I said, getting a slight giggle out of her.
"Makes sense. I would assume she is in her room, so it is the second door on the right upstairs. Don't have too much fun will ya?" She said, chuckling.
"Oh don't worry, I'm sure nothing like that will be a problem," I said, heading inside behind Kate. I located the stairs and headed up towards them, finding Lily's bedroom, which happened to be perfectly labelled with a sign on the door. I knocked on the door softly, quickly getting a response.
"Who is it?" I heard Lily say softly.
"It's Liam. Can I come in?" I asked, to which it was answered with Lily opening the door for me. Her face was stained with tears and her eyes were very bloodshot. Before I could ask any questions, she brought me into a hug, of which I returned. She let go of the hug and motioned me to follow into her bedroom.
"Please, come in. I'm sorry about the mess," She said, which confused me considering there was only a couple bags and a small pile of folded clothes on the floor.
"Oh trust me, you don't know mess until you see my brother's bedroom," I replied, chuckling slightly, "I swear, I've stood on so many things I couldn't even see, I could write a book on it."
She giggled as she sat down on the side of the bed, motioning me to sit next to her, so I obliged.
"Do you want to tell me why you're down?" I asked, to which she nodded.
"Well, I had already was in a bad mood at the start of the day, so I wasn't feeling that great to start with," She said, sighing, "So after school, I was really tired and ready to just get home and relax, but then Jillian came along. Jillian said some particularly nasty things to me..." she said, slowing down wrapping her arms around me.
"What did she say?" I asked.
"She... she called me ignorant, boring, and hideous, saying she didn't even know how someone could look me in the eye with my disgusting eye colour," She said, starting to cry, by the looks of things, again, "And she said that everyone hates me, and that everyone thinks I'm a piece of garbage."
"Lily, can you listen to me for a second?" I asked, her nodding as a response, "You are an intelligent, kind, and absolutely gorgeous woman, and I feel so lucky to be able to be friends with you, and I don't hate you. I'm sure Kate doesn't, nor does Humphrey. So what that some bitchy girl told you some mean things, it's not like her words matter. They weren't necessary, they weren't kind, and they weren't even true. Sometimes, you just have to learn to ignore some people and focus on what the people you do care about, rather than someone like Jillian."
"Okay," She said, sniffling, "Thank you."
"It's absolutely fine, Lily. There's no time wasted helping a friend out," I said.
"There's still one more thing she did," Lily said, reaching for her bag.
"Oh no, what else did she do," I said, sighing. Lily pulled her glasses case out of her bag, and opened it to reveal the remains of a pair of glasses. I say remains, because it was just a mangled piece metal with a couple small shards of glass still in it.
"Jesus, it looks like she just sat on them," I said, getting a small giggle out of Lily.
"Yeah, explaining that to mum is gonna be fun," She said, shutting the case and dropping it on the bedside table. She immediately brought me back into a hug, saying, "Thank you for coming Liam."
"It's okay, Lily," I said, returning the hug, "I like to help out where I can, plus I enjoy your company," I said, making her smile.
As time passed by, we continued to chat. Nothing really specific, in-fact, nothing really at all. We just rambled on about random things. I don't know what it is, but these kind of conversations always seem to be the best ones for me. The topics are constantly changing and nobody knows what the hell they're going on about, but they're always so fun, and I'm glad that I'm able to have those conversations with people like Lily. It wasn't until a couple hours had pasted that we realised we'd been talking for so long.
"I think it's best if I head home now. My brother probably is wondering where dinner is," I chuckled while looking down at my watch. A slight frown was brought upon her face, but she nodded in agreement.
"Thank you for coming around, Liam. I enjoyed the company," She said, feeling her arms wrap around me.
"Anytime," I replied, releasing the hug. She walked with me down the stairs and out the front door, just rambling and laughing all the way down. Eventually we got to my car, at which point I pulled my keys out and unlocked it.
"Thank you again. We should do this more often," She said, smiling widely.
"I couldn't agree more," I said, "It was fun hanging out with you."
"Well I guess I'll see you tomorrow?" She said.
"Yep, see you tomorrow, Lily," I said, receiving another hug from her, happily returning it, "Jesus, you're a hugger," I jokingly said.
"Whoops, sorry. That was a lot of hugs," She replied, nervously laughing as I got in my car and started it.
"See you later, Lily," I said, as I put the car in reverse and pulled out of the driveway, her waving as I left.
A/N: Hello everyone! I hope you enjoyed the twenty-second instalment of HMNI! A couple things I'd like to say. First things first, I would like to apologise for my absence. I have been meaning to finish this chapter for a while now but just hadn't got around to it. And second, to anyone who happened to be reading The Hand I Was Dealt, it has currently been put on hold, due to me altering my current draft quite a fair amount, so sorry to anyway reading that. Anyway, thanks for tuning in guys! Have a great day/night y'all.
