Normal people don't faint from trauma. I realize this when, slowly, I manage to come around. Normal people can stay awake for more than ten minutes. I am not normal people.

My eyes open and the first sight I come to is Ivy's car ceiling. The seat under me drones and vibrates with a dull hum. There are bunches of bags scattered at my feet and I roll to my side, pressing my back against the seat. The scenery glides by contentedly. The sky is pink after the short sunrise. I feel sick to my stomach. I feel diseased in some way. There's an unavoidable sting between my legs, and I must be as grey as a cloudy day.

Ivy breaks my suicidal quiet. "I shouldn't have allowed you to go off on your own."

I panic again behind the silence. She knows what happened. She knows and now she's going to kill him. Why am I still protecting this person? Because whoever that was back there, it wasn't him. Not by a long-shot.

"Yer not done with me, ol' Harv-cakes, not by a long shot."

My eyes flinch shut. I croak, "I-Ivy, will you hurt me if I puke on your leather seats?"

"Of course not, sweetheart."

I don't do it, but I contemplate it. I feel too guilty to fuck up her car. She makes me nervous. I can feel the heat radiating off of her. She's angry. So very angry. I break under the pressure and my voice shakes, "I'm fucking freaked o-o-out, Ivy."

I begin to feel like the chick to her mother hen. The comedy of moments ago where I was shyly avoiding contact is gone. I want it, now. I'm scared. I want to be protected. Is this all it takes to push me out of my trust issues?

"I knew I smelled clown. I knew I shouldn't have—"

"Ivy?"

Silence again. I just want her anger to stop. It's making my thought process do self-deprecating flip-flops. I focus harshly on the Cheez-it box. For some odd reason my heart breaks when I realize they're white cheddar. White cheddar is my favorite. Is it a sign from the God who doesn't enjoy listening to me? I feel like a breathing bundle of nerves. Watching that ten year old die didn't add up to the same sensation as this. My emptiness is gaping, now, Grand Canyon sized.

"I apologize," She murmurs bitterly, "I'm just—"

Badly tempered? Vivacious? Raging? Overprotective?

It doesn't help my self-disgust when I realize she's angry at herself for not looking after me. Let's lower my ego a good three thousand points, shall we?

It's all bubbling up inside me. I feel it, it kind of burns, to be honest. I loved him, and I love him but he's an asshole and I'm, undoubtedly, just as much of a jerk. I deserve it and he deserves to have his nose broken and we both deserve such suffering. We deserve pain beyond pain.

I hate how much I miss him most of all. I hate how much I want him even though I know it's wrong, worse, it's bad for me. I hate everything, right at this terrible moment.

"We'll get you home and you'll be alright, or as alright as is manageable."

Inwardly, I crack a sour joke about the way she says home. She says it like I belong there, and a part of me gives a hateful little lurch of irritation for that. I lost my home; I'm still looking for it.

I mentally tell myself to stop sitting around and thinking up ways to hate her, because she's the last person in the world I have right now (wow, nice, Harvey, cut down to a single person) and I can't afford to despise her. I can't let myself sit here and create ways to spit venom at her just because it's in my nature to wish death to all human beings. My trust issues resurface. Unfortunately, I don't follow.

"I'd prefer it, right now, in the least demanding way, if you'd share your thoughts rather than stew on them. It reminds me that you're not dead in my backseat."

"Listen, fuck off. I'm trying to assess whether I can deal with y-y-you or not. Everyone I've tried to d-deal with only ends up raping me or taking all my money."

A little hard there, Harvey, maybe you cannot be such a beast.

"Rest assured, I have no desire to force sexual escapades on you, and I'm not interested in your money…provided, that is, you even have any at all. Money is—"

Blah blah ecology rant. I tune it out completely. The car's steady, straightforward motion lulls me to calm.

I feel adrift on an unforgiving sea.