Shattered Dreams [EDITING] - Chapter 43: Chapter 43

NADIA'S POV:
I got home from the hospital this morning and I have been unable to sleep for longer than half an hour as the pain is just too much. I can barely swallow and my throat is burning, causing me to be in agony just from having saliva in my mouth. I have been sat on my windowseat all night wanting nothing more than to go up onto the roof and be with Archie with a cigarette perched between my lips, but I can't because of this fucking surgery.
The nurse did tell me that the recovery would be painful and like hell but somehow I thought that it was just something they warn you of no matter what and I wasn't expecting it to be this bad at all. She suggested having ice cream but I can't cope with it, I just keep having random periods where it just hits me and it's so bad I start crying.
I was worried for most of the night, just like I was the night before I had the surgery done because I was so off my face that it was even worrying the nurses. They came to the conclusion that it was so bad because I was so dehydrated and felt so unwell before my surgery that it caused me to have an adverse reaction to the anaesthesia. No complications happened afterwards though, which was good and I was able to come home at last.
The sky is partially clear tonight and so the moon and stars are somewhat visible, minus the few hiding behind the clouds, not wanting to be seen. I relate to these stars, I want to be able to shine on my own but I just can't, not anymore. I feel so alone that I just want to hide behind everyone else, so I am never seen again.
I hate that I have no one in my corner. Here I am sitting alone, counting the stars in the sky as they are the only thing I can truly count on anymore.
I'm not sure if I feel any different than what I did before I had the surgery but I suppose it is too early to tell. When I recover from the surgery I will be able to feel a difference and I haven't looked forward to anything more than I have for that feeling of relief; relief that all of this suffering will be over.
I blow out a breath and wince at the pain and make my way back to my bed. I don't do anything with my time now other than sleep, but now that I can't even sleep I feel lost and have no idea what to do. I have tried reading a book but that makes my head hurt after I've read about twenty words.
I grab my TV remote and put it on for the first time in a good while and scroll through the channels to see what it is on. I haven't watched a lot of TV over the last few months as I haven't been awake long enough to concentrate on anything so I mainly use it as background noise, so I am not completely on my own in the silence. Now that I am in too much pain and unable to swallow painkillers I doubt I will be getting more than an hour of sleep tonight, so I decide to go on disney plus as I recently heard that they put Glee on there, which is my comfort show.
I put on my comfort episode, which is 'The Quarterback', and turn my lamp off so I can focus on it fully without my head hurting too much from the light. The members of the glee club are standing on the auditorium stage, dressed all in black and singing the opening song and I feel the tears begin to well up in my eyes. The pure pain and heartbreak on their faces in this episode, in this opening scene especially, really cuts into me deep as that isn't acting.
It's probably weird that this episode is my comfort one because it is the saddest episode in Glee history, but it is also the most meaningful. I started watching Glee when it was first aired on TV and I would sneak my TV on at night time so I could watch it and when the news of Cory Monteith's death came out I genuinely think it changed me as a person.
I was only young when he died and I had such a deep connection to him that it genuinely broke my heart, I can't imagine how the people who really knew him actually felt.
I am fully sobbing my eyes out when they finish the song and the camera pans into a picture of Cory as his character and this is when Willem decides to waltz right into my room. He stops when he notices the state I am in and I don't take my eyes off of the TV as I am too engrossed by it to care that he is in here.
If I was crying because of the pain and not because of the TV then I would try and hide it so that he wouldn't question it, but I am not so I let him see me cry over this show as he has seen me do it countless times before.
"Why are you doing this to yourself?" Willem asks, lying down next to me on the bed.
"I felt like it was needed." I say, not taking my eyes off the show. Willem stays quiet next to me, watching with me and I am surprised. Over the years, Willem has been forced to watch this show, especially this episode, hundreds of times over and he never once complained about it. He knows that when I watch this episode I am not doing well mentally so he is staying with me, without saying anything so that I at least have him here next to me.
"What was needed?" Corey's voice startles me as he enters my room and I take my eyes off the TV just long enough to get a good look at him and I am immediately reminded of the texts I sent him after my surgery, causing me to look away from his gaze.
I know that I am feeling more and more for Corey everyday, but that doesn't mean that he should know that. I am such an idiot when it comes to things like this because I never know when the right time is and then I keep overthinking about it until I just blurt it out and it causes more harm than good. I have said those three words to one person in my life and he used that against me, so I am just so scared it's going to happen again. I know Corey is nothing like Jasper but my trust issues won't allow me to believe it properly just yet.
Willem points to the TV and Corey nods his head in understanding. "You haven't watched that in a while, is everything okay up here?" He taps his finger on my head three times and I shove him off.
"Shut up." I order with a smile and he smiles back with this sort of sparkle in his eyes that's so overwhelming I have to look away.
Corey wipes his smile away and lies next to me on my other side so I am sandwiched between two muscular bodies. My dog decides that it is a good idea to jump up at my feet, so now I can't move them either but I don't mind. She has been with me since I got home from the hospital, like she can protect me from any pain that may come my way. I had a bad five minutes of sharp pain in my throat earlier and she stood up from where she was by my feet and cuddled up to me, licking my face as if to tend to my wounds and it made me feel better.
We don't deserve dogs.
We continue watching the show in silence and I have silent tears. I feel Corey's hand slide into mine and I feel immediately calmer now I have skin contact with him. Willem hands me my glass of water every so often that I have to drink with a straw because it is just so hard to swallow.
Willem gets up unexpectedly and Corey and I unclasp our hands from each other as fast as we can, just as Rachel is about to sing her song that she dedicates to Finn and it is most definitely the saddest part of the show because they were together in real life as well as the show.
To me, there is not a more heartbreaking love story than the one between Cory and Lea.
"Where are you going? You're going to miss the best part." I frown at him and he raises his eyebrows up at me as if to say I'm full of shit.
"I need a piss and I would rather not watch this bit again thank you." He responds, leaving me and Corey alone as he goes to the toilet.
Corey turns over onto his side so he is facing me as Rachel is singing make you feel my love in the background and I feel my breathing start to get heavier. It's extremely hard to concentrate on the show when I have Corey staring at me so intently. He reaches his hand until it's touching my face, turning my head towards him and he brings his lips to mine in a delicate kiss. The way Corey kisses me so gently reminds me of a constellation of stars.
I lick my lips when he parts his lips from mine as mine now tastes of cherry from his lip balm. One thing about people who play ice hockey and ice skate is that we need to apply lip balm all the time as our lips get so chapped from the cold air in the rink.
"How are you feeling?" He whispers to me and this is the first time we have been alone since I have confessed my love to him in my drugged up state. I just hope that he didn't believe what I said and instead thought it was because of the drugs, which it was. I would never say something so big over text if I meant it.
I shake my head at him in reply to silently let him know that I am not and he will be the only person who asks me and who I will give an honest answer to. "Hurts to talk?" I open my mouth to reply, to show I'm strong but he puts his finger on my lips so that I don't even bother and let out a laugh, which causes me to cough due to the pain.
Before I found Corey annoying and now that I've started seeing him in a new light, I giggle at everything the guy says or does. I want to be mysterious around him, like I always was when growing up with him but it's hard when I quite literally go weak in the knees whenever he holds eye contact with me. He is on my mind constantly and he's a support system for me even when we aren't in each other's company. He doesn't even know he is such a massive part of my life and part of the reason why I don't give up because all I have to do is think about him and it helps to block out any pain that I'm feeling.
He moves closer to me to kiss me again but we hear Willem flush the toilet and so he freezes before backing away, going back to his original position of laying flat on his back and looking at the TV. My relationship with Corey is confusing; one minute we are friends, another we are kissing at every opportunity we get. I don't understand it at all.
Sometimes I still feel like his best friend's sister and I feel like that's all I will ever be. I don't know what he wants from me. I didn't get a straight answer out of him when I cornered him in his car after training so we don't have any sort of label right now. I would feel a hundred times better about the situation if we did have a label because then I would know for sure that I am not just this place holder for him to fill up his time with until someone better comes along, someone who he doesn't have to look after all of the time.
Willem walks back into my room, wiping his hands on his joggers as he never uses the hand towels that are in the bathroom because he says there is no point as it will just get them dirty, as if that isn't what they are there for. "I need to go."
"Why, where are you going?" I ask curiously, even though there is only one person he could possibly be seeing as Corey is already here.
"Going to see Ava." Corey says in a mocking tone, but I sense a hint of jealousy there, which I get. I get jealous whenever Ava comes round and is able to hang out with the four of us and Willem has no issue kissing her in front of Corey and I. Corey and I tend to give eachother a knowing look when they kiss in front of us because we both know we want to but we know we can't.
"Yeah, Ava's parents are at work so I can finally go see her." Willem confirms, ruffling my hair and then doing the same to Corey. I have a drink of my water to get rid of the dryness in my throat and I am glad that I am able to ignore the amount it hurts because I have the two of them in here.
"Have you asked her to be your girlfriend yet man?" Corey asks, fixing his hair again and I'm sad about it as he looks quite sexy when his hair is messy and pushed back slightly. I want to reach my hands out and ruffle his hair all over again but I stop myself as Willem will definitely think that it's weird.
"I need to try and get on her parents' good side first, especially her dads." He responds, looking at himself in the mirror to check himself over and I smile. I've never seen Willem like this before and it's nice to see. He wasn't even like this before he would go and see his ex-girlfriend so he must like Ava a lot more than he has ever liked anyone before and I am so happy for him. He has been so worried about me and focusing a lot of his time looking after me that he deserves to find some serenity with Ava.
When growing up I wanted nothing more than to see my brother happy and I'm so glad that I can say that at least one of my dreams has come true. There is no one more worthy of happiness than him and I am so proud of him now that he has achieved that, even if her family don't like him.
"Why don't her parents like you? Did they walk in on you or something?" I croak out, sipping my water slowly after I talk.
"No, they have just formed an opinion on me before even properly meeting me because of what side of town I live in." He explains vaguely and I feel awful for him. Willem is the biggest people pleaser I know so for people to have some fucked up judgy opinion about him before even meeting him will set his anxious thoughts off.
"What the fuck? That's so fucking stupid" Corey voices what we are all thinking.
"Give them time Will, they'll realise that you aren't how 'rich boys' are painted to be." I reassure him, using my fingers as quotation marks.
It's a stupid outdated thing that happens in this town where people judge everybody. Even our own neighbours judge us so it's hardly surprising that the people from the other side of town don't get along with us. We live in a very well off area, surrounded by people who would spit at their feet if they could and it's disgusting. They need to wake up and realise that we are living in the twenty-first century and where someone lives doesn't determine the type of person they are and how intelligent they are.
"I wish they'd grow up and start treating people with kindness, instead of judging us because of where we live. You don't see us judging them because they live in run down houses and live where the most crime happens." Corey rambles on and Willem and I roll our eyes at the same time because this is something Corey does a lot. I used to find it annoying but now I want to smile because I find it so adorable when he gets so heated about little things and rambles to himself about them. It's something I've noticed his younger sister, Lily, does a lot when at the rink and I think he would be proud to know that she has picked up on some of his quirks when growing up.
"Do you need anything before I go?" Willem asks me and I shake my head. "Are you staying?"
"I'll probably head off in a bit. I'm kind of into this show." Corey responds in a way that doesn't seem too suspicious.
Willem says goodbye and leaves to go to Ava's place, hopefully this time he will be able to leave without being chased down by her dad. Corey and I stay laying on the bed as we were and haven't made a move to get closer to each other and it's making me overthink. I'm about to start an inner monologue to myself until I feel him slide his hand towards mine on the bed and wrap his hand around mine. I pray he can't feel the way my hands are growing clammy from the heat of his touch. I turn over onto my side and rest my head on his chest so I am able to hear his heart beat as it beats faster now that we are close.
I love these moments where Corey and I just sit with each other in silence, holding each other and I can listen to the beat of his heart and mine echoes his. I met another part of me inside of him; he is as damaged as I am and we are slowly healing the broken parts of each other.
"I should probably go too." He announces and I release a long breath, not wanting this moment to be over. We have no worries right now. We don't have to think about Willem coming home unexpectedly and catching us like this so we can just be ourselves with each other for the time being.
"Why? Do you have a girl's house to go to as well?" I joke around with him, trying to show I am not jealous when it is a complete lie.
"You know I only have eyes for you, Naddy," He lifts my hand up to his mouth and brushes it against his lips gently. "Although, that Santana girl might have to be an exception."
I bark out a laugh and his eyes light up at the action. I can't even be mad at him for calling another woman hot because she has to be one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen.
"I hate to burst your bubble, but I think that I would be more her type than you." I tell him and his eyes go wide.
"What the fuck? Spoiler alert." He puts his hands over his ears dramatically so I can't tell him anything more.
My laugh dies off and so does his and now I am reminded he has to go. I hate whenever we are apart, I feel like a part of me is missing because he is a part of me now. "Please stay a little longer? I'm lonely." I ask, looking up at him.
"Okay sweetheart," He responds, putting my head back down on his chest with his hand and begins playing with my hair. I feel myself begin to fall asleep but then I am hit with sharp pain in the back of my throat again. "I'll stay for however long you want me too."
I snuggle back up to his chest to get myself comfy and get the remote so I can change what we are watching. There is this movie that has come out and I have been wanting to watch it, but I never wanted to go through it alone.
"Oh god, what are you making me watch now?" He groans as I click onto netflix.
"It's called 'kiss and cry'." I tell him, not giving him any information about what it's about.
The movie is based on a true story about a young figure skater who got diagnosed with cancer and her whole life changed. It is also a romance and the love interest in the movie reminds me a lot of Corey as he is also cocky and persistent.
I find myself relating to some of the issues that the main character faces and I cry numerous times throughout the movie because I feel so sorry for that poor girl who went through so much. Her coach was mean to her because she couldn't do something and other skaters judged her, yet they had no idea the massive battle she was facing all alone.
When the movie finishes, it ends with a montage of clips of the girl the movie is based on and that causes me to cry even more because I had no idea she actually died and I was really rooting for her to make it. It's such a shame that cancer exists; it attacks even the sweetest of souls and it is the most heartbreaking thing to see.
"You're doing the best you can considering your situation, you know?" Corey whispers to me when the end credits begin to play.
"Th-" I begin but stop when I realise the pain in my throat is getting too much to be able to speak again. The nurse said it should ease after ten days and I can take another ten days of agony if it means I will go back to being me.
"I know, don't worry, you don't have to speak," He speaks softly and I feel myself beginning to fall asleep, this is the longest I have been awake in months and my body is starting to feel the effects of it. "I'll go now, I'll let you rest."
I nod, not wanting him to stay anymore as I have had enough and my battery is drained. Corey and I have an understanding between us where we can ask the other to leave and we won't be offended by it. We understand that we both need our own time and that we can't be around each other constantly, as much as we wish we could be.
I face my window and I'm glad I kept my blinds open because I have a perfect view of the moon shining through. It lights up my room slightly, making me feel more comfortable in my pain. I hope that wherever Archie is, he's looking at the moon and knows that I am looking at it too.
Corey gets out of bed and I get myself comfy in the warm spot he leaves and he bends down, kissing me on the lips again. He walks to the door, looking back at me before he flashes me a smile and leaves.
In this moment I knew that I was in love with him and in this moment he looked into my eyes a little too long to not feel the same way about me.