Reality Check

October 6, 2010

Everyone wants to know, ‘Who is the real Chloe?’ Sit back and listen because I am about to tell you.

There is nothing more real than having your crush die of a heart attack a few months after cheating on your boyfriend with him, while you are still in high school. There is nothing more real than losing your role model in a car accident and having two friends murdered by the time you are half way through your first year of university. There is nothing more real than your family losing their fortune and being told, ‘you should have had more.’

There is nothing more real, than real life.

I never understood why I had to go through so many traumatizing things. I don’t believe that everything happens for a reason. I do know that everything in my past has made me exactly who I am at this moment, and as much as it nearly killed me to get here, I am happy with the person I have become.

We sat on the black leather stools at the bar. The Editor was high, the drugs racing through his veins.  My hands were shaking as I attempted a sip of vodka. I had never seen him like this; he was stumbling, stuttering and slurring coming down off a heroin high.

He looked at me and I finally asked the question we both knew was coming, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Looking downward he shrugged, for the first time since we’d met he seemed at a loss for words. “I didn’t want you to be mad.” I was in shock. Mad!? Was he serious? How on earth do you get mad at someone for having an addiction? I kissed his lips, feeling his hands tighten around my waist. We stood at the bar, arms around each other. The room was full of the usual Monday night bar crowd but it felt like it was just the two of us there.

It broke my heart to hear his response. Why are people so consumed with others judging their actions? There was obviously something he could not cope with if he turned to drugs in such a way. We stood with our bodies pressed together and I knew it would be the last time I saw him. All I could do was be there for him, but first he needed to be there for himself.