Page 72 of A Brush with Love
“It isn’t a comparison with you. Or other people. It’s me. I have a standard.” Harper rubbed sharply at the tears pouring down her cheeks. “I have to do my best. Be my best. I’m just… failing otherwise.”
“No one doubts you constantly do your best—we all admire you so much for how hard you work—but some days your best canbe a B and some days your best can even be a C or some days it could mean doing nothing at all but just breathing.” Thu ducked to try to meet Harper’s eyes. “And we’ll still be proud of you. Your best isn’t the same thing as your breaking, Harper. I think you confuse the two, but one of these days you need to learn the difference. You don’t have to live with this pressure.”
Harper let out a cold laugh. “Without the pressure, I don’t perform. That’s what this whole stupid Dan thing has proven. I don’t focus and I don’t perform. I’m just a normal, unimportant girl, doing normal, unimportant things.”
“You are important! You’re so important,” Lizzie consoled, moving to stand closer to Harper.
“Harper.” Indira stood too, choosing her words carefully. “Maybe you should think about going to therapy. I know you said you went as a kid after what happened with your mom, but maybe it could help. Your anxiety… You shouldn’t have to live like this.”
The monster clawed protectively at Harper’s torso and she leaned into its embrace. Anxiety was terrifying to live with—but so was the idea of not knowing who she was without it. Thoughts looped and rushed and collided into this all-encompassing energy that fueled every step, heightened every emotion. It left Harper feeling out of control of her mind, but afraid of what would be left if it were gone.
“I’m fine.”
“Therapy is nothing to be ashamed of.”
“I’m not ashamed of therapy. I’m a therapy graduate. I learned what I needed to learn,” Harper said. There was no way she wanted to confront the unhealed wounds that festered below the surface.
“I don’t think therapy works like that, babe,” Indira reasoned. Harper stared at her, cold numbness tingling down her limbs.
“Is it…” Thu cleared her throat and looked at the ground. “Is it because you don’t want to talk about your mom?”
Harper jerked away, hunching her back and wrapping her arms around her middle.
“Thu, don’t,” Harper warned. The room started spinning.
“I know we don’t talk about it, but you know your mom would be so proud of you, right? She’d love you no matter what and wouldn’t want you to torture yourself like this. Killing yourself over school and residency won’t bring her back, Harper. You know that, don’t you?”
Silence descended on the room. Harper’s blood pounded behind her eyes, making her see red.
“Get out,” Harper whispered.
“We’re only try—”
“Get out!” she screamed, thrusting a finger toward the door. Her friends hesitated for a moment before snatching up their things and making their exit. Thu stopped at the edge of the room and looked over her shoulder at Harper.
“I only said that because I love you.”
Hot tears spilled from Harper’s eyes as she stared at Thu. Wanting to scream. Wanting to lash out at her words. A humming filled her ears, and her body felt like it was about to fragment into a hundred pieces.
Thu met her eyes and continued. “If you want to go into tomorrow pretending this didn’t happen, we can do that. If you need to call and scream at me, we can do that too.”
Harper couldn’t speak, her chest rising and falling against jagged breaths. She couldn’t get enough air into her damn lungs.
“And if you do ever want to talk about it”—Thu shrugged—“let me know.”
Harper waited until she heard the door click shut before crumpling to the floor and crying. Her body shook and her mind raced and her heart felt like it would punch out of her chest or stop working all together. She cried until her throat ached.
She cried like a child who needed her mother.
CHAPTER 24
HARPER
Harper spent the next two weeks avoiding Dan, using finals and the school’s short winter break as excuses to gain some distance. She’d resolved to tamp down everything she felt for him. No more gushy heart-eyes at his smile. No more giddy squeals at his texts. She even turned down his offers for coffee.
It didn’t do her much good.
A part of her mind was constantly circling around him, and it was exhausting to pretend to feel less than she did. But she created these boundaries and she needed to stick to them.
