Espoir

LOUIS
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for no reason at all
- roar.
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The next morning I had mumbled something to Adrien about having an headache and he let me stay home from school.

I turn on my bathroom light and immediately grimace at the smell. Throw up sits in the toilet and I furrow my brows.

I don't remeber throwing up or even drinkig enough to the point where I threw up, but if I was being honest—I didn't remeber much after Aimée and I's fight.

I flush the throw up down the toilet and avoid the mirror until I reach the light switch. I couldn't stand to look at myself, because I knew who I looked like right now.

I knew exactly who I looked like.

I felt like a monster that needed to be caged up to stop its bad habits—I needed to be physically restrained because one way or another I was always going to find a way to relapse.

Maybe I did have that stupid Alcohol Use Disorder that Mrs.Whatever Her Name Was said I did. I had no idea how she figured it out—I did remember the doctors saying I had an alarming amount of alcohol in my system when I was brought in.

I stand helplessly in the middle of my large room—feeling utterly alone and isolated. I didn't know what to do with my hands and there was this weird guilt bloom in my chest.

The feeling always came after Aimée had to drag me out of bed or hose my down in the shower when I couldn't stop throwing up all over myself.

She wasn't stupid or a little kid anymore, she saw what drinking did to me—to our mom and Mike. It was all she had ever seen her whole life, people choosing alcohol over her.

And right now, I didn't blame her for choosing Adrien over me. After all he was a reliable person to trust. I was not.

•

Later that evening Elliot called me into his room. I had done nothing but eye the cabinet under the sink everytime I passed it so I had no idea what he wanted to talk about. Politics? He looked like a political guy.

I close his bedroom door quietly behind me and shove my hands into my hoodie pockets. His eyes burn into me and I stare at his rug that had a stain on the corner.

"I heard you and Aimée's argument last night," he says calmly, leaning back onto his pillows.

Of course he did.

"Congrats," I mumble, continuing to stare at the ground. What was I supposed to say? Yeah, I know I fucked up.

I wasn't dumb—I knew he was going to take Aimée's side. They all probably would if they were there. I wasn't bitter that they favored Aimée more than me. I mean, why wouldn't they? I was a lost cause and they already had another version of me who was passing all his classes and was on the road to success. Another of version of me who didn't drown himself in alcohol.

Aimée wasn't a lost cause like I was—there was still some hope from her. Maybe I had a played a role in that, making sure she still had some innocence or maybe I didn't. It didn't matter anymore.

"You have a right to be angry. I mean I would to if dad took over the job I had been doing my whole life. But Aimée's not the one making you feel that way, nor is it Adrien's."

"Then who's is it?" I snap, furrowing my brows angrily. "Mine?"

"It's your mothers and step-fathers fault. But firing your anger at Aimée isn't right, she's just a kid," he says, clasping his hands.

So am I.

"She's your mom too, you know. She's all your moms yet no one wants to accept it," I cross my arms. I didn't know why I was defending my mom so hard—she was barely a mother to me but putting her on a pedal stool because she wasn't as bad as Mike was easier than admitting that the parental figures I had most of my life both sucked.

"If you wanna call her your mom go wild, Louis."

I roll my eyes again. I didn't know why Elliot was acting like this. Maybe mom was a soft spot for him and I probably pushed the right buttons which seemed to be my specialty because recently I had been irritating everyone around me.

"Whatever. Nice fucking chat," I say, standing up straight and swinging his door open.

I slam it behind me.

André's walking out of the bathroom right I walk past and he smiles obnoxiously at me. "Afternoon sunshine."

I clench my fists and try to restrain myself from saying something I knew I was going to regret. "Fuck off," I mumble going to walk past.

But of course, André didn't budge.

"Fuck. Off." I say more harshly this time—shoving him out of the way so hard that he stumbles into the banister.

Stop it.

What do you look like hurting the people around you?

Dishing out the hurt you promised to never pass on?

He's about to fire back but Adrien's voice yells for dinner from the kitchen and we make eye contact for a second before he squints his eye and walks down the stairs.