I knew he was still in there, though.
My Joey was still inside the person strung out next to me.
And I loved him enough to keep fighting for him.
Even when he’d given up on himself.
“It’s okay.” Sniffling, I didn’t bother to fight the tears that were trickling down my cheeks, as my eyes took in the carnage. Knowing in my heart that the damage to his face paled in comparison to the damage to his heart. “Nothing’s going to hurt you, baby.”
“Mol…” With a great deal of effort, he shifted onto his side to face me and blinked an eye open. “…loy.”
I smiled sadly. “Hey, stud.”
“I’m…sorry.” His words were slurred, his eyes bloodshot, his pupils dilated. “So…sorry.”
“I know, Joe.” Moving closer, I cupped his damaged cheek with the palm of my hand and leaned in close. “I know.”
“The…baby.”
“Still cooking,” I pressed a featherlight kiss to the tip of his nose. “What have you done to yourself, huh?”
He groaned in response. “I was coming…to find you, I swear. I just got…”
“Sidetracked,” I answered for him, breaking my own heart in the process. “Yeah, I can see that, Joe.”
And this is it, I thought to myself, this is your future.
This is the boy your heart is set on.
“I need you to get back up, Joe.” Crying quietly, I pushed his hair off his face and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I’m hanging in here, baby, doing the fighting for both of us, but I needed to climb back on your feet.”
“I’m just so…tired.”
“I know you are,” I agreed, feeling my soul crack. “But I need you to keep fighting.”
“I’m no…good for…you.”
“That’s not true.”
“I don’t have feelings anymore.”
“Yes, you do, Joe,” I whispered, clinging to his trembling body with mine. “You just need to remember who you are.”
"I tried to warn you,” he slurred. “You didn’t hear me and now we're both fucked."
PART EIGHT
OUR NEW REALITY
AOIFE
The next several weeks passed by in a horrendous blur of deception, heartbreak, and broken promises.
Joey’s descent into addiction had come on as rapidly as the weight he continued to lose.
He was barely recognizable now.
With track marks on his arms and bruising on his veins, I watched on helplessly as he continued to numb his pain.
My boyfriend was back in the flesh, but the boy I’d fallen in love with all those years ago, seldom made an appearance anymore.
As the child in my belly continued to grow, so did the gaping ridge between us.
I couldn’t seem to reach him anymore.
It didn’t matter what I said or did, he wasn’t listening.
Joey had well and truly checked out on life.
He was my closest friend, and I felt his absence everywhere I went and in everything I did. I felt his withdrawal in the deepest corners of my heart.
He had fallen headfirst into old patterns and, right there with him, I was repeating past mistakes.
Giving him a pass and turning a blind eye to things that I knew were wrong. Things that I knew could destroy him. Because the fear I had of losing him was too great.
Falling in love had exposed the biggest weakness in me because my heart refused to allow me to walk away from him, no matter how hopeless it seemed. Weakened and demoralized, I watched on daily as he continued to splinter both his world and mine, because I knew he was still my Joey underneath the ghost he had become.
Every now and then, rare as they had become, I saw glimpses of that boy who stole my heart all those years ago. I saw the person he used to be, and I reveled in it. It gave me hope, seeing him, knowing he was still in there somewhere.
With his father hiding from the law in rehab, his mother falling apart at home, and his brother’s sudden reappearance, I knew the pressure my boyfriend was under was insurmountable. It didn’t take away the fact, though, that time was ticking, and we had a baby on the way.
It didn’t take away the fact that in a few short months, I would have a choice to make.
If Joey didn’t get a handle on things, he was going to end up forcing my hand. The thought of what might happen when that day came caused my heart to shrivel up and die.
Because I couldn’t do this without him, but I refused to repeat past mistakes.
I refused to subject our baby to the same ordeal their father had been exposed to.
I wouldn’t be Marie Lynch.
My baby would come first.
REMEMBER MY FACE
JOEY
"Molloy, wait up!" Pushing off the wall outside the GP surgery, the one I’d been waiting against for the past twenty-minutes, I hurried after her. "Wait up, will ya?"
"Can't," she called over her shoulder – her rigid shoulder – as she pulled up the hood of her raincoat, gave a quick glance left and right and crossed the road. “I’m late for school.”
Yeah, we were both late for school, but I was the asshole late for her appointment.
Swallowing down my self-loathing, I clenched my jaw and jogged after her. "How did it go?" I asked, falling into step beside her when I reached the footpath. "Is everything okay with the, uh…” Shoving my hands into the front pocket of my hoodie, I concentrated on the footpath as I spoke. "Are you okay?"
"Am I okay?" She stopped dead in her tracks and let out a humorless laugh. "Am I okay?" she repeated, swinging around to glare at me. "Hmm, let's see, I've just spent the last hour being lectured by a doctor who’s known me since childhood about the dangers I’ve been exposed to, because unlike the pregnant women waiting with their husbands and partners for good news, I'm the fool at risk."
"Risk?" Panic roared to life inside of me. "For what?"
"I'm at risk," she hissed, "because I was the fucking eejit who laid on her back for an intravenous drug user who can't remember his own bloody name half the time! A little fucking humiliating, don’t you think, Joe?" she demanded, tears filling her eyes. "To be that girl." She narrowed her eyes. "To be the girlfriend of that guy."
It took me a while to register her words.
The fog in my head made it so fucking hard to focus.
But once I did, my heart cracked in my chest. “Jesus Christ,” I strangled out. “I didn’t give you anything, did I?” Panicked, I choked out, “I’ve never cheated on you.”
“I know, Joe.” Sniffling, she shook her head. “My test results are all clean.”
Relief flooded my body. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
"Yeah, well, I guess I should say thanks for showing up," she deadpanned, turning on her heels. "Better late than never, huh?”
“I overslept.”
“Uh-huh. I bet whatever you took knocked you out hard.”
“Aoife, I’m sorry!” I called after when she stormed off. “I can do this. I can take care of you and the baby—”
“You can't even take care of yourself!” She pulled her hood back up when the wind knocked it down. “You’re sick, Joe. You’re so sick and you can’t even see it.”