Finley’s P.O.V

My eyes widened at his statement. “Wait, what?”

“I’m going to tell you about my lip ring,” Eli repeated himself.

I was stunned by this statement. “A-Are you sure?”

“I’m positive,” Eli took a deep breath.

I fought the urge to giggle at his words, as I’m an immature freak, but I managed to not laugh and listen to Eli as he started talking, not looking at me, just staring across the slowly empting playground.

“When I was younger, I was the center of my parent’s world,” he began. “They spoiled me, would always boast about me, would always talk to their friend about having a kid who was so cute and smart and they doted on me. I guess the novelty wore off around age nine, because they didn’t watch over me as much, and at first I was happy for that they were kind of ignoring me because they were really overprotective, you know?”

I nodded at this, and Eli kept going. “I enjoyed my freedom, but I was too young to realize something- they didn’t care what I did. I could rob a bank or something insane and they wouldn’t even notice. It wasn’t obvious, at first, but as the years went on, they started ignoring me more and as I got older I could tell what was going on. Slowly, they forgot about things like the Tooth Fairy, and Easter and just stopped paying attention to me.

“So when I reached high school, they basically worked all the time, and if they weren’t working, they were with each other, trying to make sure that their “perfect marriage” and “perfect family” stayed perfect,” Eli said, bitterness clear in his voice when he brought up his parent’s views on his family.

“So I decided to do stupid shit to get attention,” Eli said. “I started failing, I skipped classes, I got in trouble for attitude problems to make them come in for conferences, I wouldn’t come home until like midnight on a school night, I did crazy things. As I got older, so did my acts,” Eli explained. “I was almost seventeen when I went and got my lip ring done, trying to do something absolutely crazy to get their attention.”

“Did it work?” I interrupted him then covered my mouth and let him keep talking.

“No it didn’t work,” Eli chuckled bitterly. “Of course it didn’t work. It took them almost three days to notice, and when they did, all my dad said was, ‘good look son,’ and my mom just shook her head and said ‘kids these days are out of control.’ I’m so sick of them ignoring me,” Eli shook his head and looked up at the sky, a small smirk on his face. “I’m so sick of having to fight for my parent’s attention.”

“I’ll bet,” I said softly.

Eli swiveled around to face me, his face giving me a look of mixed disbelief and anger. “You bet? No, you don’t know what it’s like! Your parents love you; they’ll do anything for you! Their precious little Finley with her anxiety,” he said bitterly.

I drew back from him, feeling tears come to my eyes as he spoke of me so bitterly. It sent a jolt of a feeling that I wasn’t familiar with through my heart, and I couldn’t help but think of my mom, and how she warned me of heartbreak. If this is what it felt like to just have Eli make one jab at me, I don’t want to know how actual heartbreak feels.

Eli noticed my hurt expression and sighed. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean that, I’m just angry because I’m talking about my parents.”

I nodded, but I still stayed away from him, not meeting his eyes. Eli cursed and when I glanced over at him, he was running his hands through his hair, looking frazzled.

“Fin, I’m sorry,” he pleaded. “I just… I’m jealous, alright? I’m jealous that your family is so perfect when my parents ignore my existence.”

“You can be jealous of my family,” I said softly. “But you’re wrong,” I added and Eli gave me a confused look. “My family isn’t perfect,” I said, looking down at my hands then at up and look across the now empty playground. “We seem like it, but we’re not.

“My family was fine, a normal one until I started getting anxiety attacks. My brother started mixing in with the wrong crowd, my dad worked a lot and my mom fussed over everything too much. Because my brother was never home, she fussed over me. She made sure that I was fine at school, and that I had friends, and that I wasn’t having a lot of anxiety attacks.

“I became a good liar. If I told her the truth, that I didn’t have a lot of friends, and that I had attacks almost daily, she would take me to a doctor, and a doctor would mean people asking awkward questions about my family dynamic, and pills that I would have to take, and I hated those pills,” I said, imagining that little bottle of yellow pills in my bathroom, sitting there untouched.

“They fixed my anxiety, but they made me depressed,” I said, my eyes now fixed firmly on my hands, which were clad in fingerless gloves. “They made me sad, and I got even quieter and all I did was read and watch YouTube videos and sit in my room for hours and hours on end. My poems,” I said, acknowledging them with a tilt of my head and Eli nodded in recognition.

“I wrote really sad things when I was at my lowest points, like those poems, and I started going on the roof and watching the sky and the stars for hours, and I mean I would just lie there and stare at nothing. I snuck out to just wander around town, not even going anywhere, just getting out of that house and away from those pills and places that reminded me on sad times, and I would eventually have to come back, but the next day I would leave again and it was a never ending cycle, I swear, it was every day.

I sighed and rubbed my eyes, moving my hands to my temples to massage them lightly. “I stopped taking the pills. My mom noticed, and she would tell me to take them, and I wouldn’t, and we’d get in huge fights about it. My brother didn’t care whether or not I took pills or not, and my dad would just tell me to listen to my mother, but I didn’t want those stupid pills, and we’d get into huge fights about them, and I would refuse until she cried about it, sobbing about how her daughter was going through anxiety and how she tried to help but the daughter refused help and she just felt so helpless, and I’d feel so guilty that I’d promise to take them and when she’d stop monitoring me taking them, I’d stop again and then the circle would go on again.”

“Fin,” Eli whispered, but I didn’t look at him.

“I just hated them, because I didn’t enjoy being sad, but I was stuck, I couldn’t break the cycle-”

“Fin,” Eli interjected, putting his hand on my knee.

“What?” I asked, looking at him.

“C’mere,” he said and pulled me in a hug.

He hugged me tightly, burying his face in my shoulder as I hugged him back, closing my eyes and imagining those stupid pills and me throwing them across my room, shattering the bottle and having those stupid bright little things scatter everywhere, and I thought of Eli’s parents, faceless human beings who just went through the motions of life, ignoring anything else in the world, and Eli pleading with them to just pay attention, to look at their son for once in their lives.

“We’re gonna be okay,” Eli whispered, rubbing my back gently. “We both got messed up families, but we have each other, and honestly, that’s all I care about.”

“All I care about is being with you,” I told him honestly, and Eli smiled before kissing me gently.

And with all honesty, comparing both of our situations, parents that care too much are much, much better than parents that don’t care at all.

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merry christmas guys, hope you're all having a lovely day/ having a lovely winter break bc i know christmas isn't celebrated by everyone. love you guys xx

-T A Y L O R