Chapter 16 Ellise

Chapter 16 Find me in your heart "Zoe, I ll be in the bathroom." I stood up, so I felt a bit dizzy. I am tipsy. Maybe because of the few shots of tequila Zoe and I have been drinking since earlier. There s nothing else to do, so it s better just to fill your mouth with alcohol. I can t get the scene out of my mind before. Only now did I see how serious the woman was. She has something to say, and I know it is important. I don t even have an idea about what it is, but it s definitely about Joaquin. "You want me to go with you?" I shook my head fast, so he quickly understood. I felt dizzy, but I forced myself to walk towards the bathroom when I heard a scream from inside. "What do you think you re doing, Ellise?!" My heart beat faster. That voice is very much familiar. That voice was Joaquin s. Just the sound of it had hundreds of daggers hitting my heart. There s something that I shouldn t know. The man was hiding something from me. I knew I wanted to lose Joaquin because of the pain he was giving me, but I didn t expect the sudden tightness of my chest. I preferred to listen to the conversation of the two and preferred to hide in the small wall that was covering them. From this angle, you can t see the person talking, but you can hear the voice because the dancefloor music is far away. "I m doing what I should, Jo. Why don t you believe me?" I know I have an idea of ??what is happening, but fear and nervousness still remain in my system. I knew Ellise was the one she could possibly talk to here because before the party started, I met her at the door of the resto, highlighting the words that she needed to tell me something. "I will not believe that because it was nothing, Ellise! You know I love Alessia." I laughed and smiled at the man even though he couldn t see me. Joaquin has all the guts. I am what he wants? Does he love me? Me? "That is why I m telling her the truth! I was about to tell her earlier! Fuck!" Gradually, my chest felt tighter and tighter. It was harder for me to catch my breath. "You have nothing to say to her! There was nothing she should do because it is not mine, Ellise!" My boyfriend s voice was showed with annoyance while the woman she was talking to kept crying. "That s not mine, and I won t accept that—ever, Ellise. Remember that." I felt that Joaquin was coming out of the bathroom, so I hurried back to my seat with Zoe. I couldn t even take a chance to pee. I think I m backed down because of what I heard. A friend asked me several times if I was okay or if I wanted to go home, but I kept shaking my head. I have no appetite. I have no intention of acting in the next few hours, and I just want to keep an eye on the people smiling at that bar. Even when Zoe went on the dancefloor, I just stayed in my place, thinking about everything that was going on. In the middle of deep thought, someone suddenly hugged me from behind. And was it based on the smell? I knew immediately who it was. Here we go again, I thought. Every time I think more, I can t help but get annoyed. It has never been enough for a man to lie and cheat on me once and repeat it over and over again. "You re here. You didn t inform me," he said softly, but I turned around, already full of control. "You re here too." I nearly laughed because I sounded bitter. "Yup, sometimes we do gigs at this resto. So I know the owner, so. . . there." I had no plans to open up about what I heard. I just nodded at the man who was still kissing my shoulder. "Let s go home, love. . ." I was already irritated by his tenderness. My desire to get an answer to why he is doing this to me grows. I did nothing else to the man but to be good and make him happy, so why? Why does he have to cheat? All of these must end tonight. I will no longer be afraid of the result. I will not allow myself to sink deeper into the whirlwind of such work of people whom I also trust so much. "I m not going home with you," I said stiffly and clearly to the man. He lightly caressed my arm, still not losing his soft mood. "But, Love, you need to rest—" "Bullshit!" How dare he say that? Eh, he wouldn t even give me time to rest. Tonight, I reached my end. I could think of no other way to end the man s foolishness. "What s the matter, Love?" I hurried out, and he immediately followed me as well. We are getting the attention of a few people around, but I ignored that. "What s the matter, Alessia?!" he scolded me when it was relatively quiet outside. I feel his anger, but I will never let go of what I feel, too. I faced him, also sinking into anger. "You! You are my problem!" I noticed that he was shocked by what I said. It was dark, but I could still clearly see his face became pale. "What are you saying-" "How can you be that insensitive? And Jo, what about going to start again? You re fooling me. You are all fooling me!" I tried to calm down, but maybe this is the right time to say all these. All my problems these past few days. The Almighty must ve helped me. "I saw you. You came here with Ellise, right? Isn t she your date for tonight? So, why isn t she the one you drive home?" I saw people looking at us a while ago, but I ignored that. It was more important to me that I made my way out of the abyss where I voluntarily stayed for the man. "Oh, why can t you speak? I didn t even speak up! I didn t, even once, complain about what was happening! I just care about you, Joaquin, more than myself, so why? Why are you doing this to me?" I washed my face with my palms. No matter how much I want to say everything, my voice seems to be running out because I know Joaquin s mind is still closed to understand. He only thinks about himself. I stared at him and saw nothing but his pitiful face. I m sick of it! "You know what?" I boldly stared straight at the man. He shook quickly after he got what I was going to say next. "Let s end this—" "No, no. Alessia, Love, no." "Joaquin, I m breaking up with you." * * * * * "Zoe, what should I not know?" I irritably asked the friend. It s been a few weeks since that depressing night, but I still can t forget the words I heard in Ellise and Joaquin s conversation. "You have nothing to say to her! There was nothing she should do because it is not mine, Ellise!" My boyfriend s voice was showed with annoyance while the woman she was talking to kept crying. "That s not mine, and I won t accept that—ever, Ellise. Remember that." There must be a meaning beneath that. What is that thing that I shouldn t know? Something Joaquin can t accept. . . "Eh, can t we go to Ellise? That would be okay, right? Did she want to talk to you then? She was desperate back then but never insisted again. " My ears almost clapped at what I heard. We must have thought that for a long time, so I didn t look like a zombie every night. I couldn t sleep because I heard that conversation. We are waiting in the lobby to get the form to be released so we can get clearance complete. Because the previous sem is over and I will have to enroll again for the second semester next month. After Eugene s birthday, I never saw Joaquin again. I left there, and he was just left on the stand. Then he never contacted again, neither did I. I want to prove to him that I am serious about the breakup. But what my system doesn t really accept is what was the thing I shouldn t know. It was as if I would never be secure and relieved if I did not know everything. "Aren t they just the same school as Joaquin?" I don t know what s going on with me. After all, I shouldn t be doing it anymore. I broke up with the man myself, so I don t know why I would even want to know. I don t know, as if something is wrong. It seems like it has to do something with me. I nodded at Zoe s question. Still undecided. When should I ask this? After all, I probably don t have the right anymore because we re separated. Maybe I m going crazy. "Shall we go?" I never answered her, but I knew she already knew what to do. Zoe has always been full of her ways. After we processed the clearance form, we went straight to Elise s school. I don t want to think that there is a possibility that Joaquin and I will meet there, but I still try to expect that the two of us meet, and when that happens, I don t know what to do. Without hesitation, Zoe made her way to the said school, less than perhaps thirty minutes before we had arrived. "Based on her Facebook account, her program is HRM course, so we should go in that building." I nervously followed her. We are here, alright, but what is really my point? What am I really going to do in case I find out that? I just sighed as if it was my only resort. Maybe it s too late to back off because we re already here. We also immediately found the building of the HRM students. We asked right away to the first person we saw. "Hi. Can we ask which room is Ellise Sarmiento in?" He paused before smiling, "Oh, Ellise Anne?" I nodded to him as a confirmation. "She s my block mate," he replied quickly. Zoe immediately smiled at me, "We re not going to have a hard time," she whispered. "The case is, she dropped out last week. She said he won t continue school anymore." "Ah, I see. Why is that?" Zoe inserted. "I don t know. It might be a family matter." I nodded, thinking of another possible way to talk to Ellise. "But you can go to them, can t you?" I just smiled in front of the guy. I am such a fool for not thinking about that. My brain seemed to shut down suddenly. It stopped functioning because of too much thinking. Even before we were knuckled, Zoe spoke up. "Yup, we can. But we haven t been to them yet. We just became friends recently. We re worried about her situation. We don t know so. . . " It seems that the man got what Zoe said, so he immediately gave us the address. "What a freak, really! Like me, friends with that Ellise girl? Over my dead, sexy, pretty body." Zoe s laughter almost echoed when we went to the parking lot to go to Elise s house. She kept laughing even though we were already in the car and left. As for me, I can t even think properly. I feel like I m nervous because something bad might happen today, or I can t because I might just regret it, or I might just get hurt. Ah, I am going insane! Why do we have to gamble in a relationship even if we don t know the consequences? Why do we have to gamble on something that we are not sure of winning? But, whatever it is, I know, and I m sure I really want to know. Maybe I m just afraid of the possible consequences of doing so. It was as if the inside of my stomach was heaving, accompanied by the weakening of the joints due to cowardice. "Let s have lunch first?" I told Zoe when I noticed the time. Maybe we need to have lunch first before doing something ambiguous. "Your treat?" She turned to me with a big grin. We stopped in front of a famous fast-food chain. "Mine," I forced pleasure in my voice. Zoe immediately jumped there and quickly looked for a parking space. I just smiled to myself every time I could think of how much I had to be thankful for Zoe, who s staying by my side even though I always burdened her with conflicts. Even though I was full of physical misfortune, she was still very willing to help. But for now, I will deal with what needs to be faced, what needs to be known. It wasn t the best idea, but we will never know what kind of event awaits us in that place.