If I Fall Read online

  Amber Thielman

  If I Fall

  Amber Thielman

  Copyright 2019 Amber Thielman

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to real events, real people, and real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, organizations or places is entirely coincidental.

  All rights are reserved. This book is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author. All songs, song titles, and lyrics contained in this book are the property of the respective songwriters and copyright holders.

  Disclaimer: The material in this book contains graphic language and sexual content and is intended for mature audiences, ages 18 and older.

  There is content within this book that may set off triggers click here for help.

  ISBN: 978-1797557519

  Editing by Swish Design & Editing

  Book design by Swish Design & Editing

  Cover design by Anna Bloom

  Cover Image Copyright 2019

  All rights reserved

  How do you survive after your best friend takes his own life?

  In the wake of Carter’s unexpected suicide, Khloe struggles to make sense of why he would leave her so abruptly. The only way she can find out is through his journal, like a portal into the deepest recesses of his mind.

  As she unravels the dark secrets that eventually drove him over the edge, Khloe finds herself falling prey to the same darkness that claimed him. Will her other friends—both new and old—be able to help her find the peace Carter never could, or is she destined to follow him beyond the last page?

  For your convenience, below is a list of Spanish terms used in this book.

  Any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the author.

  cariño—sweetie

  celoso—jealous

  chica—girl

  chupadora de pollas—cock sucker

  compañera—partner

  corazón—heart

  defuncion—death

  demasiado—too much

  la salchicha—the sausage

  loca—crazy

  major amigo—best friend

  mierda—shit

  novio—boyfriend

  perra—bitch

  pinchazo—prick

  púdrete—fuck

  relajarse—chill out

  Blurb

  Dictionary for the Reader

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Playlist

  More Books to Check Out

  Acknowledgments

  Connect With Me Online

  About the Author

  God, but life is loneliness, despite all the opiates, despite the shrill tinsel gaiety of ‘parties’ with no purpose, despite the false grinning faces we all wear. And when at last you find someone to whom you feel you can pour out your soul, you stop in shock at the words you utter - they are so rusty, so ugly, so meaningless and feeble from being kept in the small cramped dark inside you so long. Yes, there is joy, fulfillment, and companionship - but the loneliness of the soul in its appalling self-consciousness is horrible and overpowering.

  ~Sylvia Plath~

  March 31, 2018

  “Khloe, your phone. It’s ringing.”

  My eyes flickered open. I didn’t move, and instead, let my gaze flash around the room. I laid there for another moment under the comforter, motionless and silent, still half-asleep. The air in the room was stale and smelled sour with stifling heat and sweat. My head swam with dizziness, much like it had before I fell asleep, and my stomach churned from the aftereffects of booze and weed.

  “Khloe,” the voice said again. I closed my eyes. Maybe if I ignored it, it would stop talking.

  The tiny silver cell phone sitting on the dresser next to my bed was nothing short of deceiving. The catchy tune I had momentarily listened to on repeat, now made my eardrums want to explode. How could something so loud and annoying come from something so small and fragile?

  “Khloe, answer the fucking phone!”

  The male specimen lying next to me sat up, reached across, and plucked the phone from the dresser before tossing it near my head. It was still going off, shrill and violating. Christ. Why hadn’t the person hung up yet? Still groggy, I grabbed the phone and looked at the screen, swiping my finger over the screen before putting it to my ear.

  “Carter?” My throat was raw and scratchy and tasted like bile. I cleared it and winced. “What are you doing? It’s four in the morning.”

  For a moment, there was silence. An eerie and unnatural silence that made my heart thump against my insides like steel drums. My throat tightened.

  “Carter?”

  “Hey, Khloe.”

  My best friend’s voice was different—quiet, almost poignant. I rubbed my face and kicked the covers off, sliding my feet into a pair of slippers. I padded down the hallway to the bathroom so I wouldn’t wake up the guy who was asleep again and probably drooling on my pillow. I made a mental note to wash it tomorrow if I wasn’t too hungover to function.

  “What’s up?” I asked, shutting the bathroom door behind me. “Is everything okay?”

  Another long silence cocooned me. I could barely hear him breathe.

  “Are you with anyone?”

  “Just some guy I met at work tonight. But I’m in another room. It’s all right.” I ran a hand through my tangled brown hair, trying to recall the last time I’d taken a shower and washed it. At this rate, dreadlocks would be my next fashion statement.

  “What did I tell you about sleeping with losers you meet at the club?”

  “Oh, relax.” I leaned over the sink to survey the mascara stains under my eyelids. I looked like a harlot. “He’ll be gone by morning. You’re going to worry yourself to death. Besides, there’s nothing wrong with scoring free drinks all night.”

  “You’re only eighteen,” Carter said. “You’re supposed to be a server. You’ll get fired if you keep it up.” He sighed, and silence led again. I waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t.

/>   “Carter?”

  “I’m here.” His voice washed with sleepiness—groggy—as though he were in and out of some dream world. My fingers tightened around the cell phone in my hand until my knuckles ached. “Besides, Ava needs to stop sneaking you booze. She’s a bad influence.”

  “That’s beside the point.”

  Another long silence greeted me, but I didn’t push it, just waited for him to talk. Sometimes that’s all you could do.

  “I care about you, you know,” Carter said after a full forty-five seconds. “And you have a habit of doing reckless… things.”

  “Only to push your buttons.” I took a seat on the edge of the bathtub and crossed my legs, scanning the mysterious bumps and bruises up and down my skin. Blackout nights and perplexing injuries were not new to me, but they were puzzling, nonetheless.

  “It’s not funny.” His voice tightened. I paused, startled by the sudden anger in his tone. Carter rarely snapped, especially not at me. The last time he’d raised his voice in my direction, I’d twisted his arm behind his back until he apologized just to escape the agony.

  “Don’t you use that tone with—”

  “I worry about you.” He cut me off. His voice was softer now, his anger diminishing. He sounded off somehow. Maybe buzzed or high. But Carter didn’t drink. I’d never seen him cradling so much as a Dr. Pepper at parties. “I really do. I worry about you.”

  “You don’t have to,” I retorted. “There’re a lot of things I wouldn’t have been able to get through without you. But the rest is up to me to decide for myself.”

  “If this guy in your bed is gone before tomorrow morning, I won’t have to kick his ass.” For a moment, Carter sounded like his old self, and some of my concerns faded.

  “Oh, best friend, what would I do without you?” I stood and turned on the cold water in the sink, then leaned down and filled my mouth, swishing the stale taste of beer and cigarettes out the best I could. I didn’t have the energy to brush my teeth, so this would have to do.

  “Carter?” I said, drying my mouth with a towel. “Are you sure you’re okay? It’s usually me calling you at four in the morning, not the other way around.”

  “Jusqu’ a la procaine fois.” It was our secret phrase meaning ‘until next time’ in French.

  “That didn’t answer my question,” I said with a smile. From my bedroom, I could hear the guy snoring in my bed. I didn’t know his name, barely knew his face, and I didn’t care to.

  “Take care of yourself, ami.”

  “Will you stop speaking French and talk to me?” I sat back down on the edge of the bathtub. The beer from earlier sloshed around in my stomach. “I know something’s wrong, Carter. You’re my best friend. Talk to me. Why do you sound so weird?”

  The loud beep in my ear made me flinch, and I held the phone away from me and stared at it, dumbfounded. Even during our worst fights, sometimes even the ones that had escalated to a screaming match, neither of us had ever hung up on the other one. It was an unwritten rule.

  “You ass,” I said aloud, dialing his number and pressing the green button. We were going to get to the bottom of this, upset or not. After the fifth ring, I snapped the phone shut, opened it, and then dialed again. I figured he’d have to forfeit and admit bad-tempered defeat, eventually.

  “Carter,” I said to his voicemail. “If you don’t answer this phone the next time I call, I’ll come over there and pound your fucking door down.” I snapped the phone shut for the fifth time and sat fuming on the edge of the bathtub, giving him time to listen to my voicemail. He never could bear to hear me upset, so I didn’t doubt the phone would be ringing any time now.

  Anytime.

  I dialed again, a small lump of panic was rising in my throat as the phone rang and rang. I hung up and shoved it into the pocket of my jeans, grateful—though not for the first time—that I’d passed out in my clothes. In my bed, the male still snored, even louder now. I kicked off my slippers, yanked on some shoes, and sneaked out the door, careful not to wake the stranger. I could only hope he’d be gone by the time I got back.

  The chill of a Washington morning in early spring hit me as I fumbled in the dark for my car keys and slid into the driver’s side of the piece of shit Grand Prix that almost didn’t qualify as a car anymore. It started on the fourth try, sputtering and wheezing as it gave into what sounded much like a mechanical asthma attack. I slammed it into drive and headed toward Carter’s place, unwilling to admit my high school car, Missus Betty, was probably nearing the end of her eventful life. We’d all known it for a while, but the reality of the situation still stung, especially when she was still chugging along after two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand miles.

  “We’re almost there,” I said to the wheezing car. “I know it’s cold outside, but just a little further.” Missus Betty wheezed up the hill in the direction of Carter’s off-campus apartment. The lights were off when we finally arrived, and I put the car in park and turned off the engine, patting the dashboard with a thank you. I slid out of the car and trudged across the lawn to the front door. I tried the handle. Locked, per usual. What a girl.

  “Carter Drake, open the damn door!” I shouted. In the house next to his complex, a dog began to bark, shattering the stillness of the early morning. I spun around to face the general direction of the barks. “Shut the hell up!” I didn’t care if I woke the neighbors. They were uptight assholes, anyway. A tree obscured the window to Carter’s bedroom, and I couldn’t see the light on. Maybe he’d fallen asleep midway through our argument.

  “I’ll break your window!” I threatened. As I stood on the front porch in the dark, the dog’s barking grew louder, and I became colder. Too annoyed to stand there until the sun rose, I picked up a small stone from the garden, pulled back my arm, and heaved it at the second-story window. It made a sharp splitting sound against the glass before bouncing off and hitting me in the face. I cursed, holding my nose, suddenly remembering the spare key hidden under the rock in the garden.

  “Damn you, Carter,” I mumbled. I fell to my hands and knees to grope around in the dark for the flat stone that hadn’t moved for two years. My fingers brushed the smooth surface, and, using my cell phone for light, I grabbed the key and brushed the dirt from my pants before sticking it in the lock and pushing the door open.

  The entire apartment was dark—silent. Aside from the buzzing of the fridge in the kitchen, there was no sound. I pocketed the key and felt against the wall for the light switch, flipping it on and shutting the door quietly behind me. The living room lit up, blinding me momentarily. I looked around, seeking some sign of Carter, but the house was still. Just as expected, the place was spotless. Over the suede chaise sofa laid a hand-woven quilt, the quilt I’d made him during my long-ass, torture-filled summer at camp without him. The coffee table in front of the couch was tidy, only flaunting a few stacked magazines and an aloe vera plant. The apartment was clean, cleaner than my place had ever been, which was typical for the two of us.

  “I’m coming up,” I hollered at the stairs. “I hope you’re decent.” I waited for some reaction, some grumbled reply or sleepy bitch-out. Instead, there was silence—a silence that chilled my core. “I know you’re here. I saw your car by the curb.” Trying to ward off the dizzying effects of my hangover, I climbed the stairs one at a time, giving Carter enough time to fully wake before I reamed his ass for hanging up on me. “It’s your fault I’m not sleeping right now,” I said. My head pounded, my vision fuzzy as exhaustion overcame me. I stopped in front of his door and let my hand rest on the handle, pushing it open. “I may very well kick you out of bed and—”

  There was silence, an eerie, terrifying silence that seemed to freeze time. In that silence, someone started to scream. For a fleeting second, I wanted to cover my ears and yell at them to shut up, grow up, be quiet, get the fuck out. Shut the fuck up.

  Then I realized it was me.

  I spotted the bottle of pills first, a neon
orange prescription bottle lying open on the floor. The lid was off, and it was empty. Next to the empty bottle of pills, he was there.

  With a sob, I dropped to my knees in front of him. I could hear my breath coming in quick, short gasps of panic as I reached out and allowed my trembling hand to feel for any sign of life. His lips were tinged blue, his eyes partially open and staring at the ceiling above us. His skin, at one time running so much warmer than everyone else’s, was cooling down, chilled, and waxy.

  “No,” I screamed the word until it hurt my throat. “I don’t understand what’s happening. I don’t understand what’s happening. Carter? Carter. Tell me… tell me what’s happening. Carter!” I collapsed onto him, letting my head rest on his chest. “I need to call 911,” I murmured. Jumbled thoughts raced through my mind, none of them making a bit of sense. I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and dialed 911. My hand shook so severely I dropped the phone twice.

  “It’s okay,” I said to Carter. “They’ll be able to help you.”

  “911, where’s your emergency?” asked the operator on the other end of the line. I touched my face, only just noticing the tears rolling down my cheeks.

  “My friend,” I said. I reached down and squeezed Carter’s hand. “He’s… h-e needs help. I need an ambulance. We’re in the Kirkwood Meadows apartments, number sixty-one.”

  “I’m sending paramedics now,” the dispatcher said. “Ma’am, can you tell me what happened?”

  “No. I don’t know. I just… I need someone to come and help him. I need someone to come and save his life, and I—” The cell phone dropped from my fingers. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I heard it clatter to the floor, bouncing against the hardwood floor of his bedroom. I reached for him again, resting my hand on his, our temperatures clashing. I could feel my face and fingers start to tingle and numb, threatening a panic attack.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I said, lacing my fingers together over his chest. I began compressions, holding my breath as the seconds ticked by in slow motion. I paused for a moment and checked for a pulse. There was nothing. “I love you, Carter,” I whispered, pumping his chest again. “I’m so sorry, just stay with me. They… they’ll help you.” Then, in the silence of the house, amongst the midst of death, I lost it.