Black Clouds of Cotton (In Vein #2) - C.M. Radcliff

1

Hadley

As I sit out on our balcony, I pinch the filter of my cigarette between my lips and take a drag. I breathe the toxins into my lungs as my eyes scan the hazy horizon. I’ve always been terribly afraid of heights, but when Sloane and I decided to get our own place, our options were limited. We managed to snag a two-bedroom apartment in the city for a decent price. The only catch was it was on the fourteenth floor and said floor is the hardest to rent out.

If you ever look at an elevator, you’ll see that the thirteenth floor doesn’t exist. With the bad rap that the number thirteen gets for being bad luck, they completely eradicated the number. In reality though, the thirteenth floor does exist still, the number just isn’t there. So, by doing that, the fourteenth floor is technically the thirteenth.

Do you see where I’m going with this?

Those who really think about it understand that the fourteenth floor is the thirteenth floor, just with a different name. So, even though there’s no number thirteen that you’re pressing to get to the floor, you’re still on that floor.

Thirteen is bad luck, so no one wants to live on that floor, except people like us. People who don’t give a shit or only attract bad luck. Should I really run away from something like that, or embrace it?

Tilting my head back, I exhale slowly, watching the wisps of smoke curl into the evening sky. Grabbing the arms of the chair, I scoot it back, making sure that I’m as close to the building as possible. Even though I agreed to live here doesn’t mean that I’ve gotten over my fear of heights. I’ve just learned how to live with it. And to not get too close to the edge.

The past six months have been about staying as far away from the edge as possible. After Ander, I could barely get through the day without breaking down. He dragged me through the depths of hell with him and somehow I got out. Somehow I survived. I wish I could say that the same happened for him.

After the day that he overdosed and cut me out of his life, I never heard from him again. I called him over and over again for days. He never turned his phone back on. Eventually, the number was disconnected and I finally stopped trying. I showed up at his apartment every day for weeks. When his landlord showed up with the eviction notice, I was sitting on the floor outside his door, sobbing into the crook of my arm.

Before I moved out of my dorm, Troy showed up the one evening looking for Abby. He sat in silence, watching me with a perplexed look on his face as I mourned alone over the loss of Ander. Hope was never restored, but that night, Troy gave me something that no one else could.

Troy had kept in contact with Ander after he ghosted me. He wouldn’t tell me where he was, but he could at least tell me that he was alive. His addiction had swallowed him whole, but he was still breathing.

That was a few months ago now. All I can do is hope that he’s still breathing now...

I sit alone in silence, watching the city nightlife happening on the ground below and smoke my cigarette down to the filter. A tapping sound behind me catches my attention and I turn around in my seat, finding Sloane with her finger on the glass door. Smiling, she motions for me to come inside. I look past her, seeing a few of our friends setting up Cards Against Humanity on the coffee table with an assortment of drinks.

As much as I love living with her and don’t hate my life, I enjoy my time alone. I love the quiet and the solitude and the intrusive fucking thoughts of Ander that cloud my mind.

Stubbing my cigarette out in the ashtray, I slowly rise to my feet with a sigh, looking out over the balcony into the distance once more. The sun is slowly setting on the horizon, the sky a mixture of orange and pink-tinted wispy clouds.

Another day that the sun sets and I’m left with a hollowness inside that I try so desperately to hide. I wonder if wherever Ander is that he’s watching another day come to an end.

Another day that we’re not together.

Standing in the kitchen, I watch everyone sitting in the living