? You Don’t Know What Love Means – Nothing More ?
I’d come home early that day to surprise her. I hadn’t seen her since breakfast, and I knew she’d been stressing about the wedding plans and the work she’d been doing on a solo album, so I thought I’d do something nice. Maybe order some dinner, talk about the guest list or whatever else had her stressed. As soon as I stepped in the house, the atmosphere felt off.
The lights were dimmed, and I could hear whispers from the living room. I set my keys on the counter and moved toward the voices, my footsteps echoing too loud over the tile floor in the quiet house.
And that’s when I saw them—Amy and Stella—sitting on the couch hunched over, their backs to me. At first, I thought they were just deep in conversation, but as I stepped closer, I saw the small syringe Stella was holding to Amy’s arm.
I froze.
“What the fuck are you doing here, Stella,” I said, taking a step forward.
Amy jolted at the sound of my voice. She turned to face me, and her eyes went wide and her face paled. For a second, I thought I might lose my grip on reality. My body trembled with a mix of rage and disbelief.
“Someone better tell me what the fuck is going on.”
“What’s it look like?” Stella said, rolling her eyes and pulling the needle from Amy’s arm. “She’s my sister and she needs me. You can’t keep us apart forever.”
“I—I don’t understand,” I said, my voice barely steady enough to form the words. “You were clean.”
“Relax,” she said, avoiding my eyes. “I just…I needed something to take the edge off. The stress has been too much, Eric. The wedding, the album, the press…everything! I miss my sisters, alright? I need them.”
“How long has this been going on?” I asked, even though I knew I didn’t want the answer. Neither of them spoke.
The air felt thick. I couldn’t breathe. It was as though I had walked into a nightmare, one where everything I thought I knew about this woman—the promises, the hope, the future we were building—was slowly crumbling in front of my eyes.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “No. You promised me. You promised that you were done with this shit. Withher,” I said, pointing at Stella. “You said you were going to stay clean. You—” I stopped, because I couldn’t finish the sentence without choking on the words. “You swore you were done with this.” My voice broke on the last word, my voice now barely above a whisper.
“Eric, calm down. I’m sorry, alright. I didn’t mean for you to find out like this. I’ve been trying, but it’s just…it’s so hard.”
“Hard?” I repeated, the word tasting bitter. “This is more than hard, Amy. This is you falling back into something thatdestroyed us once already. It’s destroyingyou. I can’t watch this again. I can’t watch you do this to yourself.” My chest tightened. I had spent so long trying to pull myself out of that hell, and now I was watching the woman I loved make the same choices I had once made.
“I didn’t fall back into it. I just needed something to feel better.”
I wanted to scream, tell her how selfish she was being, but I knew from personal experience that it wouldn’t help. I also knew, deep down, that this wasn’t about me. This was about her and the demons she had never fully confronted. The ones that were pulling her back into the darkness she thought she had escaped.
I knew it because I had been there.
I took a step back, struggling to keep my emotions in check. “You don’t get it, Amy. I’ve been sober for years, and you know what that takes. You know how hard it is for me to choose sobriety—to chooseyou, to chooseus—every single day. But I did that. I chose to fight. And you’re choosing this.”
She stared at me, her face a mixture of shame and defiance. And then, in a voice colder than I had ever heard her use, she said, “And what do you want me to do, Eric? Huh? You’re a hypocrite. You think I don’t know what you’ve been through? You think I didn’t hear about you falling off the wagon more than once?”
The words hit me like a punch to the gut. She was right. I had been there. I had slipped. I had failed. But I had also chosen to fight. I had chosen sobriety. I had chosen to break the cycle, to take the path of recovery.
“This isn’t the same,” I said, my voice raw.
“Fuck you, Eric,” Stella said. “Don’t act like you’re better than her.”
“Fuckme?” I yelled. “No, Stella, fuckyou. Don’t act like you care about her. That you love her.”
“She’s my sister. Of course I love her.”
“Yet I’m the one trying to save her, and you’re the one shoving needles into her arms.” I turned my attention to Amy. “Baby, you know what it’s like to fight for your life. I’m not perfect and I’ve messed up, but I’ve chosen to be better. To be someone I can be proud of. I’m asking you to do the same. I’m asking you to choose me. To chooseus.”
Her face crumpled, and for the first time in weeks, I saw her truly break. “I can’t, Eric. I’ve tried but I can’t just stop. Not like you did. I can’t just turn it off.” She took a step back, away from me and toward her sister, her voice quieter but steady. “You don’t understand. I’m scared. I’m scared that if I let go of this…I’ll lose everything.”
My heart broke for her. “You don’t have to lose everything,” I said, struggling to keep my composure. “You just have to let go of the thing that’s tearing you apart. It’s not worth it, Amy. It never has been. You have to choose yourself, first.” I took a deep breath, steadying myself for the words I was about to say. “If you can’t do that, I can’t help you.”
She looked at me, eyes filled with tears, and for a moment I thought she might give in. I thought she might choose me, choose us. But then she shook her head, and I saw the finality in her eyes.
