AVA
I watched him walk away, with his head hung low as I folded my arms over my chest. My face was probably streaked with a few tears and I gently dabbed it away with the inner collar of my shirt.
That felt like hell opening up, quite literally. He didn’t even bother picking up the damn ring, and I stared at it for a second, before moving to it to quickly pick it up. I examined it, twisting it between my fingers.
Scoffing, I clenched it in my fist tightly. I wouldn’t have been surprised, if it was originally meant for Chloe anyways. She was first choice, and I was nothing but the back up girl to Blake.
After he took everything from me.
I’d never forgive him for this, even if I was on my death bed. He thought I was just a stupid fragile girl, but I’d definitely prove him wrong.
I held onto the ring, spinning around on my heel. I’d spent far too much time outside, surely one or two people would’ve noticed by
We walked hand in hand through the winding paths of the cemetery, past a couple of other carefully tended gardens around other graves. The grounds were peaceful at this hour because of use mode of the day visitors were gone—not that it would be particularly noisy if they weren’t. But the night was still young enough that we had the place to ourselves.I glanced up at Alexander, noticing the slight furrow between his brows and the distant look in his eyes.“Hey,” I squeezed his hand gently.“Are you okay? Something’s bugging you.”He sighed, but his gaze was still focused on the path ahead of us.“Talk to me,” I said.“I'm thankful you wanted me to meet your parents. It meant a lot to me.”“But?” I prompted.Alexander gestured his free hand around our surroundings.“But being here...the air in this place. It makes me anxious.”We walked a few more steps in silence before he continued.“My mind keeps going to Isabella,” he admitted. His voice was more strained now.“The thought of somed
Living Among the LostAVALilies were for mum and house irises for dad used to be the usual ritual in the house back then. They were both lovers of flowers so we planted a lot of them around the house. I happened to not share the same love for plants as they did, but I eventually had to start caring.Even now, I cared a lot.Kneeling by their graves, I rested the flowers against their shared headstone as the setting sun over against the golden letters their names were engraved in.I stared at both their names, and the dates, my vision slowly getting clouded by tears my attempts to hold them back. They said time healed all wounds, but it has been seven years and I still haven’t completely healed. The hollowness was still there and today was the first time the feeling didn’t come with a lot of pain as it usually did.I heard Alexander’s feet inching closer behind me, and then his arm coming around my shoulder as he crouched next to me. I leaned into his warmth without a word and took a
BLAKEIt tugged at my skin and whipped at my clothes like an impatient child, the wind. All that valley, lying in a long stretch of blue mountains and green ground below me. It would take just one step and I’d be gone.I edged my toes closer to the edge of the cliff, letting some tiny pebbles drop down. They disappeared long before they hit bottom. Made me wonder if I was the one who dropped like that, would I hear the sound of my own body hurting the ground or would my consciousness have faded out before then?The human body reaches terminal velocity at around 120 miles per hour. A strangely comforting thought. At least there’s a limit to how fast you can fall. I imagined the initial stomach-drop sensation, like a roller coaster but with no track and safety bar. The wind screaming past my ears; the ground rushing up.I took another step closer to the edge and almost immediately felt a touch on my shoulder from behind.I could feel my heart screaming in my chest as I turned around. I
AVAThe coldness of the metal chair I sat on seeped into my back, and it made me more aware of myself than I planned to be. The farther the seconds were stretching, the tighter my lungs became.“Breathe,” I told myself, exhaling once and sitting up straighter.I'd rehearsed this moment for hours; what I'd say, how I’d remain calm, and how I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of seeing me break. It was the least I could do for myself at the moment.One would think I was getting ready for my first ever interview, but all this anxiety was for seeing my parents’ murderer….eye to eye since the first time since I found out what he was.Charles was caught yesterday by the Coast Guard. They intercepted his yacht before it reached international waters. There is evidence against him aside from the recording from the recording Blake sent me, financial records tying him to the hitman who killed my parents, and the toxicology reports from Isabella’s bloodwork. It was enough to hold and char
Hope is FickleAVAAfter putting on a robe and wrapping my hair in Ariel I headed straight for the kitchen. I haven’t had a proper meal in the past couple of days — not that it looked like I would be getting any today as well. The goal was to find something to quench my hunger and distract me from thinking even if it was for a few minutes.The screen of my phone lit up on the counter at the exact moment I was walking out of the pantry with a jar of biscuits.**Dropped by Isabella's**“How’s she?” I asked.**The same. Where are you? You were at the hospital to see Blake right?**“Yeah, he’s in pretty bad shape and the docs still don’t know for sure if he’ll make it.”I stared at the dancing bubble that showed he was typing. Alexander had to deal with Isabella, I had to deal with the situation with Charles and Blake. There was so much bad energy hanging around us, I could confidently say we’ve not had a nice time together throughout the whole ordeal. We still don’t and it was scary to t
The doctor's face wasn’t giving anything away, and he had the kind of practiced blankness that would make you want to shake an answer out of him.“We've stabilized him for now. But I won't sugarcoat this—he's in terrible condition,” he told us flatly.“Is he going to make it?” I asked.The doctor’s eyes shifted away for a second. Bad sign.“That’s hard to say at the moment. The bullet severely damaged his lung and he lost a dangerous amount of blood before they found him. And being left untreated for two days…”“But he survived the surgery,” I pushed.“He did.” The doctor sighed. “The next twelve hours will tell us more. If he makes it through the night, his chances will definitely improve.”If. How much a small word could carry the weight of someone’s life.After the doctor left us standing there, Jason and I stared at each other in silence for a couple of seconds, my heart still banging behind my clothes. Our conversation probably ended along the lines of me returning to check on hi