Tiara“Where you ever going to tell me?”My mother plucks a wild flower, twirling its petals in her hands before she replies me. “Maybe.”It is weird. Not only the fact that she has never been the type to be uncertain all my life – she is a yes or no person – but also the fact that she, Grace Lemptons, just picked a wild flower regardless of the fact that ‘it would prick your finger pads’ or ‘they’re way too dirty to hold.’ Those were the words she told me when I used to play with them as a kid.“Maybe?” I ask her now.She shrugs. “You were going to find out eventually. James thought it’ll be best if you knew after the divorce.”“You were filing a divorce?”“I didn’t want to at first,” she slumps her shoulders as we walk along the pathway surrounded by untrimmed ledges and the sounds of morning birds, “I was always so selfish. I wanted it all. It wasn’t fair to him. To keep him on the side.”She is just realizing that now?“I asked him y’know. Few days ago I asked him if there was so
TiaraThe beach is cold at this time of the night but I don’t mind.I need the wind to clear my thoughts anyway.Melody texted me earlier about attending the bridal shower tonight but I opted for the serenity of the beach instead. The appeal to get drunk and scream on the top of my lungs has always been lost on me.Tomorrow it will all be over. The wedding, the pretense, everything will be over. I can leave it all behind and catch the first flight back to New York, putting these past few days in the rearview mirror. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.It’s hard to think of my life now and hold back the tears that threaten to spill. Maybe one day, I’ll understand why she chose to stay, but today is not that day, and as I think back on the years, I try not to be her, to understand her choices.Growing up, I’d accepted my fate as the other daughter, the extra they had to keep. It was all I was and I didn’t mind. But knowing now that I could’ve had more, that my life didn’
TiaraThe realization hits me hard as I study his features studying mine.I don’t know when or how it happened but he has come to mean a whole lot to me and this six days I’ve had with him are probably the best days of my life. Maybe I loved him before he showed up at my doorstep, maybe I loved him in freshman year while we were still friends, maybe it’s the time we spent here, together in Ocean City that did the trick but I’ve come to love Ryan in a way that might just turn out disadvantageous to me.“Tee?”I blink. “What?”“What’s going on in that head of yours?”“Nothing.”His eyes roam my face. “It’s not nothing,” he reaches out to smoothen the crease on my brows I didn’t even know was there, the movement bringing him closer, “tell me what’s getting you all worked up.”I shrug. “It’s a question.”His gaze holds mine, his thumb caressing my cheek, “Ask me.”The question rolls in my head, a question I’ve been asking myself for the past two days. It feels final even when I say it, li
Ryan Her eyes dart around as I wrap her shawl around her shoulders.“I can’t believe we did that,” she whispers, eyes on the floor, cheeks a crimson red.I’m holding back a laugh. “You were not so shy hours ago when you –”Her elbow smacks against my stomach, “Shut up.”I laugh as she turns redder, “It’s not even bright yet,” I gesture around the semi-dark beach, streaked by the faint lights of dawn, “I’m sure no one saw us,” then because her after-sex glow is absolutely adorable, I add, “unfortunately.”Her eyes shoot up sharply and she would’ve hit me again if I didn’t lean down and kiss her lips, slowly, letting her know my intentions for later.She is breathless when I pull back and I love that I can bring that emotion out of her. “I’m just going to head to Jackson’s for a minute, I’ll catch up with you in the suite. Okay?”Her forehead bobbles against mine as she nods, “Okay,” she sighs and step back. Then as though a light bulb switches on in her head, she snaps her
RyanI push her away, gentler than I’m supposed to, because her words should be straight out banned from the fucking dictionary.“What the fuck, Ciara!?!”“Ryan—”“No, fucking let go, what the fuck??”She staggers back to me, “What do you want me to say?”“That this is some kind of twisted joke! I need you to say it!”“I can not.” She stresses on the words.“We’ve not been together in like what—”“But we were together,” her voice is placating, “that one time.”“It was one time, and we were dead drunk!”“That’s usually all it takes.”I stare her down, taking in her slender form. “You can’t possibly be . . .” I think back, “two months pregnant?”She shrugs, “Look at me, Ryan, do you think I’m gonna show?”Frankly I don’t know.My hand rakes through my hair in frustration. I need to sit. I need to think. I plop on one of the chairs, designed for the guests. There wouldn’t be any guest needed anymore, anyway. She is canceling the wedding. Because she is having my baby. Oh
TiaraI know it.Seeing Ciara in her messy-girl outfit with the wild look in her eyes, I know something is wrong.I don’t have to take in the confused expression on Ryan’s face to confirm what I already feel.They are standing in the middle of the aisle, close to the make-shift alter and I walk up to them, hoping against all odds that the word ‘wrong’ has a different context to them than it has to me.“What’s going on, Ryan?”Ryan yanks his hand away from Ciara’s touch, meeting me halfway, “Tee—”“We were just talking about you, sis,” Ciara drawls.Ryan glares at her, “Shut up,” to me he says, “we need to talk.”She chortles, “We’ve already had the talk, babe.”Babe?“Do you guys maybe want to this. . .” I gesture behind me to where a handful of people are standing, “somewhere else?”“This is the perfect place, Tee,” Ciara looks smug, too smug and I can feel a tightening around my throat, “I was just telling Ryan about the deal with Thomas.”“Um…” her deal or my deal? I have to be sur
RyanI need to think.Or not.Ciara is still with me as I make my way back into the suite and I whirl at her before she crosses the doorway. “What are you doing?”She gives me an obvious shrug, “Staying with you?”“Cut it out.”“Babe what are you—”“Oh my fucking god, Ciara, cut it out,” my nerves are raw, and I’m too pissed from everything that just happened to try and be a gentleman to my ex, who just turned my world upside down, “you do realize that this doesn’t mean we are together right?”She blinks. “What? You just said –”“I didn’t say anything back there.”“Well,” she throws her hands, “You didn’t stop me either.”“It doesn’t matter,” I need a fucking break! “I didn’t say anything because I didn’t have it in me to. We are going to find a way to compromise, because of the baby. I can’t turn back on an innocent child,” the ultra sound sheets are still burning a hole in my pocket, “this is about me and you and our child, not you. So don’t think for a second I’m getting back with
Tiara“I guess you were right,” Melody plops on my bed, “Danny is gay.”I grump into my pillows.“Taylor really was a guy’s name,” she ponders.“Go figure,” I mutter.“Gurl, you’ve gotta admit – Ocean City was a blast. That was like a honeymoon experience for me and I ain’t even kidding about it.”“Well,” I raise my head just enough to look back at her, “I’m glad one of us enjoyed it.”“Oh come on, babe, you know I didn’t mean it like that.”If only she knows how much the word ‘babe’ repulses me right now.“Yeah I know,” I sink my face back down on the silky pillows, “I know.”She pulls the covers off my body, “Come on, Tee, you’ve got to get up.”“Why?”I don’t have to turn around to see her obvious shrug, “Because it’s been a week,” she turns me over so I am staring up at her, “Listen, If it’s meant to be, there’s no stopping it from happening.”My head cocks to the side as I regard her, “Are you quoting me?”“I’m quoting a girl I once knew who would never spill a tear over a guy.”
TiaraBeep. Beep. Beep.The sounds are faint, distorted, like somehow, my head is dunked underwater and I am listening to the dim sounds from above.I listen as the time slips by because really I do not have a choice, it is all I can do anyway. My limbs are stiff, my whole body feels numb and my ears seem to be the only thing that is working.At first, I can’t make out the words, it is more like a blur, a light buzz in my state. But as time goes on the words drifts to me, clear as a dream.Hence, I listen to the occasional tearful, “Is she going to be okay?”And the hundreds of masculine, “I’m not leaving her side, you’re gonna have to fucking drag me out and put me on a fucking wheelchair.”And the usual, “If you think I’m gonna let the stupid authorities handle this you must be joking.”And the sporadic, “You’ve got to get up, Tiara. The sunset is wasting every single day.”It takes me a while to figure out the voices and at first it comes as a kind of disturb to my otherwise peacef
TiaraHis eyes bore into Ciara’s as he steps further inside.“Jackson?” I call.“You fucking tricked me!” he spits out, his eyes on Ciara.Why isn’t he looking at me?!Ciara blinks at him. Then at me. Mirroring the same confused expression on my face.“What are you doing here?”“What the fuck do you mean?”“I mean, you’re supposed to be one state away, back in New York.”“Well, change of plans. They are on their way to Connecticut.”Wait . . . what?!“What?” Ciara voices my thought.Jackson looks exasperated when he says, “Your father. He told them about his properties in Connecticut. You didn’t foresee him ruining our plans when you made this hell of a plan?”Our plan?“What are you talking abou – Jackson?” Confusion is eating away at me and his ignoring me isn’t doing anything to help my state, “What do you mean our plan?”As expected, he ignores me again. “You said YOU WERE FUCKING PREGNANT!” he barks instead, spit flying everywhere.“A slip,” Ciara shrugs, “so what?”“Yeah?” the l
Tiara“What happened to you?” I ask her.Ciara has gone unnaturally silent in the few minutes after she whacked me across the face and I don’t want her to entertain anymore riling thoughts in her head.“Talk to me, Ciara,” I almost cannot recognize my own voice. Blood is spilling from my lips and from a cut in my forehead. My eyes are dazed but I don’t have the time anymore to register my pain and put all these in thoughts.I watch as her lips shift into an unamused smile, “You stole from me, Tee. You’ve been doing it for a long time now you are quite good at it.”“But we can fix—” she snorts, “listen to me, Ciara. Let’s fix this. We can turn this all around. Untie me, let’s go home. We’ll talk about this around a hot cup of coffee and we will forget that this ever happened.”She makes a short barking sound that is between a laugh and a short ‘ha’ sound. “You’d want that don’t you? You’d want all that and more.”“What are you talking about? We can talk about this. And Ryan? He can—”A
RyanMy hand pushes the door to a bedroom open.Empty.Then a bathroom, a guest bedroom, the closet.I hear Melody doing the same all around the house, coming up with the same results as me – nothing.This is the third house we have been to within the span of time I called Grace and now, and we still haven’t found a single thing. Not a single thing to boast of.Grace was panicked when I made the call, frantically begging me to do something, anything, to bring her daughters back. ‘Daughters’ as in plural.I didn’t stop to think about what she meant.The physical manhandling of the cop in New Jersey might get me to jail eventually but for now it seems to be doing more wonders than naught and it didn’t take up to an hour before the sirens filled the air and a search warrant was issued.Tiara James-Lemptons is missing.If the cops are not going to take this serious then they’ll have to deal with the media on their necks 24/7 for the next month. That got their asses moving.I also informed
Tiara“Hello, sister.”My throat tightens as the voice registers in my foggy brain.I blink, trying to block the too bright sun rays away from eyes in that single moment.Ciara moves a bit to her right so that she stands directly in front of the sun streaming through the window, shielding me and revealing her sneering face to me at the same time.I gasp. Somehow, I still held doubt in my head even after I heard her voice. Somehow, I thought I had been hallucinating things. But seeing her confirms that she is really here, and not just some figment of my own imaginations.“Ciara? What the fuck?” I say, even though panic is tearing at my heart.This is wrong.So wrong. Surely, the hit to my head was more than I gave it credit for because now I am seeing things.Because Ciara? Yes she hates my guts but this is just . . . extreme.I try to get up to my feet to meet her gaze because the sun behind her is illuminating her features, blocking it so I know it is her but her face is kind of part
Ryan“How sure are you that this is an assault?” The man in the cop uniform asks Melody. He has a rough beard and a cop moustache that makes him look older than his age and the bored expression on his face is like a slap to my mentality.Melody looks like she is about to shake the shit out of him when she says, “What the fuck do you mean—”“Language, ma’am.” he warns, his eyebrow raised up.“How can you stand there and ask me — how can you – there is blood on the board, dammit!”The man gives her a warning look but doesn’t say anything.She goes on anyway, “The door was left ajar, on a spring night,” she emphasized, “There is blood on the skating board, and the victim is missing. What other evidence could you possibly need?”Immediately we found the door open and we each made rounds to different parts of the house to confirm that Tiara indeed wasn’t there, we decided to call the New Jersey cops to let them know of a possible assault and file a report of a missing person.So far, there
Ryan”Fifty bucks, she fell asleep and forgot to text you,” Jackson comments from the backseat, “I mean she is human after all. We do a lot of things we haven’t done before.”“I’m not taking a bet on the safety of my best friend, Jack,” Melody shoots at him.“Safety? I mean,” Jackson shrugs, “she could literally be asleep right now, and this road trip would all be for nothing. We can just take a swing from here right now to Connecticut. I know a guy with a club that can let us—”Melody shoots daggers at him that shuts him down.He clears his throat. “Have you tried calling her again at least? I mean it’s past dawn now.”True to his words the morning sun is trickling through the open windows into the car, the warm rays, doing nothing to uplift the coldness that has settled in my guts.I’ve forgotten that Jackson asked a question until Melody speaks up again, “She is still not picking up. It’s dawn already, Tee is a morning person. She should have been up by now. And if she isn’t, then
TiaraThe humid smell of mud first hits me.For a second I am led to believe that I am in a very, very dark room. A dark room with no windows and no doors and just the right amount of oxygen.But as my eyes adjust – or in this context – fail to adjust to anything in my line of view, I realize that there is a thick material around my face that covers the entirety of my eyes. It could be sunny out there for all I know.My brain is a mush of uncontrolled thoughts and deafening buzzes and the headache just above my right eye is throbbing in a way that would make the doctors fret. If the doctors saw me now.What the fuck?What happened?The last thing I remember . . .I was in the beach house. Then I went to the beach for a stroll.No, I had gone to take my jacket from the room upstairs. But that is not the last thing I remember.The last thing I remember is me standing right across the threshold in the beach house, pulling the door open because Ryan had rang the doorbell.Wait. . .My hea
Ciara“She is being diagnosed with NPD. It’s not that rare of a case but it is as severe as any other disorder out there, maybe even more.”I remember the conversation like it was yesterday.I was ten years old and I remember being really glad my parents accompanied me to my therapist’s that day. It was one of the trips we went without Tiara and I was super pumped that she had to stay alone with boring old Mrs. Fisher, our live-in sitter at the time.My mother had squinted her eyes at the doctor while my father remained calm like he’ll rather be anywhere else in the world than here, listening to some boring ass therapist.I felt exactly the same way.“What is that?” my mother asked, “What does NPD even mean?”“Well,” my therapist adjusted her glasses like someone about to give a very educated, very important but also very boring lecture. “The word, NPD is an acronym for “Narcissistic Personality Disorder” and it is categorized in most cases by a need for control, and,” she starts tick