It Was Always You Novels & Stories

The tiny, folded slip of paper , Ethan Grant’s phone number , had become my personal religion. For fourteen agonizing days, it had lived tucked deep inside the stitching of my uniform apron, a burning coal against my skin. Two weeks. I had survived two weeks of perfect silence, two weeks of scrubbing floors and polishing secrets, pretending the warm pressure of his lips on my cheek had been nothing but a fever dream.

Still his. Always his.

I hear the door close shut and I bring myself to break down completely and cry on the couch, knowing that I have once again lost a battle to my sister, just as always from the very beginning. In every battle against my sister, the outcome was always the same. My sister alway wins, and I always lose.

"Please, can it just be a fight and not a break up because I can't lose you either, I love you too much to lose you, baby." "I thought you wanted to break up with me?" I ask him, confused because he's acting like I wanted the break-up, and I didn't. "I thought when you drove off that was your way of telling me that we're finished." He pulls back from me and holds out his wrist for me to read his tattoo, the word 'Always' written so boldly, our special word. "Always, it means you have my heart forever." He says, making my own heart flutter. "I need you to have faith in that word and believe that I will never end us, not unless you want to?"

Jacob came to see me after the funeral even though we'd been broken up for months at this point but even still he was the only person I wanted to be around. He was the only person who knew Charlie as much as I did. They were best friends. I hardly talk about Charlie anymore. I try not to think about him too often because the pain still feels raw. Once I started to come out of my shell again I became sort of a helicopter parent and was constantly paranoid and anxious about anything going wrong which is why it was so weird that Alice was all the sudden taking a page out of my book. We finished primping ourselves and walked out the bathroom door and Bentley was there waitng for us.

"I understand. Just remember, you don’t have to go through this alone. Whatever you decide, I’m here for you, okay?" "Thank you," Samara whispered, wiping away a tear. "I don’t know what I’d do without you." "You’re stronger than you think, Samara. Just take it one day at a time. And if you need anything, you call me, no matter what." "I will," Samara promised, a small smile tugging at her lips. "I love you, Debrah." "I love you too, sis. Take care of yourself."

Together. Always together.

Every time. Always.

She asked. “You, always you.” The End.

"Do you want me to be there?" "Yes." I typed back one word: "Always.”