Blue Ribbon

Chapter 1 - A new beginning

"Did goodbye mean letting go,
and did letting go mean forever?"

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PART TWO

Alex's POV

I've tasted heartbreak before.

It's not a foreign feeling for me. Its bitterness is still embedded deep down in my mind. It's rooted in a very dark place, a one I've locked years and years ago.

It's just been long. So long since I last felt it ripping at my inside. It's been a long time since I felt like I could lose everything again.

Heartbreak was when they told me the plane crashed.

It was when Cara came back.

It was when Lilly looked at me and called another man dad.

It is now, at this exact moment as she stood right there and called me a killer.

It's ironic how I always felt that this moment would come one day. Our past was too complicated, too messed up to stay hidden and buried. I was a fool to think it wouldn't knock back on our doors again. The irony is that I tried to prepare myself for it, but now, as she looked at me like that, with so much blame, so much pain, and something akin to hate; I knew I am not ready. I was never ready.

She knows the truth. She knows part of it, there is no possible way she knows it all.

She knows only the ugly parts.

The ones that draw me and Cara as the bad ones; the one who killed and the one who betrayed.

The two that lied.

I looked back and wondered; asked myself how and when it all went wrong.

It was that day. It has to be. I should've never let her go. I should've never accepted it. I should've insisted more. I was supposed to stop her.

That place, that city, that country is tainted. It took a lot from me, and is still ready to take more.

*************

Four years ago...

"You must be kidding me," I snapped as I slammed my fist over the paper, "I said no before, I told you that I don't accept this, and what did you do?" My eyebrow raised, "You still went behind my back and applied!"

Lilly gulped down, fear at my anger flashed in her eyes but she didn't back away, she stood her ground and defended, "It's what I want," She explained, "Dad, it's Cambridge, it's something I've worked really hard to get and I did, so why are you so intent on taking it away from me?"

I couldn't think straight, how could I possibly think straight, "I told you there is no way in hell I am sending you there," I stressed out, my fingers curled over the acceptance letter, wrinkling it, letting my distress on the innocent piece of paper, "And I am still on my decision, you're not stepping a foot in there!"

Her eyes widened, bewildered at my words, "You can't do that!" Her voice raised, "It's not your decision to make, it's mine, so if you don't have a logical reason why you're against this, I will go, I don't need anything from you, not your money, and not your approval," Her words fed the anger building at my inside, "Because when Chase went after what he wanted, you supported him, but me, your own daughter and I can't even get your support!"