CHAPTER ELEVEN
Ruthlessness
She walked nonstop, feeding only on her veal. He continued surprising her with his lifestyle, but she asked him why he was not eating and what kind of food was he used to. He said that he really admired the kind of food that she ate, but it was not common here in the turtle kingdom and that’s why they would rather feed on different kinds of food. He didn’t let her know everything, and he definitely wanted her to adopt his life style here. His desire for her was totally unbearable and, among other precious things around him, he needed her. Meanwhile, she complained of the cold, due to overexposure ever since she had fallen into the turtle kingdom. She couldn’t adapt to it because it was extremely harsh compared to the one she was used to.
At that time, as they walked, she dreamed of the hottest sun ever, causing her to miss the hot summers of Los Angeles; but that was an odd dream now, and Clijsters would laugh at her if she mentioned that her favorite taste was sunshine at this moment. In spite of the cold she felt, she was batting her eyes at him, thinking; how cute. Sometimes he looked like one of those handsome teenagers splashed on magazine covers. “Why haven’t you eaten anything yet, Clijsters?” she asked, taking the chance abruptly. He also seemed to glance at her with some vague concern. He was silent again, that’s why she decided to start a conversation, though that wasn’t the right question to ask him. He refused to reply instantly, making her more desperate, as if he had stabbed her in the stomach. She was confused and she knew that in order to succeed, she had to trust him, but the penguin had cautioned her about him. She knew he had love for her, and she could see it through his actions, but her mind was divided.
When she made up her mind, she decided to put things right, between her and Clijsters. He was actually boring her to death, so dull it was frustrating her. “Once sitting with mum, I said to her that one day I will bring a man home. But at that moment, she just laughed at me,” she averred. “When I asked why she had laughed out loud, she said it was the funniest thing she had ever heard from an eight year old. In my mind, I wasn’t a brat; but I had learned that people love, because mum said she was always dad’s biggest date, even though they parted ways earlier.” When he saw the way she looked at him, he sighed. “She was just surprised by you saying that,” he responded. She knew he would respond; his concept of love was no different to that of other young boys learning to date. So he must be happy at heart, she thought, smiling again. Clijsters was glad to see her smile. He drew a deep breath, imagining that they were holding hands.
Twenty minutes later they were moving again, while having a conversation. Talking to him always caused her not to worry much about the journey. They had to move ahead to the forbidden gate, though it was a complex one. Hope, for her, was the one good thing that was chasing her wanderings through this odyssey.
All his behavior was a bit strange to her, as usual, but she was becoming much connected to him. Though, at times, he lacked interest, and charm, and he looked to be that person who could destroy what he cared about most. However, he declared that she was the most determined person that he had ever come across in centuries. Immediately, Chloe asked herself. Did he mention centuries? At first she thought it was just his grammatical mistake, but now she realized that all his history was referred to in centuries, not weeks, days, or hours. Anyway; she felt it wasn’t the time to dwell on that.
“So now you believe that my mother was right,” she continued after some time. “But we all live to love, and it hurts to hear people who don’t love and don’t care to be loved.”
“Yeah, it all depends on someone’s desire. She thought teenage love is not true love and is not real. Of course she doesn’t want to see you grown up, to be careless about whom you give your heart to, because she understands love. So, based on her advice, she would be happy to see you giving your heart to someone who really deserves it.” In fact, Chloe knew that sometimes teenage people of her age were not always mature enough yet, to fall in love. But there were always those teenagers (like Clijsters) who were mature enough to experience the beauty and depth of "love" – like he was doing to her. She was still anxious to talk to him, mostly continuing the story more, about falling in love for the wrong reason, something which she was cautioned not to do, by her mother, as a child. Thinking back made her to think wiser again. In other words, not to think that Clijsters was different, pure or especially made for her. She was standing there, but only in person. Her mind was busy figuring things out. She could feel something inside her telling her to give up on him, as well as her other part insisting that she couldn’t continue without loving him.
