𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐖𝐇𝐈𝐂𝐇 𝐈 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄

─ 𝐝𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐡 𝐈𝐈𝐈

𝐑𝐄𝐂𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐑

━━━━━ ◦ ❖ ◦ ━━━━━━

𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐎𝐀𝐓 𝐁𝐔𝐑𝐍𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐒 words no longer left his lips. A scratching sensation clawed at the back of throat and he was sure his voice had left him. The top and sides of his mouth were bone dry and the feeling of his tongue had long left. The dancing colors of red and orange still burned his vision and everywhere he looked he would see it. In the white snow all he saw was black soot and ash that once was a building. Everyone and everything around him had been tuned out even the voice that he vaguely recognized as Tommy. All that was in his mind was the single phrase, the single sentence:

"she's dead."

And the more he thought about it the more of a reality it became. There was no possible way she could have survived the fire. Within seconds the building went up in a mess of flames and not even seconds later her voice was drowned out and there was no sign of any life. Every solider who dragged her in had walked out without her. And that's when he knew that they had left her in there to die. Wilburs body seemed to function without him as he continued to walk in the line that had formed. People were watching from their windows, not one soul making a move towards their doors. In the reflections of the glass was the dying flames. He couldn't bring himself to look up from the ground. Behind him he could hear the protests and hostile shouts of Tommy yet he drowned out the sound.

And for a moment he fell into his mind, feeling as if he had fallen down a rabbit hole. He couldn't stop the sudden flood of memories rushing to the front of his mind. And in a blur he found himself lost in every second, every minute, and every memory that he had of her. The laughs, the smiles, the tears, and the silence.

He recalled a moment in the cavern, for what felt like an eternity ago, that he swore would never leave his mind. It was one of the moments that made him realize he was madly in love with her.

it was late in the afternoon when he noticed it had disappeared. His hat was gone. Now there was only one probable cause to this sudden misplace of the piece of clothing; his gremlin of a younger brother. The young boy had grown a habit of stealing things and for a time it was always something Wilbur would push aside as a phase he would later grow out of. Oh, how wrong he was to think that; now he would often find things missing of his whether it be clothes, objects, money, or whatever.

so as he always did, Wilbur went to confront Tommy of the missing hat. He knew exactly where to go, the one place where one could always find Tommy, the items room. It wasn't much of an items room as it was just an open space where they placed all their supplies that they had at the time. As he thought of what all to say to Tommy, Wilbur did not realize the sound of two people in the room until he walked up to the point where he could hear exactly the words they were saying.

"Tommy, you know you should not be stealing Wilburs things,"

"i'm not scared of him!"

"i'm not saying you are, I'm just saying it's not exactly a likable trait that you should be acting upon"

"don't get all wordy with me! you're just saying all of that because you're the one who's scared," the ever so irritating voice of Tommy scoffed,

"scared? me? never, there is no reason to be scared when i've done nothing to be scared of,"

"lame excuse for someone who is scared of getting caught,"