Princess Without Limits

Chapter Twelve

(Leon)

Sometimes I wondered if I'd painted an emotionless facade for too long that people forgot I had emotions too. I thought somewhere on the way, I stopped acknowledging my feelings as well. Maybe it was the guilt that I was the one that caused what happened. Maybe it was the shame that instead of protecting Lena, I let Lena protect me. Guilt made lots of people do stupid things. The self-blame that emerged from the incident was so great, so I pushed them to Lena.

I fault her for being there, for even tampering with the laptop. That was my way of dealing. Somehow, I started believing them one day. I started calling myself dumb for always condemning myself the way I did. I started not bothering to talk to her when we passed each other. I started to forget how I tried to signal to her that it was not me that didn't want to talk to her, that it was Father pulling the strings behind the scenes. I started to cut her out of my life and not belong in hers.

Somewhere among the dreamless sleep, I remembered what happened. I buried it so deep in my brain, but the recent happenings made them surface like they were the lifesavers of a drowning man.

I remembered walking into that place, seeing the laptop in Lena's hand, seeing her type furiously like she knew everything that was on the laptop, the codes, the weird little digits that keep showing up. I did remember that I was the one who screwed up, honestly. I remembered the fear that gripped me. What was she doing? Lena wouldn't do something bad right? Geniuses could do bad things with their intelligence. That was what Mother told me. Without thinking, I screamed. She spun around and looked at me, shocked. Her finger crashed down on a key in the whirlwind of motion. And my whole world was never the same again.