Pastel Colored Sadness

Epilogue

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Epilogue

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While we prepared for our journey to Maine, I found myself alone in the house that had been so safe to me. I couldn't believe that this felt more like my home than my old one, even though I've lived here a little more than a few days.

It felt like I've lived an entire lifetime here. I turned to the kitchen table where the black cloth still covered Thomas' diary and the necklace for my firstborn child. I smiled as I removed the cloth. It was time that I healed the pain that I had pushed aside so far.

I took my time to open the tiny book, looking at the first page and the photo Thomas had taken stapled to it. Each word was like I was reading someone else's happiness. Someone else's past until it came to the page that Thomas met Adam.

Each page I read after that day was like a stab to the heart, his gentle words holding so much pain as time went on. Adam had threatened him, threatened his family. The thoughts I'd wanted to hear, that he'd kept to himself, were written down here, and sometimes there were tears stains on some of the pages, warping the words.

Each page had a photo stapled to it, and each one of them was of me, or of us together. There's so much I wish I could say to Tom now. So much we never had the chance to say before.

I wish I could have helped him fight against Adam, who I realized must have been Tethys' Kelpie. This Kelpie would be coming to avenge his beloved Siren's death as well, I was sure. I don't remember him very well, but I knew he'd come.

The last entry was Tom's wish for me to forgive his selfish decision, and to know that I was his only source of light within this darkness. It wasn't my fault that he was tired of the world closing around him, closing around my light. He wanted to stop the darkness before it went after me too. He thought he was saving me from the pain that he had suffered from, but in reality he'd left me alone to deal with it myself, without his love.

Even then, I couldn't hate him for his decision. For the pain he put me through. It was because of his actions and my own and even Tethys' that I now had Conner, the person who had given me a heart.

Thomas finished with a hope that I would move on, and get better. That I'd find someone who wasn't drowning in the darkness closing in on them. To find love again.

I decided then that I would find myself while finding out what happened to Theo, and become strong enough to move on one day.

"Taylor? Are you ready?" Conner asked me as he rubbed my arms with his large, warm hands. I smiled.

"I love you," I whispered. His eyes smoldered as he looked down at me. I turned around in his arms and kissed him. "I'm ready to move on from the pain. I won't let it crush me ever again," I promised.

"I'll protect you from it to the best of my abilities," he promised as well.

"You'll protect me from it just by breathing, Conner. Now let's find my brother."