Soulmates ✓

09 | Liquid Heartbreak

It all appeared like a nightmare, inked in agony and liquid heartbreak. Shay felt a weight tied to her feet, drowning her deep into the pit of pain. Her limbs felt numb, and her head pounded, throbbed violently. Every part of her ached, body and soul. It burned like her veins were on fire.

Her head.

Her face.

Her skin.

Her brain worked overtime to recall where she was. Why was she there? And why did the voices around her reach as a buzzing bee near her ear? Shay tried lifting her eyelids, but they felt too heavy to function as if they were made of sandpaper.

"Shay," a familiar voice called softly. "Shay, please come back to me."

She remembered the voice vaguely. It had to be her mother. Shay had heard her many times over the last few times she drifted out of the dark tunnel. Her pleading, breaking, and painful voice coaxed her to stay.

"Shay, baby, please open your eyes," her voice cracked at each word, and then Shay felt her warm hands moving across her face, hair, and arms. It soothed the pain just a little. She shifted her body towards her mother's comfort, a warmth rushing through her veins.

"Ma," a moan was all she could manage out of her dried throat. She wasn't even sure if the word made it out of her lips.

"Yes, baby." Her mother sounded relieved, happy. Her hands now held Shay's aching palm and gave a subtle squeeze. "You have no idea how much I've been dying to hear that from you, Shay."

Shay could hear the sniffling, drops of hot tears falling on her cold skin, a contact that jolted her back to the surface. Then, she felt her mother's breath ghost over her forehead. Her mom kissed her skin gingerly, her lips quivering with the impact of her sobs, and it felt so painful, a deep longing lingering on her skin that Shay choked out a sob herself. Her eyes finally had the strength to open.

Shay blinked at her mother's red-rimmed, tired and wide eyes, looking down at her. Her father holding her mother's shoulders, equally distraught. Although it blurred every time she closed her eyes and opened again, Shay knew she wasn't imagining things or living a dream. They were real.

"Ma, what happened?" Shay breathed her words half-dead inside her throat. But then the beeping sound getting louder each second, the smell of antiseptic flaring her nostrils and pristine white surroundings, everything portrayed a story, a tragedy. She felt her blood turning cold, the chills rose goosebumps, and her heart thudded with skin prickling fear.

Her mom's face twisted, and she squeezed her eyes, more salty water pelting down her face. Then someone burst through the door with tired, scared-looking eyes.

Shay remained frozen. Something ugly, a deep spine-chilling fear, crawled at her ribcage. Her mom held her face with trembling hands and opened her eyes to charge at her, summoning courage. "There was an accident, Shay. Don't you remember? You're hurt, and the boys-"

Shay heard another sound from the door as a familiar boy entered the room, his forehead covered in bandages, his handsome face marred with deep cuts and wounds that would surely leave ugly scars. His timeless, red-rimmed, black eyes locked with Shay. She saw the loss, the despair, the pain, and something else, an apology. He stared into her desperate eyes, leaning against the doorframe, his broad shoulders slumped down and body tensed with unshed emotions.

"Accident?" She looked at her parents, who looked at her with pale faces and sad eyes as they nodded. Then to the boy who stood alone, his twin brother was nowhere to be seen. Her stomach dropped, her mind turning hazy and dull.

"Ryan, where's Aarav? Is he hurt too?"

Her mother wrapped her arms around Shay, her voice low and strained. "Shay, it's okay, baby." She kept stroking her hair, her face, and Shay couldn't even stop her coddling mother because of the morphine slushing through her system.

"Where is he?" Shay asked again, her voice full with demand this time, even though she was scared of hearing their answer.

"The crash was pretty bad." Her mother sobbed some more. "I'm sorry, baby-"

"No!" Shay cut her mother off and shook her head. She looked up at the boy leaning against the doorframe with hope. Then she turned to her mother again.

"Aarav couldn't make it." Her mother's voice was faint, hesitant, and painful.

Shay blinked as her words sank in and suffocated her lungs, her soul refusing to stay inside her body.

Then it all came back. The car crash, the shattered windshield, Aarav's beautiful face marred with shards of glass, his eyes grew distant and blood, so much blood.

An uncontrolled sob knocked out of her throat, her sleep-induced body vibrating through its impact. But she somehow managed to whisper out the words she was craving to know. "How long, Ma?" Her voice was hollow and devoid of life. "When did it happen?"

Everyone stopped, no sound, no one breathed for a second, then she heard a deep soulless voice. Ryan didn't move towards her, but his words were enough to crowd Shay. "Three weeks. You've been in a coma for three weeks." He released a wet-sounding sob, his body shaking with the impact. He took a brave step towards her bed, then another until he was standing on the side. "We had to cremate him."

Ryan reached for her hand, then opened her palm and placed a piece of metal. It was the same ivory bracelet Shay had gifted her boyfriend, which was a perfect fit and looked so very beautiful around his wrist. It lay in her palm, like a dead piece of metal, just like her boyfriend, the love of her life, half of her soul.

Shay clenched the bracelet tightly enough that it stung. She felt a scream deep inside her soul and a barely audible sob. She could hear her parents and Ryan speaking near her, but she couldn't make out their words. The agony consumed her like a big dark stormy cloud, crippling her body, twisting and molding her into a soulless, hopeless, and emotionless being.

Sobs, heart-wrenching sobs echoed, echoed from the depths of her heart as her mother's arms came around her shaking body.

Only one thought repeated again and again like a whiplash, scarring her deep within. Aarav Tripathi was dead. Her love died. Her happily ever after was snatched away from her brutally, no forewarning. Aarav died and took half of her soul with him.

***

AUTHOR'S NOTE

This chapter is sad and dark in its own way. I hope you're loving the story so far. If you are enjoying it, please add your comments and votes. They always motivate me to write further. I'll be updating this story twice a week, but I might update more.

I'm preparing a playlist for the book. Any suggestions?

Until next time!