Impressing the Clients

85

Paula's POV

Have you ever lost someone?

Someone so dear to you and you thought to yourself, you never get to see them again. You never get to touch them, never get to hear their silly laugh and ridiculous banters again. And you never even get to say how you truly felt for them.

That's what I felt.

And I was full of grief and regret.

I was blaming myself. 'Cause who else can I fucking blame?

If only I had not come back home to this country, if only I had stayed with them in that beautiful beach and just figured 'fuck it!', Marco wouldn't be here. He wouldn't be fighting for his life.

Yes, I pulled the trigger.

The thing with gunshots, you thought that you could get used to the loud, deafening bang, that your ear has adapted to the normality of it, that it was just some noise or some shock to your ears. But it's not. At the first kiss of every bullet might be someone's last breath. One pull of a finger can fucking wipe a living being out of this world. One loud bang can abruptly snap a life endless of potential and possibility to a complete seize of existence.

One finger, one trigger, one pull.

But two loud bangs.

And two bodies on the floor.

Two still bodies.

I was frozen and I trembling at the same time.

'What have I done?'

I was too afraid to look. I was too afraid to check. I was to afraid to see for myself what's in front of me.

And just like any lost child, I turned to the adult in the room. The expert, the all-knowing. I turned to Clint, unable to blink my quivering, scared eyes. He was looking at the bodies and he looked back at me.

I can see his lips moving, like he was shouting something, like he was in a rage. But it's all muffled. And his rage was towards me, which was totally understandable.

I fucked up.

He was closer to me now and I was just watching him shout at me, he didn't care if he was spitting on my face as he let out whatever goddamn words he was saying, he was all red and was brimming with tears. I want to know what he's saying but it seemed like I can only hear the ringing of the two gunshots.

I want to hear him, I want to move, I want to cry aloud, but I was frozen.

The next thing I know was the stinging pain on my cheek. And my upper body bended sideways at the impact. My hand was on my cheek, it was stinging hot. It was so fucking painful, I had never been hit that hard before.

But it brought me back. I was back.

"—I told you not to shoot! He's at gunpoint, Paula!" He continued shouting at me as I try to straighten myself.

Clint hit me. He hit me hard but I felt no anger, not even a little bit, it was necessary. I was spiraling further and I needed that hit.

"Did you just fucking hit my girl?" Marco rasped weakly.

Marco.

He's alive.

And just like that, the stinging pain on my cheek was gone. The ringing in my ear, silenced. Any thought in my mind, out the fucking window.