Flames, Promises & Dust

Ch. 3 - Temporary High

So i finaly got a beta who helped me out with the editing. Though i changed a couple of things quite a lot after it had been edited she was still great help. So i just want to thank HelloMojo aka Carly for helping me out on this chapter:)

And to EPHY, who has also been great help since the begining of the series .... and last but not least my readers. I honestly appreciate you taking the time to read this.  

This chapter goes a bit dark, well disturbing(i think)... so id just warn those who are not into F/F, to just not read it. 

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Temporary High

Inspired quote by Edmond De Goncourt.

How utterly futile debauchery seems once it has been accomplished, and what ashes of disgust it leaves in the soul! The pity of it is that the soul outlives the body, or in other words, that impression judge’s sensation and that one thinks about and finds fault with the pleasure one has taken.

Except Briar had not felt any pleasure during tonight’s events. There was no pleasure in the acts she had committed. The only tiny bit of pleasure came right at the end, when she was handed a pen and a contract that would most likely change her entire life. Now, that pleasure gave her actions more than enough justice. It was done and that was all there was to it. Debauchery or not, the path she had chosen was entirely to her, the correct path. Her uncle and aunt should see the strong person she had become. It was up to her to not disappoint them. And it was up to Briar’s subconscious to forget and simply move on. Regrets should not linger.

 Briar relived the events that transpired in the recent hours as she entered her hotel room. She replayed the entire night in her head, from the beginning to end. The introduction, the proposal, the seal of the deal, followed by the contract. And in one night she has gained so much. If her uncle would not be proud, then she didn’t know how else to top the current achievement. Along with achievements Briar had lost herself in the process. The very little morals and values she had possessed had simply vanished and she felt nothing of it. No remorse for having slept with a married man who would be, by the next week her boss. Instinct pushed her fears of being insane away. It wouldn’t help learning she had gone mad.

Briar shook her head, wishing her brain to remain silent. She needed to forget, yet she also wanted to see herself. To search within and summon the Briar only she knew.  

She removed that solid facade she portrays day in and day out, and instead, wore her broken scarred, fragile skin. Onyx eyes stared back at their own reflection, searching for anything human, anything to indicate that they still had soul in them; but she saw nothing. Briar smiled sadly to herself. Why was she even trying? Her soul was gone long ago, taken with permission by her childhood past. Living with no soul and not feeling anything, made life seem easier. The less emotion she allowed to control her, the less pain she felt.

Yet tonight, something made those feelings resurface. Made her feel shame and guilt, and worst of all, regret.  Of all the things in the world, Briar did not want to regret. She had a belief, and that belief went as such- regret nothing, deny everything. She had to deny tonight. She had to open a hidden door in her mind and lock tonight’s events inside. And the sooner the better!

It had to have been the last words Leonard said, before he left Briar in the apartment.

“Your father would be proud.”

Those five words triggered something in her brain. She wasn’t proud about her ways at getting employment and she had no doubt that her father was turning in his grave.