KILLSHOT // [H.S]

025. CINEMA // PEANUT

025. CINEMA // PEANUT

"Rory, get away from the window! Stop stalking people," her grandfather would have said.

Turning her head over her shoulder, she didn't see the grumpy man in his chair, watching the baseball game. Countless others had told her that time heals all wounds. But even at twelve years old, she knew it was a load of absolute bullshit.

Plenty of time had passed, and it never got any easier.

Her grandfather's chair had been deserted since she was a kid, but it was never easier to see it empty.

The kitchen had been without the constant scent of vanilla and freshly baked goods wafting through the air.

No one came through the door on holidays or to surprise her on her birthday.

Plenty of time passed to heal all those wounds - she did everything the counsellors and therapists had said, yet nothing worked.

She never cried or shed a tear in public because she knew how it made him feel to see her upset. It ruined him and shattered his heart to know she was still hurting inside after all this time.

With so much loss at a young age, only one person remained in Rory's life.

And every day, she stood by the window and waited for him to come home.

The house phone rang, causing her stomach to knot with fear. She hated when the phone rang, and he wasn't home. She was terrified to answer it and have it be that call, the kind that meant he was dead and never coming home again.

That was how a twelve-year-old secretly lived her life - constantly fearing that the last person she had would die. What else did she know? Everyone else was gone. She didn't have any grandparents left—no Uncles or Aunts. No cousins. No brothers or sisters.

Without him, she had no one. Nothing.

No one could tell the dark thoughts ran through her head. Aside from the counsellors telling her time was the cure for her wounds, they told her Dad to keep her enrolled in all the after school activities she used to enjoy. Soccer, ballet, math and science club. She hated them all, but she showed up to class every day with a smile because it made her Dad happy to see her busy. Besides, he was the one that dropped her off and picked her up, worked extra hours to afford it all, and attended every showcase, competition, or game.

He was always there.

And yet she still feared that one day, it would all end.

That's why she hated it when the house phone rang, and he wasn't home.

Because if it were that call, her entire world would shatter into pieces. And with everything she kept inside for his sake, she had no idea how she would ever function normally again.