Beast Conquests

Chapter 13: Left

"New progress has been uncovered from the most recent discovery of an ancient civilization unearthed three years ago."

          The anchor woman had a stiff smile as the television speakers made scratching background noises. The TV was unceremoniously shut off with Alexa tossing the remote on her couch.

        "I should get a new sound system." She muttered, putting whipped cream on her drink. Her friend, Lawrence, leaned back from the sofa, the pearl necklace gleaming from the morning sun.

        "Girl, so... Are you really marrying him? I mean, Francis.." Lawrence sighed and shook her head. Her best friend knew, as all good friends did, that some guys weren't as man as they seemed to be. Not as kind or sweet or even genuinely loving.

        But it would take a tragedy or a miracle to convince someone so blind in love that the one they fancied wasn't good for them.

       Alexa just rolled her eyes.

       "France is perfect."

       She looked around at the ragged one bedroom apartment. From someone raised in luxury and was born in an old money family, Alexa struggled more than most to live simply.

       As the barely livable house creaked and moaned and bitches about, ready to be burnt to the ground Alexa thought about the life she'd had before and the events that followed at how her life began to fall apart.

      It began with her sister. Mirabella Louise.

Three years ago

        She'd been sitting in a hospital, half her life spent in clean white rooms smelling of disinfectant. The familiar hospital air always lingering around.

       Alexandria Louise was waiting for her sister before her scheduled surgery. Her parents sat by her bedside with her mother holding her hand. The fierce red hair kept in a tight updo. Tall nose and milk white skin. Alexa's mother, Lana, was a naturally beautiful woman who aged like fine wine.

       Yet, beneath the sharp and exquisite features were stoic and almost stone like heart.

       "Your sister'll be here if she has any good sense." Her father spoke, eyes on a newspaper his hands twitching with the desire to lit up a cigar he kept away.

       "Papa, I know." Alexa didn't know what to say when her parents sometimes jabbed at her older sister with words like that. Sometimes she flinched as if she were the ones to who the words were directed to.

        "That ungrateful girl." Lana muttered under her breath, Alexa frowned and took her hand away from her mother. Lana sighed. "I know, I know. She's in college. She's busy. Still, is that more important than her sisters health?"

       Alexandria decided not to argue anymore to prevent the atmosphere from souring since she knew that when her sister arrives, she'll bear the brunt of the awkward tension.

        "Sister, I'm scared."
        "Don't be. Everything will be alright. I'll be right by your side, through the end."

        But no until the very last second, seventeen year old Alexandria, who hoped to the end to see her sister before being put under a potentially life threatening surgery was let down.

       Mirabella never did arrive even when Alexa was being wheeled of, despite all of Mirabella's promises.

       'I'd been battling this brain tumor since I was a child. I never got to run around and play or the only time I got to go to school was by barely a year. Painful, more painful on some days and always, almost living in my bed tied to machines and needles poking through my skin.'