Fate can be likened to the tortoise; cunning. It does not come along in a speedboat or a helicopter. It moves the only way it knows how-slow. Watching one's actions from its vantage point, one's mistakes and falls.
It is said to be a divine will that predetermines events. Simply put, it is destiny.
William likens it to a wretched junkie of a girlfriend. Sometimes she sticks like glue to your side-to help you with your progress. Gives you a push, patting your back, urging you to get all you desire most. Smiles and claps for you like a proud mother as she consciously grants your success.
Sometimes, though, like the wretched junkie she is, all she wants to watch. What gives her the ultimate entertainment-is to see you crash and go up in flames. You can never just tell what ticks her.
One works hard. Sweating buckets in pursuit of the hustle, expecting the fruits of labor in earnest prayers. Fate looks upon the man's pitiful self and laughs sadistically. She has decided she only wants to see the struggles, the pain, then watch how long the man can't stand again. Watch as he finally burns.
The man feels persistent and refuses to burn, keeps on standing; trying to pick up the pieces of life that are broken. In her high state, long legs stretch over and smash those pieces until all that remains is sawdust.
William feels he has won over fate. He could very well be Giacomo Casanova. At the moment, as he watches from the covers of the thick bush, she watches with him, puffing him up with excitement. His smile might've been tearing his face into two, like one who knows the winning lottery numbers.
Maybe he does, because there, some distance away, on stony grounds is a heap that vaguely resembles a human. Body contorted in unnatural directions. It lay on the ground like a used tissue. As he laid on his back, in place of one of his hands was a stomp, and the other bent at a grotesque angle. Blood streamed out from glazed eyes looking towards the sky in unduly devotion. Any insane man could figure out he's long gone from this world and the sane would know that it was a painful one.
William's purpose here wasn't to see the extent of damage to the man's body. His hiding in these thick bushes surrounded by unforgiving blood-sucking insects wasn't to share or empathize with this man's pain.
It was her.
His major goal was to place a face on this ray of sunshine Kaito was in a hurry to chastise. Unlike Kaito, William prides himself as the very few men-the exception-who are able to think and feel beyond the present moment.
Turns out she was only a young woman. Her dark luster locs pulled in a half-do. Her face soft and lips stretched in a line. Beauty fighting the moon for prominence. Of all her glowing features, he loved the most of her temperament; eyes hard as steel while she watched the dirt water, not the pile of death she had just caused.
Beige beach gown rustled quietly by the night air. Ankle boots as black as her mood. William tsked. Nice wears like that shouldn't be worn for such barbaric acts.
At a beat drop, her eyes zeroed in on his location. And the man's body forgot how to function. Her eyes lingered on for a few seconds, and he thought if she couldn't hear the furious beatings of his heart, she must be deaf. A second longer, had she lingered, he would've been presumed dead by heart seizure. Her legs quivered a bit as she walked out of the clearing. Moving without making much noise.
William bent over the foliage, trying to inhale as much air into his oxygen-deprived system. His body heaving in deep breaths. It was hot, so hot. Beads of sweat lined up like an army of ants on his forehead. If she saw him, he was sure he could not sweet talk his way out of it. Excruciating death awaited him, maybe more painful than the man lying there. Fate will not waste her time saving his smart ass-not when faced with soulless eyes like hers. Eyes like hers could look down on the world and it will have no choice but to crumble.
His mission, though, was a success. Saw her face and he certainly knows her. Hell, half the city knew her. The popular socialite. Left with all her parent's assets after their tragic death.
Her annual charity party held every year was the rave of the cream of the city. And Sunday, two days from today, was the date. Almost all the elites in the city will be present there.
William remembered last year was his very first time in such a gathering. He'd been suddenly hit with a mental rush of dopamine to seek social validation and confirm his social status. He had chatted and drank with high-valued men who treated him as an equal. There was no fiscal valve in meeting the host, so he didn't bother.
Now he knew he had made a mistake, how flawed his thinking was, "everybody has value and use." She certainly has more worth than the purest of diamonds. Bringing her over to his side, the world will burn before him. There will be no limit, no barrier to what he could accomplish.
The charity gathering this year will be more interesting; she was a young woman and on that night, he will present himself as the perfect gentleman. A knight on a dark horse. Or a white. Whichever color she prefers.
Jovic. Jovic Archer should get ready to swoon.
****
Twenty minutes later, he stood up. Across the room, she leaned against a pillar alone. A forgotten drink held by golden brown fingers.
William approached slowly, like a hunter observing a little deer. She stopped fiddling with her glass long enough to see him approach. He made eye contact, held it, and burst a smile her way.
"You look so bored." William came and placed a hand on the pillar above her head that forced her to look up. "If you are this bored out by your own party, then we have failed as guests.''
''I am not bored..." she defended, her momentarily agitation dissipated but her face very still. "There is just nothing left to do. And I would've cleared my plate, but my stomach is full."
"Then let me only apologize for all the men here," he cooed. "A woman like you only needs to talk and they will fall to their knees."
She gestured toward him. "Will you fall to your knees?"
"When I've lost my liquor courage."
"Everyone here wants me to stand prettily while they tell me their latest exploits. What's yours?''
"Yesterday I bought a suit," William told her, while balancing her smirk with a smile, "today I am talking to the most breathtaking woman in the room. I'd like her to dance with me. Put me out of my misery. Dance with me.''
She threw her head away from him and her completely expressionless face broke down into what might be the beginnings of smiles.
