As It Was (COMPLETED) (wattys2023)

As It Was

The sun had just peeked out from behind the mountains when we stepped out of Garrett's car.

He'd been in a mood all morning; he hadn't said a word to me in the entire two hour drive and would occasionally side eye me and shake his head angrily. It wasn't until we were in the prison that he caught my wrist and spun me around to face him before they could pat me down.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?"

I nodded. "I'm okay. I got this."

"Ev, please. . . just be careful, ok?"

I squeezed his forearm and shook free, standing straight so I could be pat down. The corridor seemed to go on for miles before she finally made a gesture for me to sit in the white chair. Clark hadn't been put on the other side of the glass yet, and it took a bit of the weight of my shoulders. It was immediately thrown back in my face tenfold when he was sat in the chair aggressively and he shouted something at the guard.

The man on the other side of the glass looked nothing like the boy who'd opened fire on us a year ago. His face was unrecognizable; tattooed, beaten, bruised, and bloody. The long, thick blonde hair that always been thrown back into a ponytail was gone, peach fuzz in its place. The moment he turned to look who'd come to visit, I saw a look of genuine shock cross his face before a sadistic smile inched its way on to his bloodied, chapped lips. He reached for the phone at the same time I did, only the first time I tried to grasp the black object, my trembling fingers slipped, and I dropped it.

The moment I brought it to my ear, his voice filled it. "You're like a fucking cockroach, Hope. You just won't fucking die, will you?"

I recoiled, feeling as if I'd been slapped. Not just by the vulgar words, but by hearing his voice for the first time in months.

"What are you doing here?" he asked when I didn't respond.

"I don't know." I answered honestly.

He laughed; cold and lacking any emotion. "You don't know? Oh, sis, here I thought you'd come to apologize?"

"Apologize?" I snapped. "Excuse me?"

"You should be in here too. Rotting away. You killed our fucking brother. You killed Frankie."

I flinched, swallowing hard to keep my emotions under control. "In self-defense. You single handedly took out nearly a quarter of your graduating class."

"Self-defense?" Clark spat with a sneer. "He never tried to hurt you! He didn't even lay a finger on you!"

"He shot Miles! He shot my fucking boyfriend."

Clark shook his head with a bitter scowl. "Blood should come before anything else."

"Yeah? You know, Clark, I would have taken a bullet for either of you. And you sent three of them through my fucking back! You don't get to sit here and talk to me about blood!"

The guard to my left eyed me cautiously and I breathed out shakily, but seeing Clark flinch was enough for me to see it. The brother that cared about me was still in there, however buried he may be. Good. That'd make this even better.

"I spent my entire life defending you, Clark. Made sure to tell everyone to keep their distance, to not bully you guys. I assured them that you weren't a psychopath, just quiet. I begged you, Clark, to look inside and see that you had a heart." I said, calmer than I had been a few second ago. "But you had your mind made up. You knew what you were going to do. I don't want to know for how long."