LITTLE SECRET | RAFE CAMERON

72: 𝘊𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘰 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦

Alice stared at the ceiling of her dark room.

The only light was that of the moon, which fell into the room through her windows and kept her awake while her thoughts ran loud circles in her head.

A week had now passed. A long, agonizing week in which she had only left her room to force herself to eat. The constant pounding of her head had bound her to her bed, but the tears had lessened as she had used them up.

But that night was the worst yet.

She lay awake in her bed for quite a while, trying to fall asleep, but every time she closed her eyes, her thoughts became too loud.

She was fucking done with it. She didn't want to feel like her life had consisted of nothing but him for the last few months.

Because now that Rafe was no longer by her side on nights like this, Alice suddenly felt more lonely than she had ever before.

And being alone did things to her that she was damn scared of...

She hesitantly pulled herself out of bed and wrapped her blanket around her shoulders like a robe as she slipped out into the quiet hallway and glanced at the door at the other end of the hall.

The small slit beneath the door showed that the light inside was still burning.

With quiet steps, she made her way up to the door and knocked, waited and thought about going back to her bed, but for the first time in ages, she found herself back in the little girl she used to be.

She needed her big brother.

„Alice?" Ian opened the door and tilted his head in surprise. „why are you up?"

„I, uhm—" She pulled the blanket tighter around herself.

„It's the middle of the night"

Alice nodded, knowing what time it was, but when she felt her throat tingling suspiciously again, she sighed heavily. „I know, but do you have a minute?"

„You okay?" His expression softened at the sound of her voice.

Every other day she would have said yes. She would have pretended that everything was fine, because she hated crying in front of others.

But that night felt like her final breaking point.

With a heavy shake of her head, she took a small step towards Ian, who - without thinking twice - wrapped his arms around her as soon as she buried her face in his shoulder.

And for a moment, they suddenly were both as young again as they had once been when he had taken on the role of the big brother whenever his younger sister was in pain.

But the pain she felt now was not nearly as easy to bear as it had been back then.

„What happened?" He asked with concern as her muffled sobs hit his shoulder.

And when Ian got her to sit down on his bed with him, she told him everything that had been burning on her heart for nights and had kept her awake. She told him about that one car ride with Rafe and the weird phone call that had started all this shit. She told him about the text messages she had read on his phone and the argument afterwards, about her last few nights and how she had hardly slept, to the final point when Alice had nothing more to say.

Every little flame that had burned on her heart and carried Rafe's name had passed her lips and gone out.

Ian was silent for a moment, thinking, just stroking her arm softly as she lay with her head on the pillow he had placed on his lap.