Escaping Death [Watty Awards]

Chapter 36-Gabriel

This chapter is very close to how my life is...maybe you guys can guess which aspect of it as you read :) But like always...enjoy and I hope you guys love it! I think this may be the longest chapter from Gabriel's perspective :) 

Inspiration comes in all different shapes and sizes.  Everyone's inspiration comes with a story. Sometimes, inspiration comes from someone very special in our lives.  Mine, came in the form of a friend :)

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Chapter 36-Gabriel

I stand up and take a step towards Gwen but she says, “No.  Please.”  Then she runs out of the kitchen. 

I let her go and I’m completely and utterly taken aback.  I can’t think straight.  Her words keep repeating in my head over and over again.  I want to marry you.  I want to marry you.  I want to marry you.

I hear the front door slam and I realize that Gwen left.  I run to the front door but she is already backing out of the driveway.  I see the worry in her eyes and tears that run down her face.  I can’t let her go.  It feels like she’s tearing my heart apart.

She sees me running towards her car but she shakes her head as she drives off towards her house.  I stand there and see her car disappear down the street until she turns and she’s gone.  If this is how it feels watching her leave then I don’t know how I’m going to bear watching her die.  Letting her die isn’t an option, I tell myself.  Panic rises in my throat and I feel like I’ll never see her again even though I know that that isn’t possible. 

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I use my powers for the first that I’d gotten them back and time travel five minutes into the future and appear in Gwen’s bedroom.  She isn’t home yet and I sit on her bed waiting for her to come home. 

I begin to do math in my head.

It’s a twenty minute drive from my house to hers.  She left about two minutes before I time traveled so that would mean that she is seven minutes into her drive.  Only thirteen more minutes until she gets home. 

One word keeps running around in circles in my head.

Marriage.

I’ve never thought about marriage.  It’s a concept that I’ve never had time to stop and think about.  Yet it’s something that Gwen has thought about.  I get up from her bed and go to her vanity mirror.  I see her journal set on the corner and I can’t help but pry it open. 

It’s written in sloppy cursive and I realize that it’s her fourteen year old hand writing.  I close the journal and examine its cover and I remember that I had given her this journal on her birthday.  It was a month before I left and never saw her again.

I open the journal again and begin to read:

July 23, 2006

Gabriel gave me this journal for my birthday.  He says that it’s for my thoughts and mine alone.  Well, I’m glad that he gave me this.  I don’t know who else to tell this to.  My mom already has a hint that I like Gabriel…I don’t even know if I do like him. I just know that I’ve been feeling different when I’m around him.  It started the night of the play when he kissed my cheek and I thought of the word love. 

Do I love him?  Does Gabe love me or at least like me?

I don’t know….UGH! I don’t know how to feel about this.  He’s been my best friend for as long as I can remember and I don’t know if I can risk our friendship for some feeling that I don’t even understand.