"What we could've had." - Original 😧😧❓❓

⭑001⭑

[Claire's POV]

I sigh as I clean the countertops. I was practically exhausted, having to look after the family bakery. It was no more than an ordinary evening, the orange and pink hue remains as a few streaks in the now darkening sky, the view beautiful through the large, open windows of this bakery.

However, it was time to close off and get going. Steve, my younger cousin who has always helped around in the bakery, finishes up packing a parcel he was supposed to deliver. We're not super duper close, he kinda just exists around here. But he's nice to have around anyway.

I bid farewell to him, taking my strawberry patterned bag as I sling it over my shoulder. I need to visit and check on mom before heading back to my apartment. I start to walk out, checking the time on the phone in my right hand's grasp, my gaze reading the digits showing 06:56 P.M.

When I suddenly bump into someone. I stumble slightly, "Excuse me," My gaze meets the ones of cobblestone gray.

Tall, masculine and cold-looking. In my opinion, he looks like one of those villain-type of guys I'd read about in manhwa's back when I was in highschool.

I simply walk past him. He doesn't look like the type to go to a small, family-run bakery, but who am I to judge?

• • •

Eventually, I catch a taxi as it takes me to the hospital. My gaze falls outside the window, taking in the much darker sky.

I pay and leave the taxi, going up the elevator after entering the hospital.

First... Second... Third... Ding. Fourth floor. I leave the elevator, walking through the hallway. Room 407. I knock at the door. Due to no answer, I simply open the door and enter into the room.

"Mom?" I mumble before noticing her, asleep and tucked in with the blanket covering up to her shoulders. I enter the room before sitting down onto the chair beside her hospital bed.

Deja Vu.

I remember being 7 years old as me and mom entered the hospital room. Dad was killed.

Murdered. June 17th, 2008.

He was a pilot, and I was told it was from a plane crash. Which was the case until I was old enough to know the truth.

Up until this day, I have little to no information, not a clue on who killed my father or why they did what they did.

My beloved father. The person I looked up to the most. The bedtime stories, the cheesey dad jokes and even when he let me put cheap nail polish on his nails.

I smile at the thought. It's been what, two decades since he'd passed? And here I am, sitting beside what could possibly be my mother's deathbed.

I'm broken out of my rather negative thoughts as someone enters the hospital room. I look behind my shoulder, my gaze meeting the kind ones of nurse Isabella.

"How's she been?" I ask casually, curious. "She's been doing better. Although Mrs. Roslynn is rather stubborn when it comes to taking her medication on time." The nurse explains.

I smile at my mother's peaceful sleeping face before tucking in a few loose strands of greyish-blonde behind her ear.

• • •

Note: this took me way longer than it should've 😭😭 i still have a lot of things to figure out for this story saurr nyeaaahhh---