REINE || Paige Bueckers

Chapter twelve : Healing

Jane

MY HEART HURT, since that day he never stopped making me suffer. I feel exhausted without doing anything, and feeling any emotions has become a burden. I feel like a burden. A burden that I have always carried in my frail arms, which presses heavily on my shoulders. My heart seems to be empty of emotions, as if it has created an armor making me unable to feel anything. Ding ! My head snapped back to my bedside table where my phone was laid. I didn't want to talk to anyone, for fear of discovering that they had also been manipulating me from the beginning. Kk's name appeared on the screen and my body relaxed slightly.

She was definitely one of the people I had gotten closest to along with- Say her name give the impression of opening still fragile wounds. Saying her name was always painful because it reminded me again and again that she had betrayed me. But Kk had nothing to do with all that, did she ?

It didn't matter anymore, I desperately needed someone to be there for me and she had always been there and caring towards me. I click on the button to accept the call.

"Hey girly pop Grey !" Her cheerful tone made me smile almost instantly, and seemed to pick up the pieces of my heart a little.

"Hey Kk ! Wanna get some food ?" I ask her then that she cheers my idea with the same enthusiasm. If she knew how bad I was but also how much good her personality made me feel good. She seemed like a ray of sunshine melting the ice from my gloomy shell.

"Hell yeah ! I'll pick you up in ten minutes." She answers me as I hear her run down the stairs of her apartment and grab her keys before closing the door. I really wish I could stay there, on my bed, depressed, my heart is begging me to do that. I was clearly not mentally ready to do anything, even getting up to go wash had become an ordeal in recent days. I was a shadow of my former self, tired of pretending everything was okay when nothing was. But on the other hand, remaining stuck in my dark thoughts would mean that I'm letting them win. I didn't want to let people like her define me and who I was going to become. I now had a career, fans supporting my work and a whole life ahead of me.

So I'm definitely going to go out to eat with Kk and try to restore my zest for life. Barely ten minutes after our call ended, I heard my apartment doorbell ring. I had barely opened the door when a pair of arms came to surround me in a comforting hug that I really needed. I almost fall into her warm embrace, letting my head rest on her neck as she rubs her hand down my back.

"Would it be too early to call you my platonic soulmate ?" I ask in a whisper for fear of rejection. I then hear Kk's innocent laughter, the vibrations of which I feel through my body.

"Nope !" She pops the "p". "And I clearly called you that when I left and warned Azzi." A laugh escapes my lips and I feel like I'm living again. I tighten my arms around Kk as the point of the bad events of the previous days seem to evaporate.

"Well it's not that I don't like this magnificent emotional sequence but I'm really starting to get hungry." I laugh again and we pulled away, then head to her car to go eat.

Paige

I slowly go down the stairs, my alarm having reminded me that I had an appointment with my coach and my manager this morning. The motivation was clearly not there if I really listened to my body but unfortunately I had an image to maintain and this discussion was visibly necessary.

"Azzi ?" She is sitting on the couch watching TV as she turn to me. " Where is Kk ? It's not our day off today ?" This little face was often the last to wake up and certainly not the type to go out anywhere, especially on our days off.

"She went to see her platonic soulmate." She mimes quotation marks with her hands, making me frown.  I really wonder who the person close enough to her could be that she could call her that. She didn't go out much these days to see anyone in particular, well except- Shit. The last person she met recently was Jane. She was the one who told me about it at the beginning and pushed me towards her.

I knew she was close but from there she nicknamed her "her platonic soulmate", I couldn't feel anything but jealousy. I certainly had no right to feel that way, especially now after what I had done to her, but the feelings I had developed remained real and were causing me a great deal of pain.

"What's happened ?" She asks me, as if she had managed to read on my face that I was not well. And I sigh, knowing full well that I won't escape this conversation with her and certainly with Kk when she returns.

"She knows. For the bet." I tell her as I sit down next to her. Just a few seconds later I feel her arm around my shoulders and my tears start to flow. I hadn't even tried to hold her back, I hadn't even tried to reassure her, I hadn't even told her I loved her. I was a horrible person, a coward who didn't even know how to admit her wrongs and apologize properly.

Ding !

Kkarnold had posted a story

Kkarnold tagged @greybird in his story

Looking over my shoulder, Azzi rubbed her hand comfortingly against my back. I had lost her. I had the most beautiful person in my hands and I had lost her. She was broken because of me. Now she was trying to rebuild herself but I couldn't be the one for her.

And unfortunately I was going to have to learn to accept it.