The Dare to Destroy ~Cashby~

Epilogue

*5 years later*

The past five years had been a blurr, it was almost as if I blinked and then suddenly time skipped forward and I barely knew what had happened. It's funny how time is like that, I mean five years seems like such a long time, five years equates to 1826 days, 60 months, 260 weeks or 43,824 hours. But the reality of it was, five years was really nothing, so much can happen and change within a year, let alone five. Hell, a lot can change within an hour if you really think about it, or even a minute.

One minute you can be sat there, staring at the man you love in the face, feeling your heart swell as you get lost in their beautiful eyes. Eye's that when you looked into them, you just knew you'd found your home, you found where you belonged after all this time. But the next, with just two simple words, those eye's could behold so much pain and heartache. "It's over", two words spoken in less then five seconds that could cause your heart to brake into a thousand tiny pieces and make your entire world come crashing down on you.

Or one minute, when you're sat with your partner, laughing and joking, laughing about the best parts of your first week as seniors. Laughing about your new friends and how one of them was so engrossed in your converstation Wednesday lunch time about your favorite bands, as you made your way to the school's cantien, that he ended up walking straight into a close door, even though you'd tried to warn him...poor Kellin. Joking about how your friend Vic made such a fool of himself in the middle of English, reading the first paragraph of Shakespears Hamlet in the most over dramatic way. Joking about all the dumb comments your friend Danny made because he was always a little behind on the joke everyone else was making. Both of you laughing to the point one was letting out cute little piglet like snorts and you have tears of joy streaming down your face as you struggle for breath. But then, there's a phone call, and suddenly, those tears of joy, become tears of heartbrake and sadness. The words 'She's gone' resonating painfully loud in the silent air.

I didn't know how the first one felt, but we knew how the second felt, because me and Austin where doing exactly that, after our first week of being seniors when he got the phone call that would change his life forever. His mom had passed away in her sleep. I'd never seen Austin look so lost or broken, it was like I could see his world crumbling around him with my very own eyes. I knew how much he loved his mother, and I also knew what it was like to loose your mom. My heart broke into a thousand pieces for the man I loved, I would never have wished that pain on my worst enemy. No one should know how it feels to loose the woman who gave you life, raised you and gave you all the love in the world, unconditionally. My heart also broke because, over the past year, she had grown to be like a second mom to me, it almost felt like I lost my mom all over again.

That day came for us exactly five years ago today. Today marked the day Austin lost his mom, I could see in his eyes how much today was tearing him apart inside. Usually Austin was all laughter and smiles so bright his eyes crinkled a little at the corners, but today, his face was full of pain and sadness.

So much had happened in five years, after the loss of his mom. Austin too, had been diagnosed with Marfan's, just like his mom had. It was so stressful for us all to deal with, we'd seen first hand just what that disease could mean for someone, an early grave. Months of being ill, countless operations in an attempt to extend their life, pills taken every day just so you could live a normal life, endless doctor and hospital appointments. Never ending tests, being prodded and poked like you where some lab rat, the heartache caused to those around you as they watched you go through it all, feeling helpless.

That had been Austin's life since, that had been our lives since, but Austin was a fighter. He refused to be beaten by the thing that took his mother from him. He was determind to live his life to the fullest, he wanted to make his mother proud and be sure that, when his time came to join his mother, he would have no regrets. So, that's exactly what we did.