Hate To Love You

12

~🌹Elora🌹~

Parking the car and getting ready to step into the house, my mind flashed with so many thoughts. What was I going to do if they actually decided to do what I thought they were about to?

I'd been with River and Sophia for a fairly long time and quite frankly I hadn't considered the fact that they could one day just as easily take me out of their lives just like they’d brought me in.

There was no backup plan for me. If they kicked me out now, I honestly didn’t know what I would do.

The part of me that held hope of things returning to how they were before their solo trips kept telling me, logically, there was nothing that would suggest them getting rid of me. Not even the conversation I’d overheard could 100 percent point to that fact. For one, I hadn’t heard the whole thing and secondly, there was a possibility they wanted to tell me something else, but that other part of me, whose feelings had been hurt and shattered numerous times, was preparing for the worst, just like it had learned to do when it came to my adoptive parents.

Again, the hopeful part of me wanted to give them the benefit of a doubt, perhaps they really did want to tell me something else, but that little voice kept reminding me of events that had happened before now, events that’d added up till this moment. Events that undoubtedly pointed to the conclusion my mind had drawn up.

They didn't want or need me anymore, they hadn’t wanted or needed me for a while now and they’d finally decided to cut me off.

No matter how much, how desperately I wanted my conclusion to be false, that voice kept reminding me that there was nothing else they could possibly want to say to me.

And so, as I stepped into the house and noticed River and Sophia settled on the couch in the sitting room, seemingly waiting for me with nervous expressions on their faces, my heart was completely frozen over. That little voice had won.

'There’s nothing else they could possibly want to say to me' I thought as I greeted both with a stiff smile and settled on a single sitter, choosing to remain silent until they spoke.

The TV was on but the volume was so low it counted only as background noise.

Normally, my choice to remain silent and their hesitation to speak would cause an awkward silence, but Sophia was clearly determined to let the cat out of the bag and she immediately started talking, leaving no room for the silence to become awkward.

"At this point, I see no reason why we should be beating around the bush when we've kept this from you long enough."

Even with my heart frozen over and feeling little to nothing, her words made my body betray my state of mind. My heart was beating furiously, but again my well-trained mask kept my body from revealing any of my emotions, even if they were little to none.

When I said nothing in response to her, she continued. "Elora darling, remember the phone call I made to you while we were away?"

The question brought her apology and our interrupted conversation over the call back to mind, and I nodded, taking a glance at River whose expression told me he was wondering when said phone call took place.

That made me wonder what the phone call had to do with anything if River wasn’t aware of it, but I chose to remain silent, my mind slowly registering the fact that this conversation was not what I expected, but my guard wasn’t completely down.

"At the time I made the phone call, I was in the hospital." That earned a raised eyebrow from me.

If what she was saying was true, then the voice that interrupted us that day was either a doctor or a nurse. I tried racking my brain to find anything that could give a hint to where this conversation was going, but I found nothing.