Forbidden Desire

[57] Heart Of Athens

𝐒𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐚 𝐃𝐞 𝐋𝐮𝐜𝐚

Lately, my days have been nothing but a blur.

I started university at the beginning of this week and I was still struggling to adjust to the new environment, new people and new routine. It felt surreal and mostly like a dream.

This newfound freedom.

Allowance of having a choice.

For the longest time, I had only been trying to survive, running from one place to another, never really having the luxury of choice. And now that I finally did, it felt overwhelming.

It had taken me an entire sleepless night to decide which university to attend. I didn't really have a specific career aim or ambition. How could I when my entire life had been dictated by just somehow existing and surviving?

I had worked as a waitress in a small bakery in Athens after escaping my uncle's house, but it wasn't a job I had chosen from my liking. It was just what I had to do to get by, to make ends meet.

And while that job wasn't entirely insufferable to work in, thanks to Levi's constant presence right by my side, it still wasn't something I would have chosen for myself if everything in my life was normal back then.

But now, for the first time, I was allowed to choose. And the person who gave me this choice also just happened to be the same man who took it away from me.

It was ironic, really.

The only thing I had ever truly enjoyed was painting. It had always been an escape from reality, a way to pour out the imagination I could never voice out.

But even then again, I had never thought of persuing it as a career. It was always present in my life as a hobby, but never really as an ambition or life goal.

Yet now, the idea didn't seem so bad. I wanted to do something that I liked to do, that I enjoyed to do.

So, after a lot of thinking, I finally thought through my decision and made up my mind on studying in one of the Fine Arts universities of Rome. I still wasn't sure where studying this subject would lead me to in life, but for now, I decided to just go with the flow and leave everything in fate's hands.

The next day, I told Elliott about my decision. Much to my unease, he fully supported me, even going as far as to say I made a great decision since he was aware of how much I loved painting.

His encouragement unsettled me greatly. I still wasn't used to this sudden new version of him, the one who wasn't controlling and wasn't forcing me into anything.

I wanted to believe it was just another one of his manipulative tricks and I knew it too, but deep down, something in me told me that just maybe he had a twinge of guilt in him. For everything he had done.