Gabriel (Book 1)

Sorrow...

April 18th, 2011

"What did you say?" I ask in disbelief.

"No." She repeats clear and strong.

"Is it just because I don't have a ring? Have I done something else? Tell me what I can do to change your mind! I will do anything!" I plead to her as she starts walking away.

"You can't do anything, Gabriel. You can't change what happened."

"But, Johanna, I want to spend forever with you! I need to be with you! I love you-"

"Stop saying that!" She shouts. She takes a deep breath and instead says, "You can't love somebody you don't know."

"But I do know you! Your birthday is-"

"That's what you know ABOUT me. That's not me. You think I'm perfect and pure....I'm not. I've done stupid things for stupid reasons. I've gone out at night and waken up the next morning not sure of where I was."

"It doesn't matter."

"I've loved someone and given up everything for him, and then been left with nothing!"

I grit my teeth and repeat, "It doesn't matter. All that matters is us from this point on." I take her hands in mine but she pulls them back and walks away.

"You can't love someone that you don't KNOW. And I can't love you!"

"Why not?" I beg her. I love her. I need her. She is all I can think about and all that I can remember wanting for 621 years that was not blood.

"Because I could never love someone who's ex-girlfriend killed my parents." She forces the words out.

"What?" Was all I could manage to say.

Who-who killed her parents?

"Who did that?" I ask.

"Oh! Don't you play stupid! My parents are dead and you pretend not to know why or what happened! How mature!" She stalks off again but I follow her, needing to know what happened.

"Johanna, I swear that I don't know anything about this! Please tell me."

"Oh really?! You didn't know that your little blonde girlfriend came to my home in Pennsylvania?! And you didn't know that while I was out she tortured and beat my parents?!"

"No. I didn't. Honestly." My heart was breaking at this story! I can't handle her being in so much pain!

"Well, you just try and imagine my pain and shock when I came home and my walls were covered in blood. You just imagine my terror when the lights wouldn't come on and when I couldn't call the police because the power was cut. Imagine me calling out my parents names: 'mom! Dad! Where are you? Please! I need you!' And then, picture running outside because you see three holes in the ground. You look in those holes and see your parents! All bloody and not moving! Lying in a grave! You try to scream but you can't. Something is out there with you but you know you can't escape it. Something flies in front of you and kicks you back. It lands on top of you and punches, kicks, pulls and scratches. All I saw was red. So much red. On me, on the ground, on the girl. She drags me to the third hole and throws me in. The last thing I remember was her standing above me with a knife in her hand. 'You can't have Gabriel,' she says to me, 'He's mine. You will ruin him.' I insisted that I wouldn't, but the girl didn't believe me, 'you dug your grave, now you can lie in it.' She jumped into the hole and cut my wrist right on the vein. There was so much blood. I never knew a body held that much blood." Her voice trails off and her body is shivering in fear.

"I still don't know who did that to you."

"SILVER BLONDE HAIR! LITTLE 15 YEAR OLD GIRL!"

Oh no. It can't be-.