121 Weeks To Run

Chapter Seven: New Beginnings

The next week was hard to digest.

My mom was happy to have my father back, but he was an emotional wreck. He hardly said anything and when he did, it was a bare minimum. He was like a zombie, he was nothing more than a shell of his former self. We tried desperately to talk about where he’d gone, or at the very least, what had happened. But he wasn’t going to budge. There was only thing that was very clear to all of us;

Lincoln was dead.

I didn’t know how or why, and the only thing I knew is that he was gone.

I had my time to cry and grieve but I just didn’t understand why it had to be him. The only one who held the answer to my question was my dad and he wasn’t going to be talking about it any time soon, that’s for sure.

“Hey, are you okay?” Jason’s voice cut through my thoughts like a knife. I turned to face him and shrugged, trying to hold back tears.

“I would like to think I am, but I’m not,” My voice shook as I spoke. “I feel like every time something is good, something else goes bad. I can’t catch a break to save anyone’s life.”

“It’s not your fault, Chelsey. Everything happens for a reason, you have to believe this or the world we live in will tear you apart.” He reassured. Even though I knew he was right, the pain that plagued my heart refused the leave. I just felt like death was surrounding me and it was going to take everyone I love until it took me.

I sniffled a little and smiled a bit. “He wanted to officiate the wedding you know.”

“If you want to wait—“

“No.” I cut him off quickly. “Lincoln would have wanted us to go through with it. We all know how he hated people feeling sorry for him.”

“Yeah, you’re right. But this isn’t about what he would have wanted, it’s about what you want.” He reminded. It was easy to fulfill what others wanted, but it was a lot harder to know what I want and go through with it. Half the time it was because I didn’t know what I wanted and the other half was because I didn’t want to step on anyone’s toes.

“I want to get married to you, and I don’t want anything to get in the way of that. In seven days I want to be your wife.” I confessed. I had to do something for myself for once, and not worry about everyone else. Just one day, that’s all I needed to just be… selfish.

“Then it is what it is. I’m glad you feel that way.” He smiled. “What do you say to a lazy day in bed? You, me, and Netflix.”

I laughed. “I say you read my mind.”

Three hours into our Law & Order: Special Victims Unit binge, we decided to just lay down and talk.

 “I’m still a little disappointed I can’t completely remember how we got together. It still comes in flashbacks rather than memories. Like fragments.” I mentioned casually, but really, I just wanted to pry. Jason could completely remember our past together and my memory was left scrambled by Cyrus.

“I can take a hint. Where do you want me to start?” He asked. I mulled it over. Because I couldn’t remember much of the beginning, I had to start there.

“From the beginning.” I requested and he shrugged and started there.

“We grew up together, your mom and mine were friends. It’s funny because they swore we’d get married, but I thought girls were gross at the time. When I was fourteen, that’s when I met Lindsay and god knows how that turned out. It was fun at first, but then I felt guilty. Like I felt like I wasn’t doing the right thing and so I ended things with her when I was fifteen. But then there was you, I liked you and I didn’t think that was right because of your age. I didn’t want you to get in trouble for being with me, and you were too young to be in a relationship, but we did anyways. That was the one thing about us; despite the odds, we always ended up strong together.