If Love Is Blind

six

CLARET KNEW MYSTERIES WERE essential to everyday life, so she made sure that the rest of her day with Kaden was a blank on my timeline. But I found out about it eventually, rather too late, I would say.

A maid had found them, well, had found Kaden outside of his isolation chamber, and started screaming and running for Mrs. Khan. You might have guessed what the reaction from her had been, but in case you haven't, I'll tell you anyways.

Lissa had warned Claret that if she took Kaden out one more time she would be prohibited from ever coming near him again. While Kaden spoke over his mum in bleak attempts to explain the escape, Lissa yelled louder until she tipped the final drop on the glass when she said, "For God's sake, Kaden, she's a plain beggar from the streets!"

Kaden let his fury get the best of him and threw his cane to the other side of the room, knocking a vase along with it. "You don't know her like I do! You don't know anything!"

"You don't know about the dangers of the world, Kaden. You can't see them!" Lissa yelled.

"You're wrong! I can see better than you!"

Claret was forced to leave the household, with an acute heartbreak punging through her chest and into the air she breathed. I knew something was wrong when she ran passed me through the entrance door and flopped her shivery body on her bed, dissolving into weeps. I came near her, sat on the edge of her bed, and asked her: "What's wrong, Dear?"

She wiped her nose and removed her hair from her face. Without turning to meet my eyes, she said, "They won't let me see Kaden."

"Why Sweetheart?"

She sniffed. "His mom thinks I'm a bad influence."

I understood. I didn't want to say anything that I knew would hurt, so I didn't say anything for a while, profoundly thinking about what would be the right thing to say. 

I look back now, and think that there is really nothing right to say at a time like that. You see, the World of Despair, it's a mysterious place. You never know what you may find in it, but the "right words" will never be at your reach. You listen. You feel. You understand. That is more than enough.

But I didn't know that until now, so I said, "Dear, you don't listen to her. You changed that boy's life. They don't get you; they never will. You're better than this, Dear. You don't listen to her, you don't listen to anyone who tries to bring you down!"

But nothing seemed to change her state. I wish I had let her let it all out by herself, I wish I had done many things differently to take care of her at that moment, but I didn't. Now I deal with the consequences that will follow my spirit forever.

Anyways, she never seemed to get over those hurtful words. She smiled less often and she ate a little less everyday. My Claret was broken at every edge and there I was, with no idea of what tools to use or what handbook to read. She was falling off my reach like was the time I had to heal her, and nothing pierced through my soul with such an ardent pain that stabbed at the wounds on my body and escaped through every pore in my skin like seeing her hurt did. 

Or so I thought, because as I write this there is a soundtrack playing through my body with a rainy blues, worse than the worst pain I had ever felt.

Then one day, as we were fixing a new order we had gotten at the book store, a boy came through our door, chiming the costumer bells as he came in. His cane, aiding his sore sight, tapped on our floor and echoed in the room. He was wearing sunglasses and a small, scared smile.

He neared me at cashier's table. My Claret was back at the storage room, and I knew better than calling her in. She was just starting to eat a little better and gained back her forces to come work with me.