Fifty Shades Different

Chapter Twenty Four

I'm so sorry that I keep reupdating the chapter but when I copied and pasted it didn't put the whole chapter and I just noticed. I feel like this Chapter is important and I'm very proud of it! Let me know what you think in the comments! And don't forget to vote and Follow!! 

Chey 

I woke up before Christian this morning, I was very quiet so I wouldn't wake him, yesterday was a lot to handle. I can't believe I never realized that Christian's scars were burns, from cigarettes at that. It explains a lot on how easily my mom, Elena, Carolyn and Alice quit smoking so easily. Grace had never smoked that I could remember, but I've seen the pictures, so at a time she did. They all have their own demons, Grace is the only one that ended the cycle really, the rest of them are still raging alcoholics and my mother died as one. Grace calmed down when she met Carrick, she never gave herself the opportunity to put her kids through what mine did. Elena never had kids, Alice had two, Chloë and Nathan, Carolyn got married because she was pregnant with Jax. Then it took her ten years to realize her husband was gay. I crossed the room and opened my duffel bag grabbing the picture I wanted out of my journal, and headed out the door.

The grass grew through the sidewalks, it's barely even light outside, but the people McKinley wouldn't know that. They greet each other loudly as they walk to their cars, it's always been this way, everyone greeting each other on the streets. How it seems so quiet but at the same time theirs always so much noise, everyone talking dogs barking. Everyone seems so good mannered here, you think they're just being simple. But really this is the kind of town where you had best be in church on Sunday morning. And that's not a bad thing but it's pretty sad when the first people to start talk about you, and everyone else in town for that matter, are always the ones sitting in that first pew.

I see two of the women from my Nana Buggy's church looking at me and whispering, that's one thing I haven't missed. Everybody knowing who you are and knowing all your business, I smile inwardly realizing that they're probably asking each other what I'm up to. Being back in town and all. As I get closer they smile and walk over.

"Oh, Ana!" Ms. Bowman, Kaleb's divorced mother smiled at me, enveloping me in a hug. The woman's never liked me, but she loves my grandmother. "How are you Dear? Kaleb told me he saw you last night. Does Buggy know you're in town?"

"Oh, no." I said quickly, the last thing I needed is that woman to know I'm in town, Elena texted me last night and told me that she had told her that she was alone. Needless to say, I was grateful. "It's a surprise visit. I'm going to see her later on today."

"Oh well, that's wonderful, I'm sure she misses you." She says, I want to roll my eyes she knows damn good and well that woman hates me right now. "Kaleb said the two of you got into a little spat last night, and that you're smoking again. He told me you were with that Grey man. They say he owns half of Seattle."

"Yeah, we did. I'm sure he did tell you that." I say sourly, I look over and I see Kaleb sitting in her car on the curb, looking dead at me. I smile and look back to her. "Did you tell you he's drinking again? Maybe if you would have instilled some discipline in your son, he wouldn't have grown up and start acting like a baboons' ass."

I walked away as she started for her car, I smiled to myself, I shouldn't have done that and I know it but after the comment he made last night, and I'm sure he told his mom the same thing he told me. He deserves it. Ididn't stop walking again, the sky was scattered with dark clouds a storm wascoming, you couldn't even tell that the sun had passed over from the east. Thewas blowing relentlessly making it quite chilly outside, making me wish I hadgrabbed my jacket. I finally reached the old rusted gate, the cemetery had beenhere forever, at least since 1854 when the city was founded. But the towns fullof Catholics, we have three Catholic churches, so the vast majority are buriedthere. The Methodist Church has always been severely unpopulated. I pulled thegate open stepping inside the gate closing it behind me, grayish white headstones dotted most of the way along the landscape before me, most of themfalling apart, but there stood two that were newer than all the others. 

I made my way over stopping at my mom's headstone, upon it read Carla May Morton, with her birth and death date. And under all that was a piece of a quote that I'd heard her say a lot as a child, 'God doesn't give you more than one little piece of the story of your life at once.' I sat on my knees in front of the stone, reaching my hand out I traced my finger over the smooth stone. For almost my entire life I'd known these words by hear, along with the rest of the quote that goes along with it. Sometimes I still dream of her, sitting with me on my bed, when I was really small maybe four or five before everything went to hell. She would always whisper those words to me as I fell asleep, she was never one for bedtime stories. Suddenly I wasn't looking at the slab of stone anymore, I could feel myself being cought up in memories.

She would always lay with me, after her and Daddy would have a fight, and play with my thick hair, running the fingertips of one hand up and down my arm and whisper the words to me. "Bae Bae," She said her voice soft so she would stir me while she almost had me asleep, "You should always try to believe, that God isn't going to give you more that one little piece of the story at once. You know, the story of your life. Otherwise you heart would crack wider than you could handle. He only tries to crack it enough so you can still walk, and still live your life. I suppose it would be like someone wearing a cast. But you've still got a crack running up your side, big enough for a sapling to grow out of. Only no one sees it. Nobody can see it. Everybody thinks that you're one whole piece, and so they treat you not so gently, because they can't see that you're already broken. I was always afraid of the monsters that would crawl out from under my bed while sleeping as I got older I realized the monsters weren't what I was meant to be afraid of. It was people, that looked like me, that bore souls, I found that they were the scariest monsters of all.

The sound of the thunder brought me back to reality, but I couldn't look at the stone anymore, instead I fished the picture out of my pocket. It was a picture of the five of them, before any children were ever even thought about, they may have been seventeen. They were at the beach, I'm not sure which one, they looked so happy. I could feel the single tear trickle down my cheek, I brushed it away quickly but I could the others following quickly.

"I wish you could have known her back then." Elena said, from somewhere behind me, I idly wonder how long she's been standing there. I wipe my eyes again looking back at her. "You would have loved her."

"Elena," I whispered looking back at the piece of stone, that was all that there was left of my mother. "Me not loving Momma was never the problem."

"Well her not loving you wasn't the problem either Babe." She said as she sat down beside me taking my hand. "I know I promised to leave you alone unless you wanted to talk, but I think it's time for a little story."