It Was Supposed to Blossom

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Ryan POV

So that, that unbelievable, crazy tale, was how everything came to this. 

When I pulled back, I slumped into a chair and fiercely wiped at my tearing eyes. I rubbed a lily petal between my index and thumb. Its soft surface on my skin was strangely comforting. 

My body felt numbed of everything. All I could do was sit in my chair, continue to stroke the petals of the lilies on her chest, and stare blankly at Lilly's lifeless corpse. I knew she was dead, yet somehow she wasn't. Somehow her body remained immobile but her soul still lived, flickering, a ghost of the present. 

Lilly's demise has now incited a whirlwind of thoughts in my head. I felt sorrow, but somehow...I was OK. When she lived, I fought for her, did everything I could to make her love me back, and it worked. But everything was too late. 

For the longest time, I felt that me and Lilly, it was only a fantasy on my part. Then, after the fateful night she asked to see me, everything changed. There was a real chance of us being an us, and hope sparked in me like never before. I thought that I had finally managed to get her to reciprocate my feelings, that we had something that could be something.

But it didn't.

I cling to Lilly's hand, trying to prolong contact for as long as possible. I leaned my forehead into her temple for a few moments. 

"Bye, Lilly. I'll see you on the other side."

And I turned and left without a backward glance.

As the sun hit my face, I turned away. I couldn't bear its glare on my fragile skin. I plopped myself on the hospital steps but I just sat there.

There was a love between us that was supposed to blossom...but it all went crashing down. 

And what do you do when the flower you loved, treasured, treated like royalty, wilts and dies?

You find another one.

I punch in a number on my phone and wait for the call to connect.

"Arden?" I say.

                                                                    THE END