Final Nightmare

4. Did it follow us?

Zari.

The candlelight gave off a low glow in the corner of the room. The flame danced around in the glass holder, and it was as if the glow was dancing in unison with the flame.

I wanted to be as carefree as that little flame. I want to do my own thing without having to worry about anything going wrong in my pathetic little life. Ever since high school things always seemed to pop up unexpectedly, for instance, the demon problem. I never had an eighteenth birthday which was going to be my biggest party. I missed homecoming, prom, and graduation. I never felt the pressure of trying to win homecoming, never got to feel how important it was to win prom queen or even getting up at the crack of dawn to get things situated. The most important thing was graduation. I'll never got that feeling of walking across the stage and getting my diploma for all the hard work I've achieved during my high school years. All because of Chris.

Sometimes I wondered, why me? Out of all people. I was planning on doing things with my life. I want to go to college to become a nurse aesthetician, I wanted a decent size family, with a two maybe three-story house, and cars with nothing to worry about.

But maybe I shouldn't put all the blame on him because I was the one who kept running back to him. I placed myself in the situation. I could have left him alone and let him have Felicia, since that was the only female, he cheated on me with, I think.

I face palmed myself and rolled over in my bad to look out the window. How could I have been so dumb? Was it the love? Were we destined to be together through thick and thin?

There were so many questions running through my mind that I decided to pick up the random phone I found under the bed and call Darrin's number that Cairo gave me earlier. I prayed that Cairo gave me the right number because right now I needed him more than ever. The ringing on the other end stopped and a groggy voice boomed through the speaker.

"Hello?"

"Uh, Darrin?" I bit on my lip nervously.

"Yeah? Who this?" He cleared his throat and sounded as if he was sitting himself up.

"Zari."

There was total silence on the phone and that had me worried. Did Darrin really forget who I was?

"Where are you?" He sounded alert like he was ready to come over, but there was no telling how far away he was.

"Home just thinking," I shrugged as I too sat up. I looked down at my toes poking from under the covers and wiggled them.

"What's the problem?" I heard keys jiggle in the background and a front door closing behind him.

"Am I stupid?" I blurted out.

"Are you stupid?" He repeated the question then smacked his lips.

"Hell no you aren't stupid, why would you ask me something like that?" A car door slammed, and an engine started in his background indicating he was going to find his way here.

"I mean I kept running back to Chris even when you warned me about him and basically got ourselves stuck in this dumb situation. I don't really know where I am. I don't know where you are. I don't know what I do for a living I don't know anything about myself, shit I honestly don't know how old I am. I could be thirty-two with arthritis or have hemorrhoids or I could-"

I was cut off by Darrin's laugher.

"You better stop stressing before you give yourself hemorrhoids. Just go with the flow Z. Do you know how many times this happened to us and we always make a way or figure out things?"

"More than I could count," I bit on the inside of my cheek.

"Exactly, were going to go through this just like the last time and all the other times. It's no biggie," I pictured him shrugging and a small smile spread across my face.