Ava is a quiet, fiery and impassioned twenty-one-year-old, paralysed with fear at the thought of her impending adulthood. She dreams of travelling the world and acting in breath-taking plays all over the globe. But she is finishing university soon a...
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Ava froze.
This was madness, she thought to herself. It was all too much to even begin to process. Kim was wrong, she'd been wrong to even think for a second that she could carry out this plot, much less speak to the man. He was a stranger to her, a complete stranger who less than a week ago she'd known nothing about. Ava was good at compartmentalising her emotions, at focusing on certain things and burying her own feelings about it. Most times.
However she was also human. More so in certain situations. She had goals, aspirations, dreams and she wanted to follow them. The part of her that had skipped all the way on this fool's errand was the part she usually suppressed. After her mother's death, she had been distraught for a week, then she had shut herself down. That's why she didn't have friends, besides Kim. People often found her engaging and were drawn to her like a moth to a flame, but the closer they got, the more they realised that she was a flame. Beautiful to behold but not one to get close to.
Kimberly and Ava's friendship worked because Kim enjoyed the warmth of her flame and knew when to stay back, however when Ava's fire was burning low, she was always there to add some fuel to it. They respected each other's boundaries but knew when to break them but in this case Ava was sure that Kim may have poured gasoline on her flame with her permission. She wasn't sure if she could control the wildfire that had been started.
She didn't know what she had been thinking, or rather she did and she was terrified to find that she was capable of that level of manipulation. Looking at this man right now, she knew it would be easy to tell him she was a seventeen year old, that she wanted to get to know her brother and sister by going to their schools. The part of her that was capable of that was the actress within her. The young lady who could become anyone she wished to portray.
The part of herself that she was now at war with was the girl who had elected to study a double degree in law and business. The girl who had aced every single one of her exams through hard work and determination. Acting was something she wanted to do with her life because when she was on a stage, she was invincible. Law? Business? They held the same appeal, although she didn't have as much passion for them.
She had always loved the thought of being a kick-ass lawyer, should that be her future after she graduated in March. Whilst she may not have had the power to control her acting career, she had never doubted that she would work herself to the bone to make a name for herself post-graduation. Ava had begun reading some of her mother's notes in her journal and she had a general idea of what kind of a man her father had been when he'd let her mother go. He had been the kind of man she could have fooled easily, however the man who had told her mother he would give up everything for? He wasn't the type of man she could fool without regret.
Taking a calming breath, Ava did what she did best, she set aside her wondering thoughts and gave her best convincing smile to the present.
"Hello," she spoke calmly, "Donna was cremated six months ago, however we desperately needed to get a hold of you, so please forgive our deception. Would you mind following us to the cafe down the corner?"
