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narrative.
Alexis did not expect it to turn out as badly as it did. Her hands clutched the sheets like her life depended on it as disbelief worked its way through her body. Heart thumping loudly in her chest, she managed to stutter her diary words.
“I thought...” They died on her lips, but a sudden surge of burning anger forced her mouth open again. “You were staying here!”
In her blind frustration, she hurled her pillow at the person she hated — yet loved — the most, only feeling a dampened guilt when its victim let out a tiny yelp.
“I thought...” She blinked angry tears away, stood up and charged to the door, sending a disappointed, hurt, look at the groaning person on the floor. “I thought...that you were staying with me.”
She slammed the door in her wake, snatched a coat off its hook, slipped on her snow boots, and left the house.
Once in the isolation of the comforting wind and falling snowflakes, she managed to stifle a cry. Her fingertips trembling from the cold, she brought them up to her face, letting them brush against soaked lashes.
“You won’t forget then, right?”
Her footfalls were heavy, bearing so much pain and regret. Why had she decided to play along? Why had she decided to live a dream she knew would never come true? Why had she made herself fall deeper?
She hated it. She hated herself.
The wind played calmly with her chestnut locks, offering poor consolance to her plight. She shivered in the cold, her tears burning the slopes of her cheeks, and she snuggled deeper into the coat, but stopped when she sniffed the faint whiff of lemongrass.
Cars were lined up obediently along the streets, snow piling on top of them, forming snow sculptures that were painfully beautiful amongst blinding white.
She forced a gulp, trudged to a nearby bench, and collapsed on it, not bothering how the snow soaked into her jeans the moment she did.
Alexis hated how much she was affected by it: she had warned herself beforehand of the consequences that followed with her investing more time into forbidden love. She had already reminded herself of its thorns, so why, why, was she out here in this freezing blizzard, bleeding her heart out through her lips?
“I just want you to live. That is all — nothing else to it.”
She cannot stop the downpour of tears, the results of a false hope that she had drowned herself in, wishing so hard for it to be true. She should have known that it was a mistake.
But, she knew that either way, she would not have stayed away from the one person she loved the most. After all, they were just so kind, so lovable.
So it was not a surprise to her when a warm hand rested on her shoulder, a stark contrast to the biting cold around her.
“Alexis, I’m–” sweet honey for words showered her in their sugar, a cameo for her situation at large. “–so sorry. I just couldn’t bring myself to tell you.”
“What?” She snapped, looking up and shoving the hand off her, her brows twitching. “So is that the reason you keep me company every day? Just for your selfishness?”
“No!”
It hurt more than it should; knowing that she was not someone’s priority, but rather someone’s past-time.
“I just...”
She could see pain, loneliness, and desperation in chocolate eyes she used to be unable to read, and it frightened her. The way her heart thumped obnoxiously loudly in her ears made breathing painful and constricted, like an iron hand was clutching tightly onto her lungs.
“I didn’t want you to forget me.”
Alexis scoffed, looking at anywhere but them. “What a stupid excuse.” Her hand shivering, she balled it up into a fist to stop it tremoring so vigorously, hoping that it would not give her away. “You’re so inconsiderate, you know?”
“I know.”
Hands rested on hers, wrapping them in soft, velvety warmth, coupled with hot breath fanning her forehead.
“You forgot your gloves.”
The whisper made shivers crawl up her spine and heat to spread surely over her neck, cheeks, and ears. Her heart would not stop hammering persistently in her ribcage, determined to make itself known, as they slipped woolly material over her every finger.
Why? Alexis bit her lip, attempting to prevent yet another wave of tears roll down her cheeks. She did not want them to see her like this; so pathetic, so broken. It was only herself who had seen and resented this side, a reflection of her insecurities and worries. She would not let it swallow her.
Yet, it peeked out at being loved so greatly and simply, and it was hard for Alexis to keep it hidden at the very bottom of her heart.
Then, she realised that she was not the only one pouring out her soul, bared, for someone else to see.
Tears were gathering at the corners of eyes she had grown to love seeing daily, their brows knitted closely together, and Alexis wanted to kiss it away, to wash away that haunting look of guilt and sadness.
She hated herself.
“I’m really, really,”
She hated how trapped she was, and how she continues to allow herself to be, when the key was within reach.
“Sorry, Alexis.”
A migraine was starting to settle, and she groaned softly, reaching a hand up to massage her temple, and she bit her bottom lip, not used to the foreign pain.
“Alexis?”
The image of them was starting to blur now, and she panicked, stretching a hand out in hopes to caress the face she saw in her dreams. The dark did not help her this time. It whisked her away, hiding her away from the feelings she wanted to embrace, but could not.
