Breathe Me

Chapter-4

Our love was made to rule the world          You came and broke the perfect girl 

Chapter Four

Catherine

Present Day

THE SUNSET BLED through my eyelids, shining so intensely I needed to squeeze them tighter to block its light away. Flicking them open, I let the golden-red colors splash across my skin. The warmth of it made the slight chill I had crawling inside my bones whisk away. Sitting on my porch chairs, I let the heat penetrate my skin to stifle the cold. Seeing Samuel at the fair had jolted my world off its axis in a way I had never expected. It left me lingering in my memories, like some horrid picture show replaying over and over in my head.

How could I let him back in, especially when the reinforced steel walls I had carefully built up around my fragile heart since I’d been with him remained sturdy and bolted into place? No one got over someone like Samuel. No one was ever the same after a whirlwind love affair like that. I’d dedicated myself to that love until he’d thrown me out into the freezing.

Sitting up, I gasped. A sharp, rigid pain jolted me out of my misery. Like my heart was breaking inside its metal cage, I felt it flutter in a panic. I slid back inside my apartment and down into a fluffy green couch I’d just recently bought.

Breathe. Just Breathe.

Rubbing the fatigue away from my eyes, I sunk down into the cushions, pulling one of the throw pillows into my lap, grasping it tightly as I curled my arms around it. I hadn’t even known him again for twenty-four hours, and he was already affecting me so. Paralyzed by his unknown intentions, I’d failed miserably at keeping him far, far away from me, like I’d sworn long ago that I would. This oblivion I was swimming in was driving me nuts.

I flung the pillow across the room, suddenly filled with rage at Samuel. He’d been the one to break my heart. He’d been the one afraid of commitment and true love, not me. What was I supposed to do when he traipsed right back into my life without missing a beat? No matter how many nights I had prayed that he had paid a high price for hurting me, nothing had prepared me for this.Who did he think he was? He was nothing to me, nothing. I decided that I should just tell him to fuck off and be on his merry way. Too little, too late, get lost!

Sucking in a deep breath, I paused, feeling a slight, soothing rift open inside. This was my chance, though. I could make him suffer, I could make him feel the exact same way I’d felt when he’d unceremoniously dumped me in front of his drunk, shallow friends. Maybe that was the reason why this was all happening. It was my chance, my one moment for payback I’d longed for all this time.

Yes, that’s what it was.

Jumping up from the sofa, I rushed to my room, grabbed my cell phone and stared down at the message that had prompted my self-loathing.

Hi! It’s Sam. Up for some sorbet? My treat. :-)

Yeah, he was classy. Sorbet on a hot Vegas night. I was game for that. It was a perfect little get-together to kick start the plan forming in my brain.