I'M NOT YOUR WOMAN. (✓)

21. the pull.

|◁ II ▷|

sza — broken clocks.

"GO AWAY!" Maya cursed at the orange dusk; its rays leaning against her window, not liking the new presence of light that had washed out the darkness.

She sat up, back hunched over, and reluctantly reflected at her reality. Havana had been the recent victim of Reginald's greed as she glared back at her white walls — wanting a do-over and the chance to control the narrative. She watched the clock tick as each second passed, mentally noting down the time.

Shit, she read out the time to herself — 9:38 AM.

That meant that her window of time to save Havana was now considerably less. But even if time was something that she had in abundance, the end result would still be the same.

She would have to part ways with Havana.

Her body slumped back under her duvet and continued to stare at nothing.

Blaze had tried her best to steer her off the race track of self-pity but Maya had shut out feeling anything, not realising, that Blaze was trying to temper her breakdown from rising to the fore. To Blaze, Havana was so much more than four grey-painted walls in a rustic part of Central London. It was their hub where they had gossiped, cried, laughed, loved, and grieved together. It was home, and it was theirs.

Maya couldn't forget a misty November afternoon in 2009 at Havana where popular jock Elijah J. Baker was vocal about his intentions with Blaze. His loose smile holding in his wintry-white teeth was the first thing they both noticed as he approached the round table with a thing to ask.

Can I take you out Saturday?

Blaze flatlined him with an abrupt No, I'm currently not dating at the moment.

Maya didn't understand why Blaze didn't surrender to his rugged charm, but she knew now.

Crippled by the fear of non-acceptance, she confided in Maya on a dreary Friday afternoon at Havana that she loved girls, not in a platonic sense, but in a way that scared her and made her dream.

As those three words left her mouth, Maya could — even still to this day, remember the fear laced in Blaze's pupils and how she thought her best friend might love her less as a result of her confession.

She didn't, in fact, she loved her more.

"ARGH!" Maya sunk her head into her pillow, blaming herself for accepting Reginald's offer when it would have been wiser to reject his advance.

Blaze heard her muffled yelp of frustration and came running in. She took the impetus to introduce some more light to Maya's blacked-out room by flinging the curtain open, "Morning. How ya feeling?"

Like a truck has run over my heart and watched it smash to pieces, if Blaze wanted an honest answer to Maya's own morbid state of mind.

She mumbled in gibberish fueled by a lack of sleep, "Can you... turn off the lights? It's too bright" making use of her duvet to crowd out the light.

Blaze lumped a bowl of hot soup into Maya's resistant hands, "Here, Maya — get this down you"

The warming smell of chicken broth prompted Maya to come out of hiding as her upturned nose was introduced to the smell of hot steam. She took a slow, delightful slurp, grateful for this pick-me-up that would wash out her heartache and her hangover, "Mmm... thanks for the soup"