Unfavorable || a.u.

Chapter 52

Bakht took her glasses off and wiped her eyes. "I'm sorry, Luke. You didn't deserve to find out this way."

I stared with horror at the square marking Sierra's grave. After years of searching, she was dead. She had been dead for so long. I lost her. I had wasted four years of my life chasing the dead.

"She died from a broken heart," Bakht continued. "At least that's what I've been told. In medical terms, it was alcohol poisoning."

I barely heard Bakht talk. I brought my hand up to the words and lightly stroked them. The love of my life was in there. She had been in there for several years. She had been in there for several lonely years.

I felt Bakht's soft hand on my arm. "I wanted to tell you before but I couldn't. I didn't have the heart. I didn't want to do that. I decided the best way to do it was to have you come here."

I slowly sank to the ground and laid my head against the stone. It was unfair. Sierra was a beautiful person with more love in her little finger than the rest of the world could ever think of possessing. Yet here she was, forgotten. Forgotten for three years. She didn't deserve it. She deserved a shrine the whole world would see.

"I didn't know her well," Bakht said. "I met her in a bar. We were both drinking the pain away. She was drinking because of you. I was drinking because of my mother back home. Sh-she convinced me to stop drinking. I couldn't do the same thing for her. I-"

"Shut up," I screamed. "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! I just found out my girlfriend is dead. Please shut up!"

Bakht sat down beside me and pulled her arms around me. I cried into her dress. She didn't say anything for the rest of the time I was there. Instead she took care of me.

Bakht brought me back to her hotel and got me dinner. It was pepperoni pizza; that was my favorite kind. She then called Louis, telling him what happened. I could hear Louis start crying over the phone.

"He wants to talk to you," Bakht said softly, handing me the phone. I took it.

Louis cried, "Luke, is it true?"

I didn't respond immediately. The words were just too hard to say. Finally I managed to whisper the word,"Yeah."

Louis let out a sob over the phone. "No no no. She can't be. I told you, Luke. I told you not to go. I told you!"

"I know you did," I said with a voice crack.

"Why didn't you listen to me?" Louis sobbed. "Why didn't you?"

"I don't know."

I played with the sleeve of my suit jacket. It was black. I feel like Sierra would've hated that. She'd want me to wear something that made me comfortable, but my mom said I had to respect the dead.

I didn't like that word. Dead. It's so final. It made it sound like Sierra was never coming back. I didn't want to think about that. A life without Sierra was not a life I wanted to be part of.

"Luke," Sierra's dad said. I looked up. I hadn't said much all day. I hadn't said much since I found out. I was a few heartbeats away from a living corpse.

"This might be late, but when Sierra's mom....passed she left this," he said. "Sierra never knew she did. It's a little late, but I thought you deserved to read it." He gave me a worn letter. All it had on it was "Sierra's" with a heart next to it.

I put the letter i my pocket. "Thank you, sir," I said.

Mr. Neal patted my back. "It's going to be okay."

I nodded. "I'll try to believe that."

"You think I don't know how you're feeling." I nodded. "Trust me, I have. When I lost Claire, it was horrible. I busied myself with work; It stopped me from feeling the pain. It helped, but I wasn't there for my daughter. Now here we are, and I feel guilty. Maybe if I helped Sierra grieve for her mother than ignoring everyone and coping with the loss of my wife, Sierra would be here today."