by Rina Kent
A future where she’s all mine in front of the world.
The doctor killed it. He aborted a dream that hadn’t fully formed yet.
Not knowing what to say or how to say it, I remain silent. I’ve always loved silence — it allows me to read in peace and let my thoughts be loud. Silence is my sanctuary.
Not now.
Now, I want to slice through it with a knife and end it once and for fucking all.
By the time we arrive to Lucien’s house, it’s almost evening.
Silver steps out of the car like a robot, hugging her bag, as I follow after. A butler greets us in front of the property. It’s built near the cliff of a beach. The nearby town is visible from here, but it’s far enough that no one would wander around the house.
Lucien must be a private man.
“Bonsoir,” a butler greets us at the entrance with a welcoming smile and motions at Silver’s bag. “S’ill vous plait.”
She hands him the bag and asks in a tired voice, “Where’s Mum?”
“Madame Davis?” I ask when he seems to be lost. I doubt he didn’t understand; he must be one of those French people who refuses to acknowledge any language other than their own. The level of his snobbishness is similar to Ronan’s favourite butler, Lars.
“Ah, oui. Madame Davis a retourné à l’Angleterre avec Monsieur Lucien.”
Really? Cynthia went back to England with Lucien without telling her daughter about it?
“What?” Silver retrieves her phone and winces. “Ugh. I forgot it’s on airplane mode.” She dials a number, then places the device to her ear. “Mum? Where are you?”
Silver paces the entrance while the butler just stands there, completely oblivious to the scene.
“I’m already in freaking France. Lucien must’ve told you I was coming. How could you leave?” She listens for a second. “It’s always emergencies this, work that. What about me, Mum? Me? Have you ever thought about me in all the decisions you make?”
Realising she snapped at her mother, she quickly backpedals. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…okay… Talk to you later.”
She hangs up with a sigh and keeps concentrating on her shoes as she speaks. “Mum had a work emergency. Lucien will be able to send the jet back to us tomorrow evening. I’m going to stay the night. You can catch a flight at the airport if you want.”
And with that, she steps inside and the butler follows her with a nod at me.
I release a long sigh, then go after her. My shoulders are tense and the back of my neck is about to snap with how rigid it feels.
I find Silver upstairs, standing in the middle of a room.
It’s similar to that time when I first touched her, first tasted her, when Mum and Sebastian announced they were getting married.
I’ve never been a believer of the butterfly effect, the fact that one simple alteration of initial conditions in a non-linear system can cause a catastrophic outcome later on.
However, I believe that small incidents, like Silver hearing that I lost my virginity that time, have led to a whole lot of clusterfuck. It’s because of what she heard that she retaliated. She fought back. And since then, we’ve kept on fighting and challenging each other in a vicious cycle.
Now, we’re here and nothing can be undone.
“Why are you still here?” She fiddles with her bag on the bed. “Go home. The driver can take you.”
“I know what you’re doing and it’s not going to work. You’ll never be able to push me away, so you might as well stop trying.”
She pretends to not hear me as she yanks all the clothes out of the bag, her back bowing and rigid under the denim jacket.
I stride to her and grip her arm, forcing her to face me, to look at me. She can’t be alone right now.
Tears glisten in her eyes as she pushes at my chest. “What do you want from me? Just leave me alone.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re in pain. I hate it when you’re in pain, Butterfly.”
She breaks down then. A sob tears from her as she wraps her arms around my waist in a vice grip and hides her face in my chest.
I pull her close, a hand on her back and the other protectively around her head. I let her pain soak mine because if I had the option to take the hurt in her cries or the rawness of her grief, I would.
I’ve been emotionally fucked up since I was a child anyway, what’s one more pain to add?
Only, this one has an entirely different meaning.
Silver is the type who doesn’t cry often, and when she does, it’s like she’s breaking your heart. It’s in those small sounds and the sniffles. It’s in the way her whole body shakes with the force of her pain.
“It hurts. Why does it hurt so much, Cole? It’s not supposed to. I should be happy I won’t be forced to have an abortion, but why do I feel like I killed a baby that was never there in the first place? Why do I feel so horrible?”
“You’re not horrible. You’re just human, and you feel pain. It’ll eventually go away.”
“W-what if it doesn’t?” she speaks through her hiccoughs. “What if I always feel this…this loss.”
“Then we’ll feel it together.”
She peeks up at me with her tear-streaked face and bloodshot eyes. “What do you mean?”
“I told you, you’re not the only one responsible for this. Your pain is my pain, Butterfly.”
38
Silver
That night, Cole holds me as I cry myself to sleep.
I cry for something that was never there. But just because the test was negative doesn’t mean I don’t feel the loss.
It doesn’t mean I don’t feel like I’m missing a part of me. A chance of an alternative future, of a different life, another…possibility.
Because I know, I just know that if it were real, Cole and I would’ve fought for it. He would’ve taken me somewhere none of the reporters or the people from back home could find us.
Now, I have to return to the reality that I’m fucking my stepbrother and that while there isn’t a baby this time, life as we know it will be over if anyone catches us.
My head’s been in the clouds and now I have to drop back to the ground.
The next morning, Cole tries to drag me into town. He ambushes me after I’m out of my shower, standing in front of the bathroom in his stylish jeans and T-shirt with his hair combed.
No matter how much I love his appearance, I’m in no mood to leave my bed today. “I want to stay in my room until it’s time to go home.”
“Huh.” He stares down at me with his signature blank expression.
“What?”
“I didn’t know you were a bore aside from being a coward.”
“Hey!” I punch him in the shoulder.
The faintest smile grazes his lips. “Forget it. I’ll go without you. I don’t need cowards on my tours.”
I hear him greet the butler good morning and tell him he’ll have breakfast outside.
That wanker.
I throw on a cute peach-coloured mini-dress with a strappy back and gather my hair into a ponytail. After I shove my feet into the first pair of shoes I find, I storm out behind him.
It’s when I’m by the entrance that I realise I haven’t put on any makeup. Whatever. I’m in no mood for that.
I catch up to Cole by the hill of the house, walking slowly.
“I’m not a coward.” I pant as I keep up with his pace.
He smiles but says nothing. Instead, he threads his fingers with mine. The softness of his touch nearly breaks my heart all over again.
Your pain is my pain, Butterfly.
That was the first time I’d been able to breathe since the doctor said it was a false positive. Knowing that Cole, of all people, understood that pain made it less sharp. It’s still there, but I feel a certain type of peace knowing I have him with me.
Wait. He’s holding my hand. He shouldn’t.
I stare over my s
houlder and try to wiggle away, but he doesn’t let me go. “Cole! We’re in public.”
“We’re not in England. No one knows us here.” He drags me closer into his side. “Stay still.”
No one knows us here.
The only one who does is probably Lucien’s butler, and he’s out of the picture now.
A surreal sense of levitation takes hold of me as I let Cole lead me in the direction of the nearest town.
Renewed energy engulfs me. I soak in my surroundings, the bright blue sky and the warm sun. In the confines of the tight streets and vintage feel of the roads, it’s like a scene from a novel.
“There was a destructive battle here during the world war,” Cole says as we pass old buildings. “Our troops fought for the French on these same streets.”
I grin, watching him study the old pavement with that curious glint in his eyes. It’s so rare to see him unleash his inner nerd. “Well, it wasn’t our battle, and yet, we lost so many soldiers for it.”
“Do you honestly believe that?” He gives me a curious look.
“Yes, the French got themselves into that mess. We didn’t have to act like knights in shining armour.”
“We were anything but. That’s called a precedent fight, Butterfly. We were going to get involved anyway, so we made the first move and fought the enemy on foreign soil. Those types of battles happened many times over the course of history, like in the Ottoman Empire’s colonisation wars, or the Persians against the Romans.”
“You’re such a nerd.”
He releases my hand and tugs me to the crook of his body by the waist. It’s the first time he’s touched me so possessively in public. It’s almost as if he’s announcing his ownership. “Who are you calling a nerd, Butterfly?”
“You.” I hide my smile. “I bet you can give accurate retellings and even recite what those generals said before every battle.”
“Of course I can. The pre-battle part is the most important. That’s the moment before death. Before chaos.”
Cole called me his chaos before, and I still don’t know whether that’s a good or a bad thing. Since he associates it with death, it’s clear on which side it falls. My heart shrinks as I try to fight off the feeling.
“It’s beautiful,” he says.
“Beautiful?”
“Yes. It’s the unknown, and the unknown can be the most beautiful thing.”
“Or the most horrible one.”
“You never know at that moment. When troops stand there listening to their generals, they don’t know whether they’ll die, be injured, or stay alive. They don’t know if they’ll see their families again or if it’s all over. It’s human nature at its truest form.”
“It’s called survival.”
“It’s called life.” He brushes his lips against my nose. “It’s chaos.”
My heart thumps so hard, I’m scared it’ll stop beating or something.
Oh, shit.
I’m not supposed to be so caught up in him like this. I’m not supposed to wish I’m still his chaos and that he’ll never ever find a replacement.
“Do you want to do something chaotic?” I bite my lower lip.
“Like what?”
I motion at a tattoo parlour across the street from which a couple are exiting, appearing half happy, half in pain.
He raises a brow. “You want to get a tattoo?”
“Together. You and I.” It’s a crazy idea, but I want to commemorate this moment. I want to remember the pain, but also the way Cole held me through it.
We’ll eventually go home, and I want to keep the moment where we got to hold hands in public as a permanent reminder of today.
I expect him to refuse since Cole isn’t the type who likes to mark skin — at least not permanently, but then he says, “I get to choose what you put on your skin.”
I jut my chin. “And I get to choose what you put on yours.”
His lips tilt in a charming smile. “Deal.”
In the parlour, we decide to get tattoos on our sides since they can be easily hidden by clothes. Cole demands that the woman take care of me, not the man. Which is fine by me since that means she won’t be touching him.
Two hours later, and after so much pain that almost brought me to tears, we stand in front of each other in the middle of a room with dark walls.
“Show me.” I motion at his T-shirt.
“You first.”
“At the same time?”
He nods and we lift our clothes, baring our skin at the same time. Cole got the tattoo I chose for him and it’s even more beautiful than I imagined. The skin around it is red due to how fresh it is, but the design is clear. It’s an open book with tendrils of smoke coming out and on top of it, written in a neat font is the word ‘CHAOS.’
“It’s so beautiful,” I breathe out, approaching him to get a better view.
Cole holds me at arm’s length. “Stay there, I still haven’t gotten my fill.”
I remain in place, swallowing at the intense way he’s examining my tattoo. It’s a butterfly. And not just any butterfly. Cole sketched something that’s identical to the butterfly pin I wore that day ten years ago in the park.
The tattoo came out perfect with all the small details in the wing. It’s an exact match to the pin and similar to the necklace around my throat.
“So?” I ask. “You like it?”
“I love it.” He plants a kiss on my nose.
My toes curl like they do every time he does that. It’s softness where Cole is usually hard. It’s something he only does with me.
After we leave the tattoo parlour, we roam the streets, hand in hand, as Cole tells me more history.
The smell of baked goods lures me in like a cartoon character when we pass by a small pastry shop.
“Let’s try croissants,” I tell him.
Cole buys us croissants au chocolat and we sit at a small table in front of the shop. There are a few old patrons at the surrounding tables, and they seem relaxed, enjoying the bright weather.
I take a bite of the hot croissant and moan in pleasure. “Now I’m craving a Snickers bar. Let’s find some afterwards…”
I lift my head and stop chewing when I find Cole’s darkened eyes zeroed in on me.
He’s sitting opposite me with the small table separating us. He’s close enough that I smell his cinnamon scent and inhale it into my lungs.
The way he’s looking at me is so sinister, it’s like he’ll grab me and fuck me on the table right here, right now.
I clear my throat, but my voice comes out breathy anyway. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Why did you just moan?”
“I-I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did. Don’t lie to me.”
“It was because of the croissant.”
“And here I thought you were seducing me.”
“I-I wasn’t.”
“Well, it worked.”
“C-Cole —”
My words die in my throat when he grips my chin with two fingers and pulls me close before his lips claim mine. It’s an open-mouthed kiss, all tongues and teeth and…freedom.
Neither of us worries that we’re in public or that we shouldn’t be doing this or that someone will see.
Fuck them.
Fuck everyone.
Because this thing that beats between us is way stronger than their words and their judgement.
The loss we felt is way deeper than societal standards and forbidden relationships.
It’s us.
As twisted as it is.
We don’t stop kissing that day. We make out in the streets. In the grocery store. Everywhere. We give the people in town a PDA they never signed up for.
I take pictures with a barely-willing Cole who hardly looks at the camera and refuses to pose unless it involves a kiss or me touching him.
I commemorate every moment and every second. I document the time where I get to kiss him anywhere I want.
Because
real life will strike again.
Real life will rip us apart.
And the only place I can have him is behind closed doors.
39
Doll Master
Once upon a time, there was a doll.
You thought you could get rid of me because I’m not sending you texts anymore.
I’m close even when I’m far.
I’ll follow like a star.
And that star will eventually become your fate and your only reprieve.
It’ll follow you as you grow. As you fall. As you stand up just so you’ll fall again.
You can’t run. You can’t hide.
Little doll, what have you done?
The fun has only begun.
And soon, you’ll come undone.
40
Silver
In the end, life goes on.
Mum was fine, and in her words, she only needed to clear her head in a place where Papa doesn’t exist. Usually, she makes him appear as the villain every chance she gets, but not this time. Maybe she’s finally moving on? I hope so, at least. I feel so sorry for Lucien.
After that weekend we spent in Nice, Cole and I evolved. I can’t find the words to describe it properly, but we just took it to the next level.
Could be because we shared a loss, or because we became more careful.
Or I did.
The anxiety and stress I felt when I thought I was pregnant was torture. It’s Papa’s election year – the dream he’s worked his entire life for. The one he divorced Mum for because he wanted to focus on his political career.
I can’t be self-immersed and ruin that for him.
Or Mum’s social popularity. Or Helen’s success.
So the only time Cole gets to touch or even be near me is when he sneaks into my room at night. When both our doors are closed and the outside world ceases to exist.
I still pretend I don’t want him there and he fucks me harder each time I do. It’s like he’s punishing me for our screwed-up situation.
Cole likes punishments. The control and the fact that I fall completely at his mercy is his driving force.