AVA
In the past years, my operations are always clandestine, I was good at being undercover. When my steps were stealthy, no one was wise enough to expose me unless for Lilith which was often.
She is smart, I will give her that.
No matter how defensive I guard my corners, she walled me up like a nonentity, and throw me out to the jungle.
It was what she did once more tonight after collaring me under the leash of my newest prey in Vegas.
Aren't I worthy of a slot to cry out my mistakes? It's all I am asking for.
But of course, she was now drunk, and she was been deliberately wild and noisy, to wake everyone up at almost three in the morning.
Mom can't find me like this, I can't give her another reason to criticize me.
I am sure Lilith's mindful of that, it's more of her goal right now. To get me in trouble, for she had my grave dug up, waiting for the clock to chime and hurl me into the darkness of my fear.
Struggling, I pull her out of my car in the closed garage, which had just also made a rambunctious show descending. While through the seconds as the door closes, I was pleading with God to keep mom and Christian asleep.
At this moment, I am only willing for peace and quiet, a place to think about how to unravel this Arlen situation. I hate those frustrating dramas that are bound to happen in this family circle, I can't beget it tonight when my brain is barely rotten from pressure.
"Just leave me here." She wailed with pain and then began to laugh exuberantly, tapping my face or more like slapping with her extremely wicked Disney nails.
I don't understand how she can do that when she was completely slouching, her futile efforts to move were even annoying, as I have to drag her with me into the house.
Several thoughts of leaving her on the floor of the garage had crossed my mind.
In the living room, I almost smash her head against the walls when she began taunting me about her dreams of me with Arlen when we disappeared to his upstairs.
Everything inside of me wanted to spill out in her face and acquaint her with the shit she had us into, for no matter how this sounds like a 'me situation' it literally involves everyone in this family.
The wanker back there had it all contrived in his stupid mental novel and is willing to take brutal actions at anymore moment.
"Where are guys coming from?" The voice wasn't my parent or Christian but the impact of guilt says it's much better it was my mom than Leigh, who is standing some feet ahead of us by the sliding door between the foyer and the living area.
How can I begin?
"Ava?" He called, sounding disturbed, as he flashes his phone towards us.
He was shirtless, wearing only joggers that are impossible to guess the colour in such darkness.
"Can you give me a hand here?" I shook my head, albeit my tone was unstable.
The lights were all off, I couldn't see his profile very well. He took forward steps silently not that he meant to, but every move he made was smooth. He picked her over his shoulder effortlessly and stride ahead of me without saying a word. As we reach the second floor, his countenance became more noticeable, the side of his jaw I am able to see was clenched.
Every hair behind my neck had risen, I waited outside the open room, against the wall, fiddling with the hem of my shorts, while her brother tuck her to bed.
A few minutes later, the door was closing off and a huge figure began approaching me until it towers over my frame and I was completely intimidated.
I couldn't help it, but he always have me melting in his presence.
"Why are you coming home now? Ava if she did som-" His thick voice started and paused when I bring my hands to the sides of his hard ribs.
He was warm but he shudders.
"I have nothing to offer her, Leigh. I hate that I am the reason why she is messed up. Because she is really falling apart, I saw it tonight. It is why I can't slap her hard for the hardship she had me in."
He leaned in and nuzzle his head in the crook of my neck. Instantly deviating from coercive to vulnerable.
My eyes closed at the soft melody of his heart and his burning respiration against my skin igniting me on fire.
"Are you considering being with her?" He muttered almost inaudible.
The solidity of the question was too tough, my eyes opened immediately but he wouldn't peel off of me. He tighten the embrace as though he was scared of something.
I swear it was the first time I felt the sound of my heart breaking, crumbling silently in my hearing and burning with the worst kind of ache that rained acid in my stomach.
How I wish feelings could be reflected in the open like sunglasses reflects the images before us, I would exhibit my love for him in every Museum, on advertisement boards and on my forehead.
He didn't have to ask, I had branded myself his, from the start of our relationship.
But then again, Leigh and I do not get those privileges because people around us believed relationships like ours, were poison. And so everything I had mentioned earlier, wishing I could prove to him, to provide him with contentment would remain in my head, undemonstrative and he would keep doubting, fearing and contesting his sister because he doesn't recognize how thick and raw his love had caught me.
"I HAVE NOTHING TO OFFER TO HER, Leigh." I reiterated with notable emphasis through a cracking voice. "Stop considering possibilities and odds of cases that I do not. Stop carrying it in your head. Stop telling me what I would never change. Stop punishing us. Stop all of it." I shove him away until there were two feet between us.
The space was exceedingly quiet except for our enraged breathing and his frequent swallowing.
It's still hard to see his face. But from what my eyes could perceive in the stillness, is his one side jaw and not clenched anymore and his blazing eyes. They're so sharp, they were streaking in the darkness as they anchored on me.
My chest was beating fast, it was rising and falling under Arlen's hoodie, I had to lean back against the wall for physical support.
"What do I have to do to show you how much I love you too?" I whispered in the dark, my voice trailing by as I began to sob pathetically yet softly, careful not to be heard despite the thick walls of the halls.
"I am sorry. I-I-I didn't mean to hurt you. I take back my words." He staggered from across me, not doing anything.
I was trembling, I had hoped he would hug me, kiss me? But he just stood there, overwhelmed with shock.
I can't do this now. I never thought this night could get any worse.
He was immobilised, not making any effort.
Shaking my head, I pull myself from the wall, because the reality of this moment is, that no one would do it for me.
My legs began dragging themselves over the long rug in the middle of the room, I head for my room in silence. It was then he reached for me, as I was mentally praying for him too.
His fingers wrapped around my clothed arms and stopped me from taking any more steps.
Even when I try, I couldn't win over my body from stopping it to slump back into him. He just felt so good, I don't know how to describe it.
"I want to love you anyway. I want to feel you in every part of my soul exactly as you flow through it every day since I met you. I want you, it fucking hurt, Ava. I am desperate, eager and I am goddamn afraid."
"Of what?"
"Are you in my future?" He asked forwardly. When we both know I do not have that answer with me at this moment. It pains me that we have to have this conversation repeatedly in short intervals instead of benefitting from the moment we have right now. "Tomorrow? In the next hour? Or the next breath I would take."
"Come." I laced our hands without turning back to meet his eyes because I knew I wouldn't recover from them.
Thankfully, he followed me without protest even when it was his room that I was dragging us into.
The room was still, dimmed with the light from the only nightstand lamp that was on and the pulled back curtains from the opened balcony, giving the bright sky access into the space.
He was still behind me, he didn't make any sound. The quiet was much better.
I let go of his cold fingers and drop the wet sweater in my hand over the floor before my fingers went for the hem of my hoodie and pulled it over my head.
My hair was still damped, I noticed that when I slipped out of my undergarments and it flow against my bare back.
The burning of his intense gaze was alive and harsh, it was prodding through every pore and making its way to my head. I was hyperaware of it.
When I spun around, bringing my hair to the left side of my neck, my gaze pursued his.
The skin of his chest was matching the quickness of mine.
Up till now, he wouldn't move, he stood like a brick, not blinking, not speaking. He was only breathing. Even that, it was extraordinary.
I close our distance and reach for the waistband of his joggers, and his eyes fluttered until closed.
He let me take it off. And when I was on my feet, I studied the man before me, and I knew I could love him anyway also.
He was an angel in a human figure. He was the only one who can save me.
I traced my finger along the straight line that divided his left and right pack abs and until my fingertips reached the waistline of his brief, it was then he moved his hands.
As always, he would stop me, when seconds ago he was barely catching his breathing.
"Leigh, just-" I began whining and stopped when he pinched the material of his brief between his fingers and pulled it down, slipping out of it.
Catching me off guard.
When he rose, I didn't have the bravery to take my eyes from his eyes. I held his gaze and waited for my heart to burst out of my chest.
His eyes were gleaming with emotions, all apparent, and easy to interpret.
"Ava, what are we doing?"
"I want to feel you in every part of my soul as I do every single moment of every day too. I don't care anymore. Save my soul, take it, have it. Do whatever you want to do with it. I would heal, knowing that you trust me enough, for you own me entirely, and it would cure you too, that only you could have it in your guard and there's no one anymore that would ever threaten you of it."
The moment my lips closed, his jaw clenched and he fleetly closed the distance between us, latching his lips on mine, his hands binding to my bare skin. And his soul clinging with mine. I felt him in every drip of my body. He was emotionally roaring with affection, devotion and love. I sensed his warmth, excitement, pleasure and tears when he assist me backwards over his bed and hover over my naked body.
It was the joy that I never had.
AN
Hello, guys.
Okay, I really don't know how to start. But believe me when I say I am dealing with some things over here that constantly deprived me of time. The last thing I want is to mess this book up, so I only concentrate and work on it at my most convenient time.
However, I am trying to figure a way to reach at least a minimum of a thousand words per chapter, maybe that way we can improve. The thing is, most of the chapters that were updated before are between three thousand or four thousand words, and I had become used to that, I feel like it's either it or nothing. And I often find it hard to reach that certain number when there's so much here to do.
Well, I am sorry for the hundredth time for the late update. I hope and wish this is progress.
Thanks for understanding and sticking around. I hope y'all are doing great.
Xoxo