Chapter 2 PAIN GO AWAY

SLADE'S POV

I ran out of the hotel immediately I hit him. I could faintly remember the lady on the bed, rushing to him, she seemed horrified just like me. I was out the door too fast to get a good look at her.

Not that it mattered. My mind was in a daze. Remorse and heartache hit me at the same time. I still couldn't picture how I got home but I did and now I was sitting in the dark hugging a red bowtied gift box.

I was trembling, muttering to myself.

"Don't cry, Sierra. He hurt me and you hurt him back. The torn bleeding forehead of his makes us even. You just gotta get over him, I just have to..."

I bit my lip. Fighting the tears that burned my eyes, gripping the gift tighter. My heart hurt. I found myself pressing a hand on it, folding up my shirt in-between my fingers, trying to make the pain stop. It didn't. It couldn't.

I gasped unconsciously as my tears dripped onto the floor. Sobs escaped my lips. Milan's face haunting my mind.

'How could you?nYou promised. You swore on your life never to hurt me. You... How could you?'

I was shuddering, hugging my knees. My vision blurred. The room seemed to be closing in. Flashes of him over that woman played before my eyes.

Sardonically, I found myself chuckling. The exotic emotions that inflated me the morning of yesterday when I picked up his parcel, felt like torment now. Before he went for his business trip, he sent me a gold necklace and in its box was a letter. He wrote;

'Quit trying to hide, you can't fool me. I know you are an angel in disguise'.

Every word of his letter felt suffocating.

He knew he would hurt me and still wrote something like that.

A pang of rage gripped me. I flung the box, it hit the standing mirror and it shattered. My sullen reflection marred as I looked at it. For some sickening reason, I remembered the girl on the bed. I didn't get to see her face but from behind she looked mature, tall, curvy, her skin luminous and her hair silky. She was beautiful, more beautiful than I was. More appealing.

'Maybe this is my fault'. I rose to my feet.

'Maybe I should have...'

I scratch my hair, scattering the brown curls, my steps no different from a sulken staggering drunk.

'I should have offered him sex a long time ago. Maybe he got tired of waiting and found her. Found someone better.'

The tears pooled again. I wiped a hand on my cheek, cleaning the droplets of water.

'Ifbhe was tired, he should have said something. Cheating on me, it's sick. He wasn't meant for me. Someone who can't wait isn't meant for me. I am better off without a bastard like...'

My eyes roamed the room frantically then unconsciously, It fell on something. I froze on the spot.

Framed and painted on the reading desk next to a artifical rose, was our last anniversary picture, taken on his yacht.

The memory seeped into my head. His voice echoing in my mind. The taste of his lips lingered in my tongue. His touch, his light kisses rippled through my skin.

My legs felt weak, I stumbled backwards and crumbled to the floor.

I couldn't fight it anymore. I let go and started crying.

'I can't do this. I can't. I... I love him. I love him so much it hurts. Someone make this pain go away, please.'

I buried my face in my knees. The sorrow overwhelmed me and for hours it felt like it would tear me apart but after a while, it went away.

I felt numb, staring at the emptiness that was my shattered mirror, hopelessly yearning for this to all be just a bad dream but time ticked on and nothing changed. The pieces of the shattered mirror lay close by. All the while I was looking at it I was mustering courage. Courage to end everything.

There was a throbbing ache at the back of my head. A crushing tightness in my chest. I felt lightheaded as I slipped off the floor and lurched to the glass pieces lying next to the reading desk.

I looked at it for a moment. That thought swirling around my disoriented mind.

'If I do this, if I cut myself, it will all go away. I will leave this wreaked life forever. I will feel fine again.'

My hands quivered as I bent over to pick it up. An oval piece in-between my fingers, I tried to bring myself to straighten up...

Someone knocked.

It was like something had hit me. The thud sound on the door broke into the silence. It startled me, dragging me back to reality. My fingers shuddered and the glass cut me. I cringed back, staring at the blood.

"Sierra are you in there? Are you alright?" Mum's anxious voice came through, sinking into my bones like ice water. "Mummy had a bad dream, are you sure you are alright?"

I had my hands over my lips. Suppressing the sobs. Fighting to hold back a wail. Mother did not have to know. I couldn't make her worry.

"I'm okay. Just sleeping mum." I lied, my voice low like a whisper.

"Are you sure, dear."

"Yes... I am.... I am just sleepy."

"Alright." Her tone still held a hint of worry.

"I will leave you then so you can rest well for school."

I heard the floors creek as her footsteps disappeared down the passageway.

I shut my eyes, slipping back to the floor. Mum just saved my life.

The night passed in silence. Somehow mum's perfect timing and her words calmed me so much I actually slept that night and in the morning, I had a clear head, clear enough to make up an amazing story about how a rat broke the mirror. Clear enough to convince them I could not go to school.

Mother knew something was wrong. I could see it in her glassy gray eyes but she knew better not to probe further. Immediately she left for work, I found my way to the large cushion in the sitting room and slumped on it. A bowl of Ice cream in hand. That's what all the heartbroken girls in the movies do right? Lick ice cream .

I tried to see if it could work for me but before I could start filling my mouth with chunks of icy creamy sugar. I heard a knock on the door.

'That's weird. Did mum come back? I didn't hear her car pull up on the driveway. It must be the neighbors'.

I scurried to my feet and hurriedly opened the door.

'Good morning, sorry my mum isn't...'

Our eyes met and the words stuck in my throat. He stared at me. In his ever-changing calm demeanor, accentuating his polished appearance.

A deep frown settled on my lips. I swung the door, he held it, forcing it open.

"Sierra stop, I just want to talk to you."

"Get out of my house! Get out of my life!" I yelled, standing a little from the door he had thrown ajar.

"Sierra, please, let me explain."

He pleade. His chest rose and fell in palpitation. Tension filling the atmosphere.

"There is nothing I want to listen to. Please leave me." my time was final.

"Sierra it's not what you think it is. I didn't know what came over me. I swear I didn't even know she was there."

He had a terrified look in his eyes as he spoke. I had never seen him like that before. He seemed as though he was losing something worth more than his life.

"But you still fucked her anyway." the words fell from my lips. I didn't care infact, at that point, I wanted it to break him like he broke me.

"It was a mistake. I didn't even go all the way."

I scoffed. "Oh so I am supposed to be happy. You didn't go all the way so I should forgive you? Kiss and make up right?"

"Sierra-"

"You promised!" I yelled, tears trickleed I wiped it immediately.

"You lied to me."

I ran a hand through my already tousled hair, I felt like I was loosing it.

"Please just leave. Please!"

He held my gaze. Breathing slowly. Contemplating what to do next. We stood there, in silence until his footsteps broke it. He turned his back and made for the door slowly.

"I will come back when you've cooled. Just remember this, Sierra. I could never do anything to hurt you."

I banged the door, slipping to the floor.

All the pain came flooding back, it felt like last night all over again. I curled up into myself. Wishing so badly that I had gone to school instead. In the midst of all this distress, the only thing I could think of was calling my best friend Kale.

I thought I could find salvation in her. But that phone call, our conversation on the roof, was the beginning of a nightmare I spent the rest of my life trying to escape.