Duplicity

Chapter Nine

9. To be Loved 

Ever since I had escaped the facility I had a strange admiration for love songs. I liked them all; the fast ones, slow ones, sad ones, happy ones. It was the only that I had listened to as the years passed and I had never understood why. I had swore off love since my younger years, but yet here I was with a longing heart and soft melody. Now, that I was back in Werversted, I finally realized why I had such a fascination for these love songs. Alexander.

After I had left my father sitting in the bar along with Leonardo I decided that I wouldn't be able to face both Tessa and Darius right now. I had too many questions and not enough answers swimming around my head and I felt in any moment I would be washed ashore. Why was my uncle able to move on so quickly after my 'death?' How had my father known I was alive? How did he know my name? How did he recognize me? What else didn't I know? I came back to Werversted for closure, but yet I had never felt so vulnerable than I was in this moment than in the last five years.

The rain had stopped, but the streets were covered in puddles and the streets were slippery. Occasionally a car or two would pass by me and would slightly splash water onto the sidewalk. My hands were stuffed in my pockets and I had the yearning to cry though the tears never fell. My stomach sank with each step I took and my head became cloudy. A number of things had contributed into making me feel this way; the most important one of them being was that I was going to kill somebody. I was going to kill somebody. And although I'm a anti-hero who had done a lot of bad things in the past I had never killed anyone. Kidnapped, beat, and rob yes. But I had never killed someone. I would have done all that for my uncle who apparently didn't give a rat's ass about me. Maybe David wasn't just a waste of space after all.

Some way or another I had ended up in the last place I expected to be; the graveyard. The ground was moist and a cloud of fog had hung in the air, giving the place you're cliche ominous look. If you asked me why I had decided to make my way towards Caleb's grave that night I would blame the alcohol, but if I'm honest I felt like I had pay my last respects. So I trudged my way through the muddy grounds in my favorite pair of white sneakers, but I didn't find it in me to care. I had walked past numerous tombstones and family mosumeliums with slumped shoulders and solemn face. It didn't take a long time for me to come across the familiar sight of Caleb's grave sight. I could vaguely make out the dark silhouette of a tall figure looming over the grave. However, I was surprised to see that the person wasn't visiting Caleb's gave, but mine.

I had known that I was buried next to Caleb during the burial, but at the time I was too preoccupied to see how well maintained it was. Not that I didn't expect it to be cleaned, but to my surprise there were fresh flowers on my grave. Caleb of course couldn't put them there and I had known no one else to put fresh flowers there. Expect Alexander. When the simple fact dawned on me that this person had to be Alexander I quickly hid behind a nearby tree. It was one thing for my father to know that I was alive because after all this time he had never looked for me, but for Alexander to know would be a whole different ordeal. If I was ever discovered by the facility once again no doubt they would kill all the mortals that I knew; Darius, Alexander, and my father. I wasn't worried about Darius because he doesn't know the connection between Rozetta and Duplicity, and frankly I couldn't give a shit about my father. Though if something had happened to Alexander because of me I would never be able to forgive myself. Which is why I was standing in a damn bush.

I was close enough to see what he was doing and barely be able to hear him. If I had strained by ears hard enough I was vaguely able to make out what he was saying. "I guess you have your whole family now, Athena." He sniffled, his shoulders stiffened.

"Nothing has been the same since you left." He admitted placing the flowers along the bottom of my tombstone, "But than again I tell you that every week." My heart strained. He had come to my grave every week for the last five years. He still loved me, even after I had been gone. "You were going to be the one." He mumbled.