Tragedy ✔️

Chapter Thirty Eight

Chapter Thirty Eight: Rekindling Relationship
Sophia Crawford

River takes me to the hilltop after seeing his father.

The entire visit to his father didn't really go as planned. He didn't get closure. The visit only reopened deep wounds, wounds that took River months to heal.

River was unable to sit still the entire drive back home. His fingers kept drumming against the steering wheel of his aunt's car and he took shallow but rapid breaths trying to calm himself down.

The visit just tormented him.

I couldn't help but feel bad that I forced him to come. I thought it would bring him some kind of peace to face the man who has haunted his dreams for months, but it only ended up worsening things. And now-looking at River sitting beside me by the edge of the hilltop, looking down at the view-who kept covering his face with his hands before he pulled them away again frustratingly made me want to pull him into a hug and never let go.

But that's what the hilltop was for.

He brought me here the other day to find some peace, and now we were here after the dreadful visit to his father trying to find some peace, but I think River was struggling to find some peace of his own right now, but the hilltop seemed to have a good effect on him. We were sitting here for maybe thirty minutes now and River started to calm down, slowly but surely.

"You're smiling." He says, fighting one of his own when he looked down at the beautiful view down below.

I shrug, not bothering to fight the smile he noticed. "I love it here."

He nods slowly. "Me too."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Go ahead."

I sigh, contemplating whether or not I wanted to ask him the question I wanted to ask. "What the hell happened to us? We were born and then boom, we're suddenly grown up with a lot of problems we cannot even solve."

River chuckles. "I thought you were going to ask me a question I know the answer to." He looks at the sky above, focusing on a plane that flew past. "But to answer your question as best I can... I don't know how we got here."

"Why does losing someone hurt so much?" I ask after I nodded to his previous answer. "One moment we're smiling and laughing with a loved one and in the next they're just gone. When they leave, not only do we lose them, but they leave a gaping hole in its wake. I don't think we can fill that hole anymore."