Fractured

Chapter 22

They say love is indescribable, it is. And that's what I hate most about it. When I was younger I had the problem of not being able to express my feelings. My dad thought maybe I was going through a phase but my mother thought there was something wrong with me. She was concerned for me. My mother tried to ask her friends who are school counselors to give me therapy on how 'I don't feel.'. I hate her now for that because now I feel so much. Too much. When you're young people think you know nothing, you feel nothing.

When you want your flowers to bloom and turn pretty you feed them and take care of them. You make sure they're healthy, that's what I don't understand about parents, well the abusive ones. There are your kids if you don't want them, why have them? For them to take care of you, no, no. Check up on your kids; they're humans too. Don't hurt them, do the opposite and take care of them, be there for them. If I had flowers I'd never do what my mom did to me.

We're all fragile like flowers, we have petals too that are our emotions. Every time a petal falls we get pushed more to the edge, because of how bruised we are. Right now I'm on the very edge.

I look down at my reflection in the water.  Useless. What a waste of space. Your own mom didn't like you, the so-called love of your life didn't either. And you are a whore because you love two men at the same time.

I lean my head back on the cool wall and slowly let my body go deeper. I inhale and don't exhale until I submerge under the water. I blink excessively under the water. These are my last thoughts. Slowly, very slowly I feel pain and just close my eyes, my head is ringing. There's pounding noise now.

                                                                    ...

I gasp and jerk up coughing water. When I look down my body is covered in a towel and I'm drenched in water. Oh it didn't work, I'm not dead. My wide eyes look around and I notice I'm in Rowan's arms. My gasping continues as I back away from him screaming.

"STAY AWAY, STAY AWAY FROM ME. PLEASE. PLEASE DON'T HURT ME. STOP IT, NO. NO. NO." I bury my head in my knees and rock myself back and forth. I feel his arms around me and wiggle around to escape from his grasp. Later I just give up and when I look up it was Quinton and he's whispering "It's okay, it's okay. I'm so sorry, love. Please don't do this. I failed you I know but now I'm here. I'm not going to hurt you I promise. I love you so fucking much it's hard me to breathe. We love you so much." he wipes my tears away and pulls me up in his arms.

As he sets me on the bed and realizes everyone is in the room. Looking down shamefully not knowing if they're judging me with their eyes. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I'm so selfish, I couldn't do it anymore so I thought if I- if I killed myself maybe the problem would go away." Ajax pulls Emily closer to him as she cries. "Please don't say you're sorry. How could you blame yourself? None of this is your fault, it never was and never will be." Darren says his body is shaking as he looks down at the floor.

"Malia, please don't hurt yourself again. I know we're being selfish because we're asking the one who's suffering in pain to stay alive for us cause we need her. Please don't kill yourself, we love you so much. I love you so much. I need you, you're like my sister. Friends are family and if something happens to my family I won't know what to do with myself." Emma says as she hugs me, her cries muffled into my shoulder.

Quinton looks down at us with tears in his eyes and clenches his jaw. "I wish I could do something to change the way everything was, but I can't. I wish I could make your pain go away but I can't. What I can tell you is that we're all sharing your pain because we love you so much it kills us to see this. But Malia friends, family, lovers whatever they are they're supposed to help you. And that's why we have to tell someone. We need to get help and when we do you'll be safe and everything will be okay." He sits next to me and grabs my hand softly and places it in his.

"It'll be okay, I promise sweetcheeks. You're my heart and I'm your infinity. I hate keeping promises I can't keep but this one will be kept and I'd go through hell to keep it." he says. I breathe a 'okay.'.

"I-I have a friend who's a cop here he worked with a similar case like this before. And they won the guy got locked up in prison for life but he killed himself a year or two in prison. Malia you don't have to worry about him, you shouldn't. Someone that inflicted so much on you and caused you so much pain shouldn't have to carry your worry or your love. They don't deserve it.  But my friend also knows good lawyers and more, you'll get justice. You'll be safe, he won't be able to hurt you."  Ajax says.

Emily walks away from his arms and bends down in front of me. She breaks out into a smile before speaking "You know what the best part is. We have evidence too, we took photos. That motherfucker is going behind bars. But it's not going to be an easy process you're going to go through a lot more but we are going to as well. Court. So much, but it'll be okay cause I just know we can do it.". 

I nod wiping away my tears. Standing up I say "Okay let's go.".

Darren looks at me. "Right now?" he asks, his eyes wide. "Yes, now." I say my voice, shaking.

Before we leave the house I look down at the messages Rowan sent me. Quinton comes behind me wraps his arms around me "Definitely bring your phone too." he says. I turn around and wrap my arms around his neck. "I'm scared." I whisper to him. "Me too. But I got you, and you got me. We all have each other's back and everything in me is saying it'll be okay." he whispers back before he grabs my hand and leads me outside. I'll love him forever.

A/N: All I can say is treat people the way you wanna be treated. Cried. Ps. I promise the when Quinton said I promise I won't hurt you wasn't a foreshadow. Do you think we're flowers? I love flowers too. I love you, stay safe! <333