Unexpected Love ✔️

T W E N T Y T W O

A R I A N N A

I don't leave Zayn's place and return to the apartment until well after one O'clock in the morning, thanking Tony, Zayn's driver, I slam the car door closed behind me before making my way up the steps.

I close my apartment door behind me before making my way through to the lounge where I hear the familiar voices of the girls talking between themselves. I join them, plucking the bottle of red wine from the table before squeezing into the seat between Ava and Freya, throwing an arm over Ava's shoulder before taking a sip straight from the bottle.

"Where did you disappear off to?" Sierra asks jumping over the back of the couch and landing in the corner, behind Ava. 

"Went over to Zayn's," I tell her, glancing at her over my shoulder to see her staring at me as my words sink in.  "I just wasn't really in the mood for celebratory drinks at the bar, you know," I explain sending her a soft smile as I brush my hair out of my face with a sigh. 

"We know and we get it," Ava points out, grabbing a hold of my hand and giving it a gentle squeeze as she smiles softly in reassurance. "How is she anyway?" She asks and I blow out a breath, taking another swing from the bottle of wine.

"She's getting worse." I offer with a shrug of my shoulder, keeping my gaze laser-focused on the floor beneath me, not daring to meet anyone's eyes.  My voice is stripped bare of any emotion  whatsoever as I swallow harshly, "You know walking into that hospital room last week and just seeing her so lifeless and frail, I lost all hope of her getting better." I whimper because the thought kills me. Knowing it, accepting it, and admitting it out loud are three completely different things.

I knew early on that the cancer was going to get the best of her because things were different this time around. Her body and her reaction to treatment were completely different this time around.  Accepting the fact had taken me a little longer because it was the one thing I didn't want to do. Somewhere in the back of my mind I still had hope that she might be able to fight this and come out on the other side.

Hope is a real fucking bitch.

It might have hurt a little less if I didn't hold to hope that she would beat cancer and survive this somehow, that she would make it out alive and live on to see me head over heels in love with the guy who waited for me, she'd give him shit but at the end of the day she would have loved him if she knew he was the real deal simply because I loved him with everything I had and that was enough for her, she would walk me down the aisle dressed in white on my wedding day and hand   me over to my future husband and that she'd be there to congratulate me as a married woman. She'd be there when I had children of my own holding my hand through it and telling me that they were perfect because they looked just like me.

She would have been the best grandmother to my children, simply because I had seen her with Liam and Liliana, teaching them how to do things with a patient smile, accepting every single of their flaws and loving them anyway, because they were her grandbabies.

It kills me to know she won't be here for any of it.

A set of arms wrap around my neck, pulling me back into her chest, and I wipe the tears away, not having realized I was crying. "It's going to be okay. Ari," Sierra whispers, softly with a sad smile. I stare at her, my attention unwavering, feeling heartbreakingly numb. 

Because I'd rather feel nothing than feel the hurt of what's coming. Ignorance is bliss  – or so they say. And I was naive enough to think I could make it out of this storm alive. I stand up, heading to my room, to grab a quick shower, my skin musty with sweat from dancing around on stage all evening.