Everything You've Come To Regret

41 | like fire and powder (one)

AN: I don't even know where to start. It's so long, I know. And even though it's clearly not the end, it feels like a big accomplishment after forty chapters. Here is the first part of this very long and heavy chapter, the one I've dreamt about ever since I started writing EYCTR. I'm so happy. So sad. Thank you so much for being here. <3

This one is for my Madu. What would I have done without you?

warnings: mentions of death, alcohol and drugs, ...angst

February 5, 2016

For a master of deception and subterfuge
You've made yourself quite the bed to lie in
Do your time travelling through the tanning booth
So you don't let the sun catch you crying

⋆ ˚ ° ° ˚⋆

The next day, the sky was grey and rainy. I felt anxious already, and the hustle and bustle of the city could only worsen my frustration.

Yeah, it was the big day. Maybe I should have felt a tad more optimistic about it though.

My hands felt clammy when I arrived at the museum, already packed with people decorating the main gallery where the speech and the exhibition would be held. I made my way straight to my office, gathered some papers I would need and went downstairs again to make sure everything was in order.

It was around ten o'clock when I drifted closer to a painting depicting Romeo and Juliet, noticing it for the first time since it had been moved here. I'd never really stopped there before, so I stood in front of it for five good minutes.

I remembered reading the book in high school, back when Sophie liked to tease me about my cheesy romance stories. But Romeo and Juliet wasn't cheesy, was it? It was the angst I would have loved to live just for the experience–just for a day, maybe as a side character behind a glass screen before I could turn back into a normal teenager again.

These violent delights have violent ends,
And in their triumphs die, like fire and powder
Which, as they kiss, consume

Clearing my throat, I ignored the upcoming wave of nausea coming in my throat and spun on my heels. There was no time to imagine whatever violent end I could think of at the moment. I'd been silly to dream about this kind of tragedy just to spice up my life in that small city we used to live in. Tragedy was nothing but a nightmare, and I feared I was already into it.

I focused my attention on the small mirrors which had been set up on wall panels all around the room instead. Each time I crossed my own gaze in one of them, I smoothed down my suit and touched my hair.

Sophie had been right; I looked like I was on drugs.

Thirty minutes later, the lights were brighter and everything was louder. Champagne glasses filled the tables set up in a corner, and every sculpture was highlighted with a different shade of neon light. All around, people of the security staff guarded a high-price painting or a piece of jewellery.

In the entrance hall, a dozen of well-dressed people were already making their way inside with an appetiser in one hand and a drenched umbrella in the other, their low whispers resonating in the room.

Pretending to look at another painting on the wall, I pulled out my phone and quickly texted Alex. I was going to lose it before it even started. And it wasn't all about Luke–although it was mainly because of him and the plans I'd imagined the night before instead of sleeping. I kept thinking about the speech I had to do, and every word I would mispronounce, every hair I would lose if I kept tugging on it.