𝐈𝐥𝐥-𝐅𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝 ✔️

38

And there was no doubt inside me. No regrets. As I watched her paint, nothing inside me regretted turning my back on my people. I felt it inside me that I was to be here, with her, for all my immortal life. 

I stand up. The wood creaks beneath my feet as I walk down the steps and get closer to her. I stand behind her as I watch what she creates. She had a talent. I understood now why she loved art so much, she could've created it.

"I used to paint out here all the time," she tells me. "I'd stand and paint and eat cherries. Life used to be a lot simpler."

I felt partly responsible for the disruption of her life. She may not be a true angel, and it may not be her true parents I killed, but I still lied to her for months. I still tried to kill her. I still made things much more complicated for her. 

"From what grocery store?" I ask. "This house is in the middle of nowhere."

"That's how I like it, Adi," she says that nickname again. 

"I like it too," I tell her. "Being here with you and only you. Away from everybody else. I could stay here with you until the end of time."

She tries to hide the smile that wants to form on her face, but as much as she tries, I still see it and her dimples. 

"I picked the cherries from a cherry tree," she tells me. "It's in the forest."

I look at the green trees in the distance. I begin walking toward them. She calls out to me, "Hey, where are you going?"

I turn around and tell her while continuing to walk backward, "Over my dead body will you go without cherries for a minute longer, Valeria."

She rolls her eyes while smiling. She says, "You always talk as if you're writing a romance novel."

"Maybe I am," I smile back. "I could write one about you."

"You just did it again!" she says. 

I turn back around and continue walking toward the forest as I hear her laugh behind me. I follow the trail, I'm not sure exactly where it is, so I just continue walking until I see it. 

As I walk, I think about what Selena said to me. The Lord never met me - thankfully, as he would've burned my lost soul, I wasn't as strong back then. But I did not understand the correlation between The Lord and me and Valeria. Why she said Valeria and I could not be together, and why The Lord had anything to do with it.

She was probably just saying that to get me to keep her alive. She knew exactly what I had felt for Valeria, she knew I'd keep somebody alive who had any information that could help her. She was probably just using that to stay alive.

In the distance, I see red berries on tree branches. I begin walking over to it. I looked at each berry closely, making sure to only pick the ones that looked the best. I picked them until my hand could not hold any more. 

I put one into my mouth as I walk back in the direction of the house. I began to think of this place as my new home, if it was where she was, it was where I would be. 

I see a large tree to my left. It's covered in white flowers. I don't plan to spend too much time looking at it until something catches my attention. My eyebrows lower and my head tilts as I step toward it.

I questioned if the insanity inside me was taking over and altering my vision. I knew I wasn't right - I knew there was something wrong with me. Hearing voices and not remembering leaving myself messages in my room. And now I must've completely lost it as I hallucinated.

Believing it not to be real, I walk until I reach the tree. I reach my hand out to touch what I see. I expect the hallucination to end once I touch it and for it to return back to normal. But as my fingers touched the tree bark, I could not only see it, but feel it.

"What the hell?" I whispered to myself as I took a step back. This was not a hallucination, it was real, but what the fuck was this?

I blink, and blink, and blink, but what is in front of me never changes.

Carved into the bark is, "Adonis + L----," with the second name scratched out. A date is below, one that dates back to 200 years ago. 

I stand here, confused, I had never been here before, and who was this other person? 

I had thought that I was losing my sanity before.

But now it felt completely gone. 

Word Count: 1507