Always As You Say (Book One In The Waven Series)

22

Anthony

Anthony's POV

I meant what I said.

I was gonna stay away, so what if I did think about him all the time. And started imagining him when I was reading. And staring at his art for ridiculously long periods of time.

Didn't change a thing.

And you know what I did that, I stayed away for ten years. That's a long fucking time alright.

Long enough for me to realize that I hate portraits, hate them. Standing still for them is uncomfortable, and they always come out wrong, unless of course, Nik is painting them.

Then the process is nice and comfortable, him being quiet and me talking to much. And they come out beautifully too, hell half the time I can't even believe that that's how he sees me.

Long enough to realize that Nik snores, loudly, and it makes me very uncomfotable to try to sleep when I can't hear it.

And shit, long enough to realize that the guy is completely in-fucking-sane.

Which, yeah, was really obvious now, but really, the dude was fucked up.

And honestly, there were many many moments before I left that I should have noticed this, hell the fact that he had ever been with anyone he had been with proved that all on its own, without the help of the murder and the torture and the hardly there regard for his life.

And the more I started thinking about that, the more worried I got. Because yeah, Nik was older, and therefore stronger, but he had never been on his own.

And I know, he isn't alone he has Veronica. But that's not what I meant.

I meant that he has always had somone to show him who to be, an older or wiser or more brutal person to let him know how he should react, whether it was as they would or the opposite.

She couldn't be that for him.

Not because she was young, she wasn't, or because she wasn't wise, though she wasn't, or because she wasn't brutal enough, she most certainly was.

She couldn't be that for him because once upon a time he had been that for her, he had influenced her and so, even though he could love her and he could trust her, he would never follow her judgements. Not when he knew that they were at least partially his own.

So I caved.

I decided to see him, only for a minute or two, just to make sure he was alright. I shouldnt've, should've just stayed where I was and minded my own fucking business.

He wasn't there, neither of them were actually. It was like they didn't give a shit, just left.

No actually, before they left they decided it would be a good idea to burn down the whole fucking town.

Just like that fucking asshole did, but hey, at least they didn't burn the house down too.

I stayed.

It's not really like they could be pissed about that, hell it was my house. And clearly they didn't care all that much about it.

I also decided to help with the rebuilding. I wanted to have it there, that city, and, lucky for me, they didn't stay behind to ruin the skeleton of the city, so there was something to rebuild from.

As soon as it went up, and was filled with people again, I could smell him. Not Nik, The Waven.

That fucking asshole was here, and he was laughing.