Broken Strings

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - E I G H T

He eyed her, skeptically. "Not even a chocolate muffin?"

She shook her head, offering a faint smile.

"Wow, last time I checked you loved chocolate muffins."

"It's been fourteen years, Francisco." She nodded as the waiter walked away. "Things change."

She awkwardly looked around the bakery. She didn't even know why she'd called him. She didn't know what she wanted to say to him. She guessed she just wanted to apologize. Like she had been her entire life.

"It's been so long. You know I was surprised when you called me last week."

"I spent an hour stalking every Francisco Ramirez that I could find on Facebook." Anisha laughed softly before looking back at him.

Happiness was all around him. His dark brown eyes were bright, filled with hope and love. Unlike the last time she'd seen him, weary and heartbroken at Cassie's funeral.

"How have you been?" She asked him the question, sincerely.

"Pretty good actually. I mean a lot better, now. I guess it takes some time for things to get better. But I'm happy, really perfectly happy." A gentle laugh filed his sentence. "I mean after everything with Cassie I didn't even think that I'd be able to move on. She fucked everything up and at first I hated her for doing what she did, the way she did what she did. We could've gotten through things, together. And she didn't want that."

"So she took the easy way out." He huffed a little. He still missed her, he'd gotten over it but still, sometimes he just did.

Anisha wanted to argue and tell him he had it all wrong. Cassie hadn't taken the easy way out. Because it was the way out that Anisha herself had contemplated for long. It wasn't the easy way out. It wasn't. But in a way, it was.

Anisha could've easily ended the pain. The razor and the bottle of pills had been within reach, just like they had been for Cassie. But for Anisha, it certainly hadn't felt like the easy way out.

"I thought you'd be more understanding. Especially you Franco. You lost someone you loved and I thought you'd be more understanding. You'd understand that some people, they can only pretend to be strong for so long." Anisha was whispering, her tone accusatory.

"That sooner or later, some things for some people just get too much. That some things just get too hard."

"Too hard? You're fucking kidding Anisha. So what if the baby wasn't healthy, me and her, we could've gotten through things together."

Anisha shook her head, almost apologetically. "I know. I'm just sorry. I hated her too, you know. I hated her at first because of what she did. She was selfish and she didn't think about how her death would affect everyone around her. She only cared about her own pain, all about herself."

"But then, I was her."

Anisha played with her hands, her eyes cast down.

"Some days, I'd be all alone and everything would just be too much. Just like everything was too much for her. Too much, I don't even know what it is. But I know what it feels like."

"Too much would be when the house would be quiet and the kids would be at school. I would sit on my bed and cry. The walls would close in on me and I'd wrap the blankets around me, to keep my demons away. I could never feel anything or think because everything would overwhelm me. I'd just sit there and cry. I had no idea what to do and everything, it just felt like it was ending. And cry, it was all I could do. And then, I'd think how easy it would be for me to disappear. How easy it would be to slide a razor across my wrists and cut so deep that my pain could finally disappear."

Anisha sniffled a little, rubbing her nose as a few tears fell down. "I know what it's like to be alone, be heartbroken and unloved. I know the feeling of not being good enough, no matter what you do. I know what it's like to constantly have to beg someone to love you."

"But more than anything, I know how it feels to wish that everything would just stop already."

She slowly looked back up at him, wiping away her tears. His eyebrows drawn together as she let the facade she'd built fade away.

"Maybe Cassie took the easy way out. But maybe it was the only way out for her. Because you have no idea how hard it is to pretend to be happy. You have no idea how hard it is to continuously convince yourself that things will get better. So truthfully, I don't know if she took the easy way out. It wasn't the right way out but fuck, you can suffer for so long."

"Anisha, I..."

Anisha sobbed, burring her face in her hands. Her cries were a little muffled as she slowly willed herself to just talk.

To just talk, even though she wanted to get up and run out of the bakery, away from Franco.

"Anisha, I didn't say that. I know what it's like to lose someone you love. You know." Franco slowly shut up as the waiter walked back with his order. He looked at Anisha as she grabbed a napkin, wiping away her tears.

His daughters were too preoccupied to notice the somber aura around him and the woman he was seeing for the first time in fourteen years.

He smiled softly, picking at the blueberry muffin placed in front of him. "You know, we planned our life together. Cassie wanted to wait until the baby was two before we'd get married, just so she could be our flower girl. She always joked about getting married in Spain because my parents are still back there. And she wanted a house by the beach."

"All of a sudden, it was all gone. Everything we wanted, together, everything we planned, it all just disappeared. All gone."

"I loved her and she killed herself. There's nothing that can justify what she did or why did it, Anisha. But you know, I know what it's like to walk into your house and find the woman you love on the floor with empty bottles around her and a container of pills in her hands. I know what it's like to lose everything you've ever wanted in the span of a few seconds."

Anisha's breathing slowly became sparse. She placed a hand on her forehead. It was her fault.

"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. It's my fault." It was all her fucking fault. Andrew said so and Anisha knew it was. "It's all my fault. I'm so sorry."

"What the hell are you talking about, Anisha? It's only Cassie's fault and that's it. You're a doctor, you know better than anyone that sometimes it's just luck. Sometimes it's just how things are."

Anisha shook her head, sobbing and looking down at her lap.

Franco didn't blame her but he should. He should blame her.

It wasn't even about what had happened at the hospital the day Cassie had been admitted. It was about a week before that. It was Anisha's fault. She'd carried around the guilt long enough.

"Cassie overdosed on Xanax." She choked down a sob that filled her, her voice shaky nonetheless. "Cassie overdosed on Xanax and I was the one who prescribed it."

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This was not I planned to write this chapter but I had a few days of writer's block and I finally figured out the next three chapters.

I appreciate and tips all of your comments from the last chapter. I went along with the idea that most of you had that Andrew should find the truth out from a third person instead of Anisha telling him.

Well, let's just say Anisha's end is near :)

Next chapter : 750 votes :) There's only seven chapters left, not including the epilogues.