The Club

CHAPTER 26

I get down on my knees and look to the sky with my hands pressed together in the air. The tears pour down my face as I shout to whoever will listen.

"I don't want this. I was wrong when I made that wish. Living a life of anonymity is so much better than not living it. I want to take it all back. Please let me take it all back."

As the rain pours over me, mixing with my tears, I lay down on the cold grass and wait for the inevitable. I'm done fighting. I can't take the pain I've been putting both Graham and myself through. Everybody dies eventually and I need to own up to the fact that I made a mistake.

"I take it back. I take it all back. All of the fame and money in the world only made my life worse and not better."

I close my eyes crying myself to sleep in the middle of the deserted park. Hoping with everything inside of me that this is not the end that I have been waiting for. The familiar fog that I have come accustom to surrounds me pulling me under into the dream land. Or more of a limbo like state. Is this where I will spend the rest of my dying days? Not really living but not really dying? Just stuck in this empty fog covered world? Is this the hell I've signed myself over to?

The fog lifts leaving me in the park I was just sobbing in. Only now I'm no longer lying down and my face is free from tears. The rain has stopped and there's a single lamppost still lit. I turn around expecting to find the source of the voice that has haunted my life since my twenty-seventh birthday but I'm alone. Completely and excruciatingly alone. The light beckons me and I step forward hesitatingly. Half expecting for the boogie man to jump out of the shadows and end my suffering. When nothing happens I continue walking.

Sitting on the ground underneath the light is an intricate box. It reminds me of one that used to sit on Mom's dresser. We didn't have a lot of money growing up but she did have this small music box that she kept all of her jewelry in. It came over from Japan with Dad's grandma when they immigrated to America. And it has stayed in the family ever since. He gave it to Mom as a wedding present and I remember as a little girl always admiring the music box and hoping that someday Mom would give it to me. I completely forgot about that box until just now. I haven't seen it in years. I would assume she still has it but I wouldn't really know.

I pick up the box and admire all of the detailing. The sides are lacquered with mother of pearl in the top is ornately designed showing a Japanese girl underneath a cherry blossom tree in full bloom. I turn the small box over and over in my hand looking for the familiar marking that would lead me to believe this is the same box. And then I spot it. On the bottom corner near the location of one of the small legs is a tiny chip in the pearl. I gasp and almost drop the box.

I haven't seen it in years but I would know this box anywhere. I hug it to my chest realizing I finally got the box. But how? And why now? I glance around me one more time expecting to find someone, anyone here with me. But I'm still alone in this deserted park.

I turn my attention back to the box in my hand and turn it back around so the top is facing up. I lay my hand on the small knob and slowly pry it open hoping to hear the beautiful music inside. And that's when it falls. My heart races as the box slowly floats down to the concrete like a feather. The music doesn't flow freely but sitting inside where Mom's jewelry used to sit is what I've been searching for this entire time. The light is blinding off the shined metal cushioned against the crushed velvet.

I collapse down to my knees and reach in almost afraid to touch it but unable to control myself any longer. My fingertips run along the cool metal and I pick it up feeling the heavy weight in my hands. All this time. I've been searching all this time and I finally found it. With the weight that has been on my shoulders since this whole fiasco started, I half expect it to weigh a thousand pounds but it doesn't. It feels like any other key but in a way it's so unique and fitting for this situation. The bottom half looks like your typical antique key but at the top is a treble and bass clef in the form of a heart.

"Now that you've found the key, Erika, what are you going to do with it?" His voice comes from behind me and I'm not the least bit shocked. I knew he was here I guess he didn't want to show his face until after I found it.

I focus on the key in my hand and I refuse to turn around and face him. There's no point anymore because as soon as I leave this hell I will be free of him. He can't control me anymore and I can finally breathe again.

"I'm going to unlock the door to the twenty-seven club and I'm leaving the way I came in. I made the wrong decision on my twenty-first birthday. I know that now. I should have never made that wish and I'm going to make things right again."

"There's the door. What are you waiting for?"

It feels too easy. Like I shouldn't be able to get a do-over. What makes me so different from the rest of the people who didn't escape the club? Why was it their destiny and not mine? I glance over at the door and back down to the key. It can't be that easy, can it? "You're not going to stop me?"

"I have no reason to. The journey has been about you. I was never going to stop you from fulfilling your destiny. Deter you, yes, but ultimately it has been up to you to find your way. And you found it."

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. I spent so much time thinking that there was some secret to finding the key. That I needed to get to the bottom of the ins and outs of the club to escape it. But knowing that I held the answers but had to look inside myself to find them is overwhelming. With one last look to my haunting for the last year of my life I place the key inside the lock and close my eyes. I refuse to let myself fall into a desperate place again. I won't let this happen to me and I will truly enjoy my life this time.

With a turn of the key, I push the door open and I can't help the smile that fills my face as I walk through this door for the last time in my life.

OH MY GOSH! Seriously I cannot thank you enough for sticking with me this far and continuing to read about Erika's journey. This was such a fun story for me to write even though it's drastically different from my usual stuff.

If you want to read any of my contemporary romances, they're all available on Amazon to read for FREE in Kindle Unlimited. Check them out here ---> https://amzn.to/2CnBlAs

The last and final part will be updated next week and if you have a second to please star and comment on these previous chapters I would be extremely grateful.

Thank you!