The Collins Curse | ✓

31.1 | "i don't want you here"

Kenzie's body trembled with an ache that rippled through every attached limb, numbing them. She could feel a prickly sensation starting at the tips of her toes and traveling up to the ends of her fingertips. Kenzie tried to wriggle her fingers, hoping to reduce the jolts of sharp pain but it only intensified. A silent wince left from her parted lips, as defeat, shamelessly pondered in her head. Her eyes burning underneath her shut eyelids as a blinding whiteness flashed in front of them.

But, in the midst of the agonizing pain, she felt something. A sensation that left goosebumps on the surface of her skin and the heart monitor to her left beeped furiously at the way the beating organ in the middle of her chest thumped erratically.

It only lasted for a mere second, but it was enough to silence every awoken tremor and reduce the aching pain until it became bearable.

Kenzie didn't have to open her eyes to know it was him.

It was a given in the way her body relaxed miraculously, at the touch of the feather-light kiss he left on her forehead. She felt the calmness wash over just as his hand came up to gently cup her cheek. The pad of his thumb tracing over the corners of her lips and the apples of her sunken cheeks. Even with her eyes closed, Kenzie could feel his eyes intently roaming over the features of her face, trying to familiarize himself with her new dull pale skin, gory bruised under her eye, and evident purple veins running through them.

She didn't need to know what was running through his mind, not when she felt his single droplet of tear fall on her cheek, leaving a trail of wetness all the way down to her jaw, telling her exactly how he felt. It wasn't long before his warmth left her, and Kenzie heard him clear his throat.

"H-hey," his voice shook. "I'll see you tonight."

A long pause stretching into the already silent air. Kenzie's own closed eyelids starting to sting from the unshed tears that they were holding back because she knew exactly what he was going to say next. And, though it made her heart soar upon hearing them, it also painfully broke it.

"I-I love you Ke-Kenzie." he finished with every bit of emotion laced into those words, and Kenzie couldn't help a lone tear from escaping, joining in with his.

With every step, Kenzie could hear Miles take away from her, another tear escaped and when the door of her room silently shut leaving her alone once again. She lifted herself up to sit upright and couldn't help the burning sob stuck in her throat from escaping her mouth, her hands flying up to cover her mouth as she bawled into them.

It hurt.

Everything hurt.

But, her heart hurt, so, so much more.

It was like everything she had kept inside of her for so long, decided to free themselves from the shackles within her.

Her curse.

Leukemia.

Miles.

At the thought of her boyfriend's name, her sobs calmed as her mind occupied itself with memories of him, forgetting the sadness she had just caused him.

Starting from the moment his voice invaded her ears and closed the hole in the middle of her heart until the last thing she heard was him claiming his love to her.

Miles loves her.

It caused her hurt heart to flutter, and for tingles to course through her veins in excitement. An overwhelming sensation felt as if it were to burst through her chest, it was painful and euphoric all at the same time.

Kenzie didn't know what this overpowering feeling was. She knew she had felt it before, but now it seemed as if it were stronger and more powerful than all the other emotions running through her.