No One Killed Venus Wilson

XVI. SEIZE

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

      EVERYDAY HUMANS make a decision. Left or right, yes or no, black or white, save her or leave her, a decision is made and it changes the course of one's life forever. Every moment of everyday humans stand at a fork, a decision in their mind and uncertainty in their hearts. Decisions that taint their pasts, affect their present and form their futures. Decisions like the one Lily Tran made that night when she decided to enter the spider web Venus Wilson had constructed so delicately, made of her enemies and her sins. Decisions that will haunt her forever. Decisions she found herself regretting nightmare after nightmare.

"Oh my God, what do I do?!"

Leave her, please leave her.

"Someone help me!"

Don't scream. Don't scream. Don't scream.

"Listen to me Lily, I need you to breathe for me."

Run, Lily.

"Lily?"

Venus?

"What's that on your hands, Lily?"

Red, liquid, blood?

"Lily, you killed her, oh my God, you killed her!"

     "—No!" Lily's shrill voice bounced from wall to wall.

     Her chest rose and dropped with each intake of air and her hand rose to wipe away the excess of sweat around the back of her neck and forehead. Lily looked around the dark room, her eyes becoming accustomed to the absence of light before a feeling on guilt and nausea settled within her stomach. Her hand dropped from her neck only to latch onto the fabric that was draped over her stomach not wanting to make a trip to the bathroom so late at night.

Once her breathing had leveled off her hand automatically reached out for her phone that was thrown on the bed lost in the sea of blankets and pillows. A groan slipped past her lips as she failed at locating her phone, only wanting to hear one voice at that moment. The same voice she'd been avoiding after the scene she had witnessed, the same voice that she had grown used to. The same voice that reminded her of that dream, the same voice that led her to find Venus' lifeless body.

Just at the mention of her name, Lily's phone shone in the pitch black that mirrored the view outside of her window. Her sense of hearing had picked up the thunder and light rain that splattered against her window. But that was not what alarmed her, the sound of the familiar ringtone that belonged to a lost lover was what haunted her mind with memories that threatened to break past the walls she had built in order to forget anything and anyone that had to deal with Venus.

Yet her hands had a mind of their own as she watched her thumb slide across the phone screen in order to accept the call. It was almost second nature for her to receive a call from him at this hour, a routine that seemed so ancient though only having started a couple of months prior. Words were not exchanged as she pressed her phone against her ear, she only listened to his erratic breathing and from that, she knew he'd had a nightmare. Although this Lily did not rush to reassure him that it was only a bad dream instead she listened to him breakdown little by little not speaking until he was ready to listen to her.