[old] hexes for exes, briarville girls (1)

二十九。別再傷害我了

(don't hurt me anymore)

PROGRESS WAS MADE, Livia told herself.

She apologised to James and Jack. She told Lila and Brie, and for once, they all sat together during lunch (and everyone stared, confused, until they lost interest and returned to what they were doing). Sarah was enraged, but Livia decided that she didn't care, even as the red-haired girl sent her glare after glare. If looks could kill, Livia would be dead. But she wasn't. She was living, breathing, alive, everything Melody wasn't.

It hurt her.

But she wasn't alone now.

And for a moment, Livia finally understood:

She hid her pain of losing Melody behind layers and layers of masks of anger and hate, targeting them all towards James because there was no one else for her to blame (except maybe herself). When people are angry, they want to take their anger out on someone or something. James became her punching bag. Now that she had made up with James, there was no one and nothing to focus her rage and heartbreak on anymore. So, she turned back to the real thing.

In the end, it all boiled down to Melody. Everything she did was for Melody, and Livia didn't think it was necessarily healthy anymore. She needs to let go and move on. It's only right.

But Melody...

If Livia doesn't, who will keep her flame burning?

Certainly not Sarah. James had already more or less moved on, as with Jack. She didn't dare trust Miguel and Jessica- the former was the reason Melody is gone and the latter too unstable.

"This is the happiest I've seen you since you came back," Brie was saying when Livia finally snapped out of her trance. The two girls were heading down to their last class of the day.

Livia smiled. "Yeah. I know. Finally got some stuff off my head."

"If only you had listened sooner," Brie whistled. "You gotta stop being so stubborn. We were scared we truly lost you."

Livia raised an eyebrow. "So you guys were discussing me. Guess I'm famous now," she teased, nudging the dark-skinned girl with her elbow.

"Don't flatter yourself," Brie replied with a roll of her eyes. "We were just concerned. I mean, not just me. All of us. You changed so much it was...unsettling."

That was another thing Livia had finally realised. No one else had really changed. She was the only one who truly did. Change wasn't her enemy. It was the exact opposite. She needed to change to move on. If she didn't, she'd be stuck in that period of time all her life, depressed and crying herself to sleep every night.

"I know."

"For once, I'll take you word on it," Brie sighed, blowing a lock of stray hair out of her face. "It's nice to see you're not trying to kill the twins anymore. Jack was always innocent anyways."