Violet was taken aback by her aunt's unexpected appearance. She had to blink several times to fully realize who was standing in front of her.
Violet felt a surge of panic when she heard footsteps approaching the kitchen, and she tried her best to suppress the feeling, saying it was just another anxiety attack, but when she saw Mariel, it faded only for a fraction, and now she was more upset.
This was their world with Draco, they ran away leaving everything and everyone behind, and no one was supposed to disturb their peace and happiness. Violet suddenly felt small needles of anger — Mariel shouldn't have come, It was not she who should have come in through the door, but Draco.
Violet opened her fingers, which had been gripping the fabric of her sundress so tightly that her knuckles were white, and with a sigh, she smoothed the hem away from the folds.
She had to find out the reason for Mariel's visit and get her out of there as soon as possible, because she could already feel her head beginning to ache — she urgently needed to rest.
"Mariel?" Violet spoke in a low voice, looking at her aunt with a frown.
Her aunt was the only remaining relative, and Violet loved her with all her heart and was grateful for her help and support, but the moment Violet felt that she had just opened her wings and was ready to fly, Mariel lowered her to the ground, with a heavy thud.
"Violet, what's going on?" Mariel looked a little worried as she peered at her niece from under her furrowed brows.
The question was somehow a trigger for Violet, and she could feel her sanity slowly slipping away from her, leaving her head teeming with bad and disturbing thoughts.
"What are you doing here and—" She broke off, lowering her head. She began to breathe heavily, and a panic attack was coming on. She tried to breathe deeply, trying to distract herself, but the only thing that was in her mind was the question "Where is Draco?" He was able to help her avoid it.
"Violet? Okay, it's okay." Her aunt gently stroked her back, and in a few seconds Violet felt better. She looked up at Mariel, but immediately closed her eyes — no, she didn't feel any better, in fact, Mariel's touch only made her feel worse.
Mariel looked at her with sad eyes, with an expression of sympathy and pain for Violet. Mariel was heartbroken by Violet's suffering. She wanted to do everything she could to help her, but she knew that Violet's main help would be only herself.
She looked around the kitchen where they were standing, and her eyes fell on something behind Violet.
"What's this?" She asked and went to the kitchen set, picking up something that clattered on the marble surface, but Violet kept her eyes closed, feeling the tips of her limbs go numb, and the feeling of nausea began to grow rapidly.
"Please don't tell me you didn't take your medicine today."
Violet's eyes snapped open, and she suddenly felt as if a cold spear had pierced her.
Medicine.
It was something that put her in a daze, and slowly, she turned to Mariel, her eyes falling on the pot that her aunt was holding in her hands, in which she was cooking dinner for herself and Draco. But when Violet looked closer, she saw that there was only dirt and scraps of newspaper.
"I—" Violet's voice sounded pitiful, broken, and she closed her eyes and shook her head, wishing that Mariel would just leave and Draco would come back instead.
She suddenly realized that she could no longer hear the chirping of the birds, and there was no sunlight coming through her closed eyelids, no smell of fresh-mown grass and acacia.
She started to shake.
"Violet," Mariel let out a resigned sigh, walking back to the girl who was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, "I know how bad you feel, and I want to do my best to help you, but I can't if you don't let it all go, if you don't let him go."
The last words were spoken in a whisper, but Violet could hear them perfectly.
She suddenly felt as if the ground was slipping away from under her feet, as if a million knives had pierced her chest, and she felt as if she was choking on a flood of tears that were pouring out of her eyes as she opened them, shaking her head even harder as the realization hit her hard.
She was standing in the middle of the kitchen in Mariel's house.
She looked around — there was no window, Mariel's kitchen never had a window.
There was no window, there was no their garden; there was no sea, no narrow path leading to it, no balcony in the bedroom that overlooked the azure horizon that met the firmament, and there was no Draco. Because he was dead.
Five months ago. The day she was able to get out of the cellar.
In fact, Draco had died that day. And it broke her. It broke her completely. After months in the cell, the loss of Draco had shattered the last shred of her sanity.
So, after sitting next to his body for a few minutes, she'd gotten up and calmly went to his room. She'd locked herself in there for a few days, not letting anyone in. She was completely out of her mind — It seemed to her that Draco was there with her. But in fact, there was no one there. She'd spoken to the void, imagining him, pretending that he had survived and was by her side, as he'd promised.
And she continued to live like this, until Mariel came. Violet's body had moved to Mariel's house, but her heart and soul — to a house near the coast, along with Draco.
Violet was broken on the outside, but she was happy on the inside, because her mind was elsewhere, where her heart had always been drawn.
She was a living ghost, barely leaving her room, and Mariel, having pulled herself together and let go of her brother's death, had decided to get her niece out of that state at all costs.
She also felt guilty for sitting back and believing the note Violet had left on the table in her room, she blamed herself for not listening to Draco say something was wrong, she blamed herself for not even trying to find and help the girl when she had spent months in the cellar of Malfoy Manor.
Her poor little Violet had been through too much to stay sane.
The specialist Mariel had seen had prescribed the medications Violet was supposed to take every day. When she took the pills, she would lie silently in her room all day, staring at the ceiling — and It was like she was dead. Violet always felt terrible these days, all she could see was the ceiling that she wanted to bring down on herself.
But when she was skipping her pills, she was back in her own little world with Draco. To that mansion in a place where it was warm all year round. As he'd promised. With light-colored walls, with their large bedroom, a large garden with beds of violets. With a wild beach that seemed to belong only to them. With Draco.
But it was all in her head.
Violet had tears running down her cheeks. Every time her perfect world collapsed, she would get hysterical — It was as if she was reliving the day of his loss over and over again.
She pressed a hand to her chest, choking on sobs, and she saw that there was no bracelet on her arm. Her ashy wrist was empty, and she burst into even louder sobs.
It really wasn't real, he was really gone forever. He had left her alone in a world where they had to live happily ever after together.
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry..." She whispered between sobs, not sure why she was apologizing or to whom.
Her head rested on Mariel's shoulder, her tears falling to the floor — she felt her world shatter again.
She cried long and hard, until she had no strength left, until her tears had dried up, until her body was shaking with hiccups, until her mind was empty — and then, on wobbly legs, she went to her room, supported by the arms of Mariel, who gently set her down on the bed and began slowly brushing her hair, expecting that it might help Violet feel at least a little better.
Touching her hair was her weakness after all.
"You're my strong girl, you'll be fine, we'll get through this." Mariel murmured softly, gently running a comb through Violet's dark, tangled hair, which had lost its luster the moment its owner lost the sparkle of life.
Violet's eyes filled with tears again — her hair held many memories.
Her father, Mariel, Draco, Kristen, Luna — they all touched her hair, in the worst and best moments of her life, when she was bad, when she was happy.
Her father always twirled a thin strand of her hair around his finger when they talked, Mariel always combed it when Violet was little, Draco jokingly tugged at her strands when they exchanged barbs, Kristen always managed to pin them down when she rested her head on Violet's shoulder, and Luna — Luna made her braids while they were in the cellar.
"I left your medicine on the nightstand," Mariel said, and it was only at that moment that Violet noticed she had just finished brushing her hair, "Please take it when you're ready."
After the door closed and Violet was alone in the room, she slowly turned around, glancing at the glass of water and the small pill next to it. This little pill was able to help her, even in such a cruel way, making her feel depressed and broken, but it could help her. She only needed to take these pills every day, and then, maybe very soon, she would feel better.
Violet got out of bed and went to the nightstand, taking the pill between her fingers,
"I want to feel better." She whispered, but her hand didn't move. She thought back to the place where her mind drifted away every time she didn't take the medicine, and her heart ached — how could she leave it?
How could she leave Draco there alone when he'd never left her? He'd never left her, he was always with her, he was always waiting for her in another world, how could she leave him there, in their house he had found especially for her?
In that place, she was happy, in that place, she didn't see a grey veil in front of her, because in fact, Violet was grey to herself.
She associated herself with the color grey, dull and inconspicuous. Like a cloudy day, like a poisonous smoke, like a fog that prevents people from moving. Violet was grey — between black and white, always between good and evil.
She felt grey, while Draco was silver to her. They were the same, but Draco was always brighter, more precious — he always attracted the attention of others, they were drawn to him, because the silver color meant not only coldness and restraint, but also the richness of the inner world, intelligence and power.
Grey and silver — so identical, but so different, just like Violet and Draco were.
While she was the greyness of a cloudy day, he was the glow of the moon on a clear night.
It was a balance, they needed each other — so now Violet put aside all doubts, and murmured, "I'm sorry, Mariel, but not today." She went to the bathroom then, throwing the pill that was going to tear her away from Draco into the sink.
But before she could return to her room, her gaze caught on her reflection in the mirror, and she was horrified.
It was hard to recognize the old Violet. Now she saw a tortured girl with terribly pale skin, with bags under her eyes, with protruding bones stood in front of her. Her hair was combed, but it looked like straw — dry, dull, sparse, she'd lost a lot of hair in the last few months.
Her hand went to the cabinet, and before she knew it, the scissors had already cut off more than half the length of her hair, falling in heavy strands into the sink.
She didn't need her hair anymore, no one else did.
She went back to her room then, her hair just brushing her shoulders, and turning on a soft tune on the radio, she sat on the edge of the bed, facing the window, and closed her eyes.
Outside the window, the weather was bad, the rain drummed on the roof like cold needles, the trees were leafless, stretching their ugly, gnarled branches to the sky — to the grey, low-hanging sky.
Not wanting to see it and thinking about it, she remembered what Mariel had said once — that they couldn't leave this place and run away to a warm one together. Violet had to do it alone, but at first she had to get well.
The medicine might help.
A small voice in her head spoke, and Violet was about to take another pill, but she suddenly realized that she no longer heard the sound of rain.
"Hey..." A soft whisper that made her lips curl into a smile joined the melody, and when Violet opened her eyes, she was already in the bedroom in the dream mansion and Draco was standing in front of her, smiling broadly.
"Took you long enough." She got up from the bed and wrapped her arms around his neck. She felt the warmth of his body as his hands rested on her waist, pulling her closer to him. She felt a soft kiss on her shoulder, she felt him.
How could she let him go and live without him?
"A new hairstyle? I like it." He touched the ends of her hair as they pulled away from each other, and then his eyes moved to the radio behind her.
"What are you listening to here?"
"Dance with me, come on." Violet said, pulling him by the hand to the middle of the room.
Their bodies touched, their eyes locked, and they began to move slowly, circling the room with the sunbeams.
She regretted the thoughts that had been running through her mind about the medicine before he came. Why did she have to break her happiness? It was the only time she felt truly happy and fulfilled. Next to him. It didn't matter in reality or in her head — as long as he was with her, she was happy.
"I love you, Draco."
"I love you, Violet."
Forever in her heart and head.