After their exchange at the park, the two boys walked back to Nessa's home. When they reached his bedroom, Nessa finally admitted to still having the stuffed animal that Kris once gifted him. Together, they lit it on fire.
And they tossed the ashes into the evening sky, where the black speckles took flight like the butterfly Nessa had on his hand, as well as buried within his heart.
She was pissed off, but the feeling was certainly nothing new. Emi almost only ever knew rage and hardly anything else. Dr. Wallow would always tell her that it was unhealthy, and she needed to learn how to cope better with her anger. Emi would respond by spitting in his face and calling him a prick. He was a great example as to why she hated men.
Her mother, on the other hand, was trying everything imaginable to make excuses for him. She would insist that Dr. Wallow wasn't all that bad, because he was just doing his best to offer his help. Emi just rolled her eyes and flipped her off. "He'd be more helpful six feet below."
"You can't just send death threats to every person that gets on your nerves." Her mother responded, following closely behind Emi as she made her way for the front door.
"Watch me." Emi replied.
"I have been trying everything to get you to open up to me!" She yelled, crossing her arms as Emi sat next to the door so that she could desperately pull on her combat boots. "I don't understand what happened."
"What happened?" Emi scoffed, hardly even listening to anything her mother was saying. "Are you fucking serious?"
"Shit was bad back in Scotland. Your father was bad. I took every penny I had and moved us across the world so that we would be away from that jackass." She was shaking with rage of her own. "But you just shut down."
"Shut down?" She got back onto her feet, staring her mother directly in the eye. "We moved across the damn world, and you started working nonstop. You stopped buying us grocery's, or taking me to get new clothes. You stopped saying that you loved me, or that we were going to get through this. If anyone shut down, it's you."
With those words echoing in the narrow hallway, Emi turned and left.
It was late into the night, the absence of stars leaving Emi to think back to her childhood. Her father's estate was massive, and it was located in the rolling hills of Scotland. There was always stars out, and she loved to climb onto the roof and stargaze when she was just a child.
She visited her father once a year, usually during Christmas time. She wasn't looking forward to it, but she missed the way people talked and the way the land looked. Chicago was just so disgusting.
Emi didn't really have a place in mind as she walked. She was tired and lonely, wandering the city streets with her eyes sharp. It wasn't safe for her to be walking around so late, but she couldn't stand to stay in that house for a one more second. Besides, she kept pepper spray on stand by just in case, as well as a switchblade that Venice had gifted her on the previous Christmas.
She had on a black sweatshirt with the hood up, and a black mini skirt with fishnets underneath. Emi figured that she probably looked a bit like a prostitute, but she didn't really mind.
After walking aimlessly for almost a half an hour, she decided to pull her phone out with the intention of calling Ilya. She needed a place to stay, and Keely unfortunately wasn't an option. So in her desperation, she prodded her memory for whether or not Ilya was busy that night. But then she realized that even if he was, Venice was most likely safe in his bedroom and his contact was readily available.
Before she could actually press the call button though, she heard footsteps behind her. Emi stayed still for a moment, trying to gauge if the person was pursuing her or walking past. Then the footprints stopped, and her brow furrowed.
She turned her head.
Stood a few feet away was an uncommonly tall man with a hood up to shroud his own face. He wore jeans and his hands were tucked into his pockets. Emi was instantly put off, stepping back and reaching into her pocket for her pepper spray.
Right as she lifted it with the full intention of just spraying him in the face and booking it, he lifted his hands. There was nothing in his palms, leaving Emi confused as to why he originally had them in his pockets. Slowly, he lifted them to his hood and pulled it down.
The sight of his face made her hesitate on if she should still spray him. Not because he was going to do anything to her, but because he had in the past.
Xavian stared down at her with earbuds in his ears and a crease in his brow. He took one out and opened his mouth. "Why are you out here in the middle of the night?"
Emi immediately rolled her eyes and put her pepper spray back into her pocket. "Why are you?"
He glanced around at the mostly empty street. Then he shrugged. "I couldn't sleep."
"Why'd you stop behind me like a fucking creep?" She was pissed off once again, needing yet another walk to cool herself off.
"I was wondering why you stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. Then I realized that I recognized you, so I was deciding if I should say something." He told her.
Emi wasn't sure what to do next. The option to call Ilya still remained, and she was tempted to go through with it. But something made her hesitate, and that fact pissed her off more than anything.
She was thinking about that conversation they had the morning after what she did to Keely. He angered her every bit as much as usual, but he also made sense. And he helped her. He told her where Keely was, and he even admitted that he didn't hate her. Emi stared up at Xavian, scrutinizing him closely.
He was the same as before, and yet something was different. She remembered how he always loved to take midnight walks, even when they were dating. Only if he wasn't studying, of course. Emi also knew exactly how his wardrobe would change drastically sometimes.
Usually he favored brown plaids, and beige jackets. High waisted trousers and thick belts, turtle neck sweaters and cozy cardigans. But on the weekends or late into the night, he was an unrecognizable fragment of the night. A stranger on the streets without a story in his clothing or a memorable mark to be found. Just another person who couldn't find sleep through the blinding gaze of stress.
"Are you heading anywhere particular?" She didn't know why she asked him it, because she knew that he enjoyed the feeling of running away just as much as she did. They both had no target in mind for their arrows outside of somewhere other than the bow.
He looked around at the almost silent street. "Somewhere other than my bedroom, I suppose. Are you?"
"I guess you could say the same for me." She sighed, tucking her cold hands into her sweatshirt pocket. The forecast said that it was going to start snowing later that week, and it was clear in the dropping temperatures.
He nodded, obviously wanting to say something but eventually choosing to suppress it.
Emi knew what he was hoping to ask, and she couldn't help but want to indulge it. In reality, she was never going to be good for Keely or any other person if she kept running from her problems entirely. She had no qualms about leaving her mother in the dust, but there were more digestible options.
That included mending the divide between her and Xavian. While she was never going to be able to fall in love with him again, she didn't entirely loath the idea of speaking to him like she once had. Which was both a terrifying concept, as well as an appealing one.
"Do you want to walk with me?" It was hard to not choke on her words, because they were certainly not the easiest ones she had ever said. But she managed it, and that was an accomplishment.
He stared at her in shock, but once that wore off he smiled gently. The same way he used to when she would drag him on her week long benders, and he would lay on the bathroom floor in a pile of his own exhaustion and sick. She would softly stroke his hair, and he would smile despite it all. When she asked why, he always said because you're with me even when I'm disgusting.
That smile was stupidly endearing.
"If you'll let me." He replied.
They walked in silence at first. Emi had no idea what to say to him. It was hard to even be civil after such a long time of consistent hatred. But she was tired and lonely and trying to become a better person. She assumed that the latter came with learning to accept her past, and grow with her future.
"Are you still stressed?" The deeper into the night it got, the harder it was to hide the raw grotesque nature of life and its woes. "With school, and your mum?"
Xavian sucked in a breath, but he shockingly didn't deflect. "Yeah. It's hard to balance it all."
"You know you don't have to be perfect, right? I've been saying that forever." She reminded him.
"Perfection is what the world expects from me." He glanced at her and grimaced. "Well, most of the world, anyway."
"Perfection is fucking pointless."
"Emily!" He scoffed, and their eyes met. Then he couldn't help but laugh a bit. "How can you be so confident in that?"
"Because I've never been perfect in anything in my entire life other than perfect at fucking things up. And that was not an accomplishment." Emi shrugged, her hood falling down to reveal her unbrushed and damaged short hair. She supposed that Keely's habit of not taking care of her hair started to rub off on her.
"I wish I was like you." He said.
Emi almost tripped, completely caught off guard by what his statement. "What?"
"Your attitude of just being yourself is so liberating. But I just can't be like you. I'm too worried about disappointing everyone."
"Are you saying I'm a disappointment?"
"No, dumbass." He rolled his eyes. "I'm saying that you're not scared to just do what you want. Regardless of what everyone wants from you. It's admirable."
"I hurt everyone around me because of it." Emi shook her head. "That's not admirable, it's pathetic and selfish."
"Selfish is imperative. It's envious."
It didn't make much sense to her, so she kept quiet for the time being. Emi was going over all of the things she knew about Xavian in her head. All of those long months since everything was destroyed between them, she was absolutely convinced that he was nothing more than a selfish prick who only cared about himself and never gave a thought to anyone he hurt.
She realized that it was stupid.
Xavian had always been on the selfless side when she really thought about it. He didn't have a 5.0 gpa for the sake of his own personal ego, but because he wanted his mum to be proud and not worried about how his unstable home environment was impacting him.
He told Emi pretty much everything about himself. Things that no one else knew, and she had been too blindsided to take all of it into account. His father was a right twat, and Xavian didn't talk about him much. He did say once that he started studying the way he did because he wanted to make his father proud too. He also said that the day never seemed to come.
But he did see how much it relieved his mum, so he stuck to the hard work and strived for more than just perfection. Even when it was becoming too much, or when outside factors were too daunting. Xavian still kept his grades more than just perfect, and he still did everything his mum expected of him. Shopping, cooking, cleaning. Even having friends. She wanted everything for him, and Xavian swore to always deliver. Even when it was only an illusion.
Thinking about it all made Emi frown. She wished that maybe they would switched parts of their personalities. That way she would have more respect for the people around her as well as the integrity of her future. And Xavian wouldn't be so uptight. He would loosen up a bit and learn to accept failure just as well as success. Too bad life didn't work that way.
"Xavian." She always thought his name sounded powerful. Like a villain in a mid-evil storybook. Perhaps he could have been the villain that truly won.
"Yeah?" He furrowed his brow, awaiting what she had to say.
"Do you want to start over? I seem to be doing this more often than I ever thought I would, but maybe I need to. I'm never going to fall in love with you again, but I miss you." She paused. "And if you ever tell anyone that I said that, I will rip your tongue out and shove it down your throat."
Again, that smile returned. He tilted his head. "I miss you too, Emily."
"Then let's pretend that none of that dumb shit happened." She told him.
"I can handle that." He nodded.
Hating all of the emotions that burrowed deep within her chest, Emi wanted to set fire to them all. But she couldn't do that, and she was trying to learn how to face them instead. So she did something that she normally never would have.
She hugged him.
And, holy fuck, it felt disgustingly great.
Not because it was her ex, or because she was seeking validation from a man. But because she had made progress. She was able to forgive him, which was something she never thought she could do. And he forgave her for her own shortcomings. And most of all, she truly did miss him with all of her heart. Tears flooded her eyes, but she forced them down.
"Thank you, Xavian." She said into his shirt, holding onto him for dear life.
"Is it redundant to say that I should be the one thanking you?" He chuckled, but he choked slightly on his words. As though he was also emotional over it.
"Can you stop making this so damn hard?" Emi snapped, but she was secretly smiling. He hugged her back, and they stayed like that for a while. As time marched onward, they grew in each other's arms. Perhaps not physically, but in a way that they would never be able to perceive with their eyes. A way that impacted their worlds the most.
And that was a beautiful thing. A defiant thing, which Emi was proud to realize. The world wanted her to stay the same. It wanted her to continue to fail. She wasn't just some random person destined for a pointless life. She wrote her own story. Nothing would ever tie her down, not even grudges.