"Lavender, don't you think you're drinking too much? This isn't like you." Claire looked at her in concern. "It's fine, Claire. I just can't seem to get numb no matter how much I drink this." Lavender sniffled, drinking the wine left in her glass like a vodka shot. "I can go for more." She said, opening a new bottle.
"Three bottles are too much! You could barely ever finish one, now you're drinking another? Just what in the hell did Tristen do to you?"
"Stay out of it."
"But your elbow-"
"I fell, he didn't hurt me."
"Lavender, Jim will not tolerate this. You know your new book is due in less than one and half months. If he gets to know the slightest detail about this..."
"You'll tell him?" She shot up her blood red glare at her.
"N-No! Of course not." Claire stuttered.
"There's already enough drama in my life, and if he starts with his... God knows what I'll do."
"No, I've had enough. It's already past 10 in the night and you're not drinking any more." Claire snatched the bottle before Lavender could pour herself another glass. "Claire..." She rolled her eyes. "You've been continuing this since the past few days! Are you an alcoholic?" Claire scolded. "Alcoholics are those who drink out of addiction. I'm drinking in hopes of forgetting mine." Lavender said with a lump in her throat.
"Just talk to him, please." Claire whined. "I won't. I don't want to. If he comes again asking for me, tell him-"
"That you slept. I know, Lavender, for the millionth time. He comes every evening, can't you meet him just once?"
"I'll see about that. If there's nothing else, I'll go to sleep." Lavender stood up from the seat at kitchen counter. "Eat some more, for the sake of God. You like pasta, don't you?" Claire insisted, showing her the bowl filled with delicious looking red sauce pasta. "I'm full. You are a nice cook." She said gloomily. "You just ate five bites! You drank more than you ate! It's not good if you drink on an empty stomach." Claire scolded.
"It's really useless, I'm still sober." She wiped her mouth with a napkin, throwing it on the counter. Lavender left without looking back at her. "Please bring some sense into her, God." Claire sat down, holding her head. Lavender locked her room, deciding that she'd go to sleep right away. "This alcohol better get me sleepy." She mumbled, taking one look at her kitten, Creampuff. It was joyfully eating its food near it's bed. "Guess you're the only thing from Tristen that I'll ever raise." She sobbed, looking at her tummy and rubbing her hand on it.
Turning off the lights, she hid herself under the covers and watched the glowing galaxy in her room again. She recalled her favourite memories of her and Tristen to feel better, but those good memories somehow brought her more hurt. "Only if everything could be alright." She shut her eyes, letting a few tears fall.
She heard the ticking of her wall clock go on like a metronome. She tried to fall asleep to it.
Tick, Tock. Tick, Tock. Tick, Tock.
Lavender kept herself at it for the next few hours. That's when the clock dimed once. It was 1 am and she was still wide awake. She slept on her left side facing away from the window, thinking of how she could have avoided her mistake by simply doing nothing. She could have prevented their fight by staying put and letting the police car pass. She should have known that Tristen knew better and he could easily handle the situation. She should not have meddled in his business, because now it was not just her life, it was also Tristen's. She could prove to be Tristen's biggest weakness to his rivals, specially that Baldwin guy, J.C and those whoever Tristen named.
She shut her eyes again, realizing that she had forgotten to blink. It burned when she closed her eyes; enough to let more tears escape. She lied motionless, as if paralyzed. Her body weight was heavier than usual, which might have caused her to sink deeper in the mattress of her bed.
A hand held her waist from behind; a body sheltering her back from the cold winds coming through the window. "You're climbing balconies again." Lavender said in a husky voice. She had gotten herself a sore throat from constantly crying. "You wouldn't let me through the door." Tristen whispered, embracing her tighter. He snuck his other hand under her neck, letting her rest her head on his arm.
"I'm sorry." He added.
"Just go, Tristen. I'm sleepy anyways." Lavender said. "Since the past few hours?" He asked, bringing his face closer to her head until his chin touched it. "Don't make this hard for me." She mumbled.
"You're the one making me hard right now." He replied in the most casual tone emphasizing that her lower half was touching his.
"Tristen, please. I'm in no mood for jokes. I'm trying to figure everything out."
"What's there to figure out?"
"Everything between us. I don't think I'm the right one for you, Tristen." Her lip quivered. "That's non sense. No one could be as perfect as you are for me. Moreover, I'm the one who's wrong here." He started caressing her waist. "How's your elbow?" He shoved the covers off her top half, trying to observe her injury in the moonlight falling through the window. "You change the bandage dressings often, right?" He asked, delicately inspecting it.
"Mmh."
"Did you show it to a doctor?"
"I did."
"Then it should've gotten better by now, what happened?"
"It caught an infection. I had no choice but to go to the doctor."
"When did you show it?"
"Two days ago."
"Baby, it's nearly been a week. Why wouldn't you look after yourself?" Tristen asked softly, careful to not change his tone in any way. He put her arm back under the covers before embracing her again. "I don't really care, Tristen. I left it to heal itself." She exhaled heavily, getting tired of the conversation.
"Did I hurt you that much?" Tristen whispered, intertwining his fingers with hers while patiently waiting for her response. Lavender remained silent to his question, which was an answer in itself. "I'm sorry, love." He apologized again. "Do you want to know why I was upset?" Tristen asked, hoping for a chance to give his clarification.
"I acted recklessly and gave your rivals a weakness, that's why, right?"
"No."
Lavender creased her brows curiously before spinning halfway to gaze at him from her peripheral vision. "Then?"
"I nearly died." He replied, burying his head into her hair in shame. "You gave me a heart attack that day, I thought I lost you. I nearly thought that the car would crash into yours and..." He trailed off. "But it didn't happen, right?" Lavender said.
"It could have. Almost all the odds were against you. You're truly lucky."
"I'm fine, Tristen. It's not the first time a car was about to crash into me."
"What do you mean?" He asked in a protective tone. He was ready to jump out of the bed and break into the person's house who tried to harm Lavender. He just needed a name. He spun her around to make her face him and pulled her body closer to his. "It's been years since it happened. All the way back in Bilsburg. I have very faint memories of it. I recall walking down the streets of the Merchant Alley, where I happened to drop my favourite pen." She explained.
"Favourite pen?"
"Mmh. It was a limited edition given to me by my favourite writer who's workshop I attended. I happened to drop it on the street when a car came driving rashly into my direction. I almost thought it was the end of the world when..."
"When?"
"Somebody pulled me aside."
"Pulled you aside?" Tristen rephrased, putting her brown hair out of her face. "Yeah. That person I'm guessing was the maybe a little older than me, but young. I was in my teenage years back then."
"Do you recall who the person driving the car was? Or at least, which car was it?"
"No, I don't. But wasn't it obviously your family's? You guys have it all under your control there."
"No, I recently took over that side. If you were in your teens, I'm assuming it's been more than a decade. It was Bates' family who was in control back then."
"I didn't know." Lavender muttered, looking into his eyes in whatever lighting the night provided. "We have all crossed paths before, I realize it now." Tristen huffed, hugging her to bury her head in his chest.
"Huh?"
"I'll tell you everything sometime. For now, just sleep. I'm here with you." He pecked her head. "Also, about what happened between us, I'm so sorry, love. I regret every bit of it. I shouldn't have asked you to leave my place. It's still yours. Everything in and outside my place is yours." He caressed her head. "Except the drugs and my illegal businesses." He added, finally making her smile. It had been weeks since she had smiled.
"I love you so much, baby. I can't imagine you being involved in a scandal. I can't imagine a life without you." He said again. "I love you, too. I understand your feelings now." She mumbled, holding him tighter. Lavender blinked her eyes, realizing that was what she needed to fall asleep. That warmth she felt from his body, those hands that held her affectionately, and those lips that pecked her forehead lovingly, it was all she needed.
"Just how much did you drink, Lav?" Tristen smirked, sniffing her breath. "Three bottles. Wine." She mumbled, tracing her fingers over his collar bones and to his chest. Her palms created two balls of fists around his shirt. She missed him. She needed him really bad. And now, he was right beside her. She was in his embrace, safe from all the dangers that one could think of.
She shut her eyes and in no moment, she was deeply asleep.
Tristen, however, was wide awake.
He was thinking about what Lavender had told him. I almost thought it was the end of the world when somebody pulled me aside. "I didn't know it was you back then." He mumbled lowly to himself, caressing her head gently as she slept to it.
He shut his eyes to play the flashback from the time when his parents were still active mafias.
Rewinding his memory tape back to approximately a decade and a half, Tristen found himself in the middle of the Merchant Alley in Bilsburg. Everyone seemed to be inches taller than him. His clothes were not the same, rather he was in clothes that a normal teenager would wear. A black tee and ripped jeans. He had blades hanging down his neck through a long black thin elastic string, like a necklace.
Real blades.
He was back to when he was nineteen. He was standing in what seemed to be the most crowded area. He was watching people pass by with a cigarette between his fingers. He was reflecting on himself.
His actions.
How his dad had scolded him for turning a soft heart towards a police dog. How he wasn't able to shoot the dog who tried to sniff him and his dad's scent out. The dog was able to get away, wounded though, because Tristen's father had shot its leg.
It was a bad shot.
Tristen was sad on the inside that he had to witness an innocent animal get hurt. But that was the part of his mafia becoming process. He needed some time to himself, and out of his parent's HQ at the outskirts of the town.
He had just lit the cigarette and it was new. Just when he took another long, long puff, his eyes fell across the road on someone who had to be the most pretty girl he had ever seen. He blowed the smoke out while he 'checked' her out. Maybe he could ask for her name? Maybe he could offer her help with all the bags that she was holding?
She definitely seemed to need some help. Her hands held a notepad and a shining designer pen along a burdensome backpack on her shoulders; also a sling bag hanging down her elbow which she tightly folded to keep it in place. Her brown hair flew with the breeze as her eyes wandered left and right on the street.
Her hazel eyes. She was looking to cross the road. That was it; Tristen figured he could help her. Just when he was making up his mind, her eyes fell on him.
Him and the cigarette he held near his lips.
He panicked, throwing the cigarette down on the concrete road before smashing it. She exchanged glances with him for a moment, when she dropped her pen. She must have done it unknowingly, given that they had a moment of eye contact.
Did she find him mesmerising?
She bent down to pick up the pen along with all the baggage she was carrying. Tristen smiled to himself before he thought of approaching her. "Make way! It's them! It's Kim!" People ran here and there, making a chaos.
It's Bates's dad, Tristen thought. He shifted his eyes back to the girl, who was struggling to keep the stuff on her, as the car approached her before he could. Tristen creased his brows as he made a run for it, but it was too late. He knew he couldn't make it in time, but he didn't give up.
The car rashly drove on the street and was about to hit her when a young boy pulled her back. Tristen stood with his eyes wide open. That girl; how she fell in the boy's arms, looking at him fearfully. She lowered herself down on the road since her legs trembled vigorously from the shock. He helped her back up, and took one of her bags from her. They seemed to have a conversation for quite a while, and then, they both headed his way.
Tristen cleared his throat and fixed his hair as he saw her coming. He kept her eyes on her, ignoring the boy since he knew him just too well. He was Bates. Tristen kept staring at the girl who walked with her head lowered in fear. Bates spun around to find her falling apart once again. He put his arm around her and helped her walk.
He was taking her back to her house. They passed Tristen without any word. Bates ignored Tristen's existence, as he should, since they did not want to expose to everyone that they knew each other.
The girl, however, looked at Tristen as she passed him, closely. She wanted to tell him something, or so did he think. But her eyes definitely wanted to talk. That's what Tristen could not decode. Only if he could replace Bates and drop her home himself. Only if she could be with him...
"Now I know why that sucker chose to become a writer." Tristen rolled his eyes in anger, hugging Lavender closer while he recalled those memories.
"Fucking loser. No way I'm letting him hold her
again."