CHAPTER 47:
Where He Finally Accepts
~~
|Archer|
I stood outside the Apartment door and took a deep breath. Dread and unease churned in the pit of my stomach.
I hadn't been here since that fateful day at the hospital. I had been living with Shanaya at her parent's apartment. But it had been over three weeks since the funeral and Shanaya had to return to Kenya to resume her work, and even though she'd told me I could stay there for as long as I liked I knew it would be too much of an imposition.
I'd talked to Seth, the mechanic who I had been working for these past couple of months, he had been sympathetic to my situation and told me that I could stay at the loft above his service shop.
I couldn't bring myself to move back here. Not when Fallon wasn't here anymore. I was only here right now because I still hadn't picked up my stuff.
I unlocked the door and stepped inside. It was strange, everything was just as we had left it but the apartment seemed colder, empty. It didn't feel like home anymore.
Thankfully I didn't see either Adrian or Nelly. I didn't have any strength left for any sort of human interaction today. I made my way to Fallon's room.
The door was left slightly ajar and as soon as I stepped inside I heard it. A low, almost keening sound It took me a moment to realize that it was actually Spartacus who had been wailing, sitting on top of Fallon's bed. The large feline stopped when he saw me and looked back at me with what I swore was hope in his single good eye. He waited for a while but when he realized that Fallon wasn't coming in after me he turned back to look out the window and resumed his mournful cries.
The hollowness in my chest seemed to intensify. Everything inside me hurt. Every breath I took seemed excruciating.
I looked around the room and my heart dropped when I noticed that all of Fallon's stuff wasn't here anymore. I noticed the two packed cardboard boxes placed neatly beside the bed.
Suddenly, I was angry. So angry.
How could someone's entire existence be placed inside two fucking boxes?
Spartacus let out another pitiful howl and I automatically reached for him but as soon as my hand touched him he hissed at me and scurried off the bed. I was taken aback. I stumbled and knocked over the two boxes.
The smaller one opened up at the top and its contents spilled out.
I cursed under my breath as I started picking the stuff up and placing it back into the box.
A familiar aqua-colored book lying face down a couple of feet away from me caught my eye. It was Fallon's diary. I picked it up and just as I was about to put it back into the box the page it had opened to caught my eye.
More importantly, the picture that had been taped to that page caught my eye.
It was like someone had sucked the air right out of my lungs.
My eyes widened in shock.
My hands trembled as I sank to the floor.
How is this possible?
How does she have this?
Writing on the opposite page caught my eye and when I saw my name I started to read;
Dear Archer,
'Dear' sounds a little weird and formal doesn't it? I didn't know how else to start this letter. You're probably never going to read this anyway. It's more for me than it is for you if I'm being completely honest.
I'm writing this letter as you sleep peacefully beside me.
I like watching you sleep.
I'm laughing at how creepy that last sentence sounded but it's true. You're completely off your guard when you're asleep, relaxed, that permanent crease between your eyebrows disappears. It's beautiful. Then again, I think everything you do is beautiful...
Okay, moving on. (You're my boyfriend I really need to stop fangirling over you)
I laughed as I read those lines. It was such a Fallon thing to write. Suddenly tears started to blur my vision. I quickly wiped them away and continued to read.
The reason I am writing you this letter is because I have kept two secrets from you.
The first one, I am sure that you already know, or at least you must feel it in your heart. I must tell you, that day when you thought I was sleeping and told me that you loved me, I heard you. I just didn't have the courage to tell you that I felt the same way.
You see, ever since I was a kid I've held on to this notion that if you don't acknowledge how much something means to you it doesn't hurt so much when it's taken away from you. Like that time at the orphanage when the older girls took my mother's silver hairbrush I convinced myself that I couldn't use that hairbrush on my wild hair anyway.
But I'm starting to see that that's not the case when it comes to you, there's no way on this earth that it won't hurt if you're not here with me. I can't even picture existing without you anymore Archer Hastings.
And that's because I love you. I love you so much that it's hard to breathe.
I'm hopelessly in love with you Archer Hastings,
And I think you already know that.
My tears were freely falling now. They smudged the ink on the page but I kept reading.
Now for the second secret.
It's a secret I've kept for 5 years.
To be fair, I didn't really know about it myself till a couple of days ago.
But before I tell you what it is I need to ask you something;
Do you believe in destiny?
I didn't. I thought of the whole notion of destiny as absurd. Partially because believing in it meant that I had been destined for all the awful things that had happened to me and what hope did I have for the future if my destiny was so fucked up.
But the thing is as I've gotten to know you over the past few months I've started to think differently. You've shown me what being valued and appreciated feels like, you've made me experience true happiness.
Sadly, that wasn't always the case.
5 years ago I was sure that I was destined to be miserable. I believed that there was no hope for me to find happiness. I was hurt, and lonely.
I'm not proud to admit this but there came a point in my life where the pain became too much for me to handle. The thought of not existing started sounding better than existing the way I did.
And just when I decided it was time for me to end it all, just one step over the edge...
That's when I saw him.
My guardian angel.
I never saw him again after that day. I don't even remember most of what we talked about. Just that he'd convinced me that no matter how bad things seem in the moment they can't stay that way forever because life doesn't exist without change.
And no matter how deep we've gone under, we just need to hold our breaths for a little while, till we reach the surface.
We just have to teach ourselves how to stay afloat.
A stranger saved me that day and I'm so glad he did because I got to experience loving you Archer.
I never got that man's name but when he was leaving a picture fell out of his wallet.
I kept that picture with me to remind myself that no matter how bad life gets I can get through it. So imagine my shock when I saw that same picture on your mother's phone when she came to talk to me last week.
Imagine my complete and absolute disbelief when I realized that the picture that for the past 5 years kept me grounded, gave me courage-
Was a picture of you all along...
So I'll ask you this question again Archer Hastings,
Do you believe in destiny?
Because I do.
Yours forever,
Fallon Chambers.
I ran my thumb over the old, frayed picture.
A picture of me not more than three years old.
A picture I knew that Jordan used to keep in his wallet.
A strangled sound escaped from my lips as I broke down. My entire body shook with the intensity of my cries. It was the first time I had cried since I found out that I lost her.
Acceptance is the hardest part of loss. It hits you like a train coming towards you at full speed. Accepting that someone you love is gone causes the worst kind of pain imaginable, maybe that's why it takes so long for some people to get there.
But I understand that while acceptance is painful, it is also necessary.
Because without acceptance there can be no healing.
Maybe it was because he heard my cries but suddenly I felt Spartacus's large body beside me. He lay his head in my lap as my tears kept falling.
I pressed my face against his warm fur and continued to sob.