CHAPTER 4

Asha's POV

OH. MY. GOD.

OH.

MY.

FREAKING.

GOD.

She almost kissed me. She was this close to just slamming her soft full pink lips on mine in a hot, obviously steamy kiss and the best part is, I was actually gonna let her kiss me.

God knows how much I wanted a taste of her in my mouth. How much I wanted to feel those lips on mine. How much I wanted to run my hands through her hair. How I wanted to drive her crazy like she drives me crazy by just existing.

Fuck.

I wanted her to take control over me or better yet make me lose fucking control. I wanted to drown in her, to forget I existed for a moment, to forget all my anxieties and insecurities and just live in that beautiful lust-filled bubble.

Sadly, that will be in my dreams for a little longer now.

Speaking of dreams, mom had already left for work like forty five minutes ago and I was still on my bed, laying on my back staring at my ceiling covered in green  glow-in-the-dark stars brushing my fingers softly over my lips as I remembered how close she was to kissing me. My lips feel all tingly and my heart clenches and flutters in excitement at the mere thought of what would have happened if she just kissed me.

I don't know how long I stayed up in bed thinking about Riley and her lips but the next thing I knew, I was walking down on a street in the afternoon. My black and blue skateboard on my left hand while my right hand was in the pocket of my jeans. I was listening to some music from my ipod and the afternoon was shining on my face. I was very deep in thought, probably about how school always fucked my mood up. Loud sirens from two firetrucks and an ambulance broke me from my depressing thoughts. I never really paid attention to where they were headed to because I thought they were headed to town, but they didn't make the turn towards the town. Instead they went straight ahead, and the only people who lived on that side of this town were us, the Martins.

Oh no.

No. No. No. Noooooo.

It's not where I think they are going.

It can't be.

Right?

...

I immediately got on my skate board and rode as fast as I could back home.

My heart dropped and broke.

I couldn't believe what was happening before my eyes.

I couldn't stop staring at those gynormous flames of red and yellow consuming our entire house. My home.

The dark smoke that continued billowing all over.

"NOOOOOOO. DADDY, PLEASE, DADDY..."

"miss you need to get out of here right now. We need you to step away from here and just stand a little farther away from the fire."

I couldn't understand what that dude was saying. All my mind seemed to focus on was how I left my dad in the house and he promised he'd be back to take me out to the carnival because I performed really well and that would be my reward. How he came two days ago from his 3 month long business trip and wanted to spend this Friday evening and the entire weekend with all of us as a family out having fun.

Then I looked around at our compound and saw something that just made me lose it. Completely.

Parked just near the house was my elder brother's black audi. He only drove that car on his way home. Which only means one thing.

Owen. Was. Home.

And said home was on fire.

Fuck.

OH shit. This can't be happening. I just broke down.

I fell on my knees and choked on a sob. Every single emotion, pain, anger, shock, I just let it all out in one long loud cry.

"OWEN. OWEN PLEASE DON'T LEAVE!!"

I woke up with a jerk, beads of sweat on my forehead, my heart beating so fast, and tears streaming down my face.

That nightmare has been haunting me for the past seven years. It's always the same thing. Anti-depressants never helped, therapy didn't work, I just ended up living with it.

With a loud sigh, I got up and went to the bathroom to take a piss then went downstairs for some vanilla tea, yeah that would help. It was around half past four in the morning and mom would be coming back at seven from work. I decided since I didn't have anything better to do and I'd definitely not be getting any sleep if I went back to bed, I'd bake her favorite cake, a chocolate mousse cake. Owen and I would bake this when I was little for our parents wedding anniversary since I could remember and our parents simply adored it.

So I got everything I needed to make a the cake from the pantry and started mixing them up.

"Hey O, are we making cake today?" I asked as I was skipping towards the kitchen where Owen was taking out stuff from the pantry that were clearly for baking a chocolate cake.

"yeah Asha," he said as he turned around to look at me. He lifted me up and placed me on the kitchen counter and started blowing raspberries on my neck and face. I giggled lightly since he's little stubble tickled my face.

"yay, chocolate! My favorite" I said while giggling loudly and clapping my small hands. We played around in the kitchen while mixing up the ingredients. He poured some flour on my face that made me sneeze a little bit and I took some flour and poured it on his Grey t-shirt.

He started chasing me around in the kitchen while making roars sounding like a lion. I giggled loudly as he caught me and threw me up in the air.

"Hey Ash,"

"hmm?" I turned to face him with a curious look on my face.

His eyes softened and his lips curled into a small smile.

"I love you always." he said

"I love you too, forever and ever and ever." I told him with a wide toothy grin on my face.

I realized I was crying when I felt something wet on my cheeks.

Seven.

Seven long years of me crying every time I remembered my dad and Owen.

Seven years of wondering why they decided to leave me.

Seven years of listening to my mom break whenever she tried to build herself back because her pillar was gone.

I still hear my mom and dad's voice singing harmoniously for me when I went to bed. I could still feel my dad's beard poking my face when he kissed me on the forehead and promised he'd always be there. I still see my brother's face every time I'm riding my bike because I used to ride around the town with him. Even though he was older than me, he never acted too cool to play with his little sister, he always played with me, always protected me from bullies, made my first day of primary school not seem so scary. He was always there. And he promised he'd always be there.

But he never kept his promise.