CHAPTER 8

Pain.

It makes you suffer.

I could hear them screaming at me, 'I hate you' 'You are annoying' 'Just kill yourself and spear us all YOU'. But this time they were instrumental and his words were the lyrics on repeat in this song.

I promised, No, I begged myself to leave this feeling in Chicago, to leave their words in Chicago. Tears threatened to burst their banks as I stood there charged by a traitor of a mind. But now I was here and was convinced everyone would hate me the same way.

I tried, trust me I tried so hard to excuse what he said, but the way he said it reminded me of what I ran from when she was no longer there to protect me from it, what I swore on my first day in England I'll ignore. My fears weren't just uncertainty of the future anymore, they were real. Not just in my mind this time, in my world.

What you're thinking is the same as them. she's overreacting, she's annoying and irritating. I want to believe you are not but my mind won't let me. I'm convinced the world is a threat and I have to hide.

Doctors failed and pills failed, so many pills failed to quiet my thoughts.

But her death stopped them.

I was just as dead as she was, a breathing shell of a hollow human.

They are back now, triggered by the slightest rustle of a leaf.

Draw I should draw, yes, that's how they'll leave but they didn't.

So much to say but no one to say it too.

Why did he affect me this way? I didn't know his name or who he was but he was affecting me. No it wasn't him it was how he said it, his eyes were the same as theirs. The same look and the same tone that left me with raised rods on my wrists.

***

I lay there awake with the only thing I knew would never leave me.

My thoughts.

They were hurting me but they weren't leaving me and I'd rather that than losing something else.

'Knock'

'Knock'

'Knock'

Startled by the sound this late at night I rushed to the door of my new room. Who the hell is knocking at this hour? "Who is it?" I whispered through the cracks in the double doors. "Unless you're having a secret romance, who else would it be, it's me Emerson."

I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding and opened the door. He walked in like it was his bedtime routine, unbothered at his intrusion.

"I'm not going to ask if you're okay because I know you're not,"

I stood there, staring at him, lost for words. The light cotton of my nightgown caressing my ankles with the draft from the open windows.

"Aila, you've been distant since you arrived. I jokingly shot insults at you loads of times when I was showing you your room and you didn't even give your snarky comebacks." "What's happening?"

'My room' I didn't even remember Emerson showing me my room. I was so consumed by the insanity. I only now took in the room I was in. It was big and airy following the royal theme as the rest of the school. If it wasn't for my phone and laptop on the desk there was nothing that said we weren't in the 19th century.

Emerson cleared his throat, averting my attention back to him. I've never seen him in anything other than his sweater and trouser pairing, his ruffled dirty blonde hair and black T-shirt made quite the impact.

"Aila, you need to talk to me, I need you to know I'm here for you." "I know this isn't easy, it's not everyday you wake up to the existence of 'magic' and that you have such a big role in everything."

I liked that about Emerson, he wasn't afraid to say what he wanted to say. I wish I could be better, like him, be the daughter my mother deserved. Not this pathetic excuse for a young woman.

His words warmed my heart. The idea of being completely vulnerable with someone. No judgement, no assumptions, just so utterly exposed in the best possible way.

Still, I couldn't, I tried to form words to explain what I was feeling but they didn't come.

I was grateful he thought it was about having this said power and becoming an heir and it should have been about that but it was far from it.

"I didn't think you would notice. It is about that actually," I was twisting my fingers in my sweaty palms anxious as to what he would say next.

He didn't say anything.

Instead, he stepped forward and pulled me towards him. His chin on my forehead and arms around my waist. I felt his hands around my waist already but this time they were tight, warm, nurturing.

We stood like that for some time. My head on his chest and arms around his torso with teary eyes. I felt taken care of, something I thought only she could give me. I didn't want to let him go, the warmth I felt didn't come from his body, it came from his heart.

I envied his heart because mine couldn't give him the same thing.

" You're not alone," he made some distance now, looking me in the eyes. "I'm here Aila, right here and I'm not going anywhere. We may not have known each other long but time is made for a clock, it doesn't define the depth of our friendship."

I smiled, his presence and words and look in his eyes gifted me a sleep I needed more than I knew.