Nick_Looman

Selucas Brightblossom was in his younger years a bright and smart boy who lived his life doing nothing out of the ordinary; he studied well, he helped his father and uncle in their greengrocer business and he supported his mother with raising his sisters. It seemed then as if his life was going the normal direction and his future looked bright, everyone expected him to become a good citizen with a nice job, his parents where definitely expecting him him to go to a good and well established university because of his outstanding intelligence, however unfortunately in the end he would not go on this paved path instead taking a rough and dangerous one. It all started when his parents decided to move on to a new place, the city of Ardenburg in the warm sub-tropic south, where they would settle themselves in a modern environmentally friendly house in a calm neighbourhood. Here they sought to begin a new life in a spacious and nature-abundant city, Selucas was at the age of seventeen (almost eighteen) at that time and at this place his parents expected him and his siblings to blossom into fine young people, but it would go on differently.... Bad encounters, shady friends and the temptation of big money and a high status that goes with it would turn everything upside down... An once good and hard-working boy would turn into a full-fledged gangster without shame and values. How did it end up like this?!

Good Boy no More

Jake's voice rolled through the late evening air— deep, steady, almost haunting. He wasn't just singing Eminem's lyrics. He was bleeding them. The moment he took the mic and began "Just gonna stand there and watch me burn..." Darcy felt something crawl beneath her skin.

She hadn't expected this. This song thrilled her senses. It was a song that was close to her heart, she held it dearly.

The lyrics hit harder than she thought it would. Jake wasn't singing like a joker. He wasn't posturing. He was.... Sincere. Each line laced with pain. And not just the dramatic kind people fake on stage. No— this was raw, stripped down.

Darcy stood frozen near the hedge, wine glass untouched in her hand, her heartbeat rising with every verse.

"That's alright, because I like the way it hurts..."

And now? Complete silence. One of her fake friends tried to taunt him by giving a nasty comment— seemingly to please the queen of thorns, but to no avail, because all the big talk and haughty, triumphant behaviour from earlier this evening had gone. Disappeared. The fake friend looked confused when Darcy didn't answer her taunt with a follow-up taunt, she thought: Oh my god, why is this malicious Ursula not laughing at my slimery dose of toxic nonsense?!

Jake was now standing under glowing lights, drowning in the very emotion she thought he never had. She thought of him as a cold-hearted heartbreaker, deceitful and heedless, not caring about emotional matters and the sort.

People around her leaned in. Were affected, just like her.

Darcy's breath hitched.... Her plan.

"Just gonna stand there and hear me cry..."

A sharp wind rustled the trees. The weight in her chest grew heavier.

Jake's voice— how it cracked on that word "cry" made something uncoil in her throat. She tried to speak. Tried to move. Tried to signal. But it was too late.

Darcy opened her mouth, but her voice vanished.

Jake didn't try to finish the verse.

He didn't shout. He didn't scream.

He just stood there. Staring. Hollow-eyed. Silent.

And Darcy felt her knees almost give out. The crowd gasped— then laughed. A wave of noise, camera flashes, unfiltered glee.

Darcy didn't hear any of it. Her fake friends stood confused, not knowing how to react now that their malicious ringleader who had been scolding and scoffing Jake from morning till late evening, strangely refrained herself from laughing at her ex's downfall. They wisely kept their mouths shut in awaitment.

All Darcy could hear was the echo of Jake's voice. That one moment of aching honesty in his performance. The truth behind his silence now.

She had done this. She had shattered something delicate and unspoken.

This wasn't the smug Jake who flirted with Layla. This wasn't the boy who had neglected her. This was someone else. Someone real.

And she'd just poured acid over him in front of everyone. Her hand trembled, glass wobbling in her grip. She wanted to run.

But the plan was already done. Set in stone. Rigged to trigger.

And there was no button to undo it.

No fishing line to reel back the humiliation.

Darcy's vision blurred slightly— not from wine, not from smoke. From the weight of it all. The ache in her ribs. The knowledge that she couldn't apologize now. Couldn't explain. Couldn't fix it.

Darcy turned away, hiding her face from the crowd, her stomach twisted with guilt. I can't stand this! No! Ugh! Why do I feel like this?! Oh my god I did it, come on Darcy, you did this, be happy! Oh my god, oh my god! I'm panicking. What have I done?!

III.X Regret