Torneró

14

Sylvie's POV:

3 days later

Knocking on Carter's black wood front door, my heart pounds faster than usual in anticipation. I'm about to do something that I have never done before. The door opens after seconds of no response, Carter stands in front of me with a pair of black sweatpants on and no shirt. His hair is roughly messed up and falls over his forehead. "Syl" He pronounces in a ruffled, low voice in surprise. I nod my head, gripping onto my handbag's strap with my other hand so it remains in the middle of my body. "sorry, come in" the door opens wider as he gestures to the living room, I smile gingerly as I walk past him and into the dark, cold room.

"Did I wake you?" I ask him as politly as possible as I switch the lights on, "it's okay", he responds avoiding an actual response. "do you like me?" I ask suddenly, turning around on my heel abruptly to face him, this seems to have taken Carter by surprise because he stares at me as if I am a ghost. His eyes widened and dilated with a t-shirt wrapped around one of his hands. "Uhh-" he begins, searching for an answer.

"It's okay if you're not, but I was thinking about it. Why the hell would you tell me something like that? I mean I definitely don't want to believe your stupid lie but it would honestly explain so many things. Like how you can figure out where I am like a creep, or why you always seem to be around when something bad happens. Or why your friend ran after that man, or even why he stabbed me in the first place. Like what the actual hell, anyways I was confused over why you told me this because it's not like we're exactly the people who get along with each other best. Oh, and by the way if this is a joke then I will personally kill you" I ramble, attempting to hide the awkward silence and fact that I was nervous.

When he doesn't respond, I open my mouth to continue but he realises and quickly steps towards me. Carter places a hand on both sides of my shoulder and leans down really close to me, "I trust you" he informs in barely a whisper, yet his voice is still stern and clear. I nod my head, staring directly into his enticing eyes. I push my head closer to his face, "then it's time I begin to trust you" I announce, copying his tone of voice before pulling back away from him and walking towards the door.

"Wait, where are you going" he questions me, causing me to stop in my tracks and turn around to face him. "put your shirt on and grab a jacket" I order before turning back around.

Carter rapidly pulls his shirt over his messy lock of hair and grabs the leather jacket hanging by the door, following me out.

I get into the driver's side of my car while Carter sits next to me, in the passenger side. "Where are we going?" He asks me, observing the land surrounding us. "to your death" I respond teasingly, I could picture him rolling his eyes and looking out the window again.

Finally we arrive, the cemetery.

"Wow, you really weren't kidding" he gazes over the grey, cement sign. I smile at him and face back towards the gates, taking a deep breath in and going over what I'm going to say silently in my mind. "This graveyard creeps me out" he says as we walk through the grassy ground, the only light guiding us being the bright moon's reflection.

We come to a stop at my desired location.

The gravestone stands tall in front of us, the colourful, once alive, flowers from my last visit remain dead and crusty on the green, grassy ground. "Who is this?" Carter questions in a low, almost whisper, from beside me.

I can feel his eager eyes digging into the side of my head, though my eyes remain on the engraving of the gray stone. "Isabella Nova Maé", Carter continues to stare at me. I can already feel the tears forcing themselves through. "My mother" I add. He hesitantly turns his head towards the gravestone, "what happened to her?" He asks me cautiously. I take a deep breath in, and sit down on the grass.

The debate between whether I should tell him or not has ended. I've decided to tell him everything. Carter crouches down and takes a seat on the grass directly next to me. He crosses his arms over his bucked in legs as he watches me carefully.

Picking and pulling pieces of the grass out of the ground, I begin, "I went to a party when I was 16, it was just a regular night. When I got home, my mom and I were arguing because of something stupid I did. I told her that I hated her and wishes she was dead. All of a sudden, the window shattered and a group of men came in." I take a deep breath in, glancing towards Carter who continued to watch me and listen closely. "Two of them held me back and pulled me away from mom. I tried running to her, I begged them to stop but they wouldn't stop" I couldn't fight the tears back anymore, I tried squeezing my eyes shut but it didn't work. The tears broke through. "They tortured her, and then killed her. Right in front of me. I've never forgotten that moment and I won't ever be able to forget." Carter pulls me in and forces me into his warmth, he wraps his arm around my shivering body and I let myself go.

"The last thing I told her was that I hated her", I choke over my words, he strokes the back of my head, "shhh it's okay" he whispers softly. "I never got to tell her how much I love her and how much I need her" I continue, the years blurring my vision. Carter's head tilts up to the sky as he continues his motions, "it's okay" he reassures me. I grip onto his shirt as I cry painfully into his chest, he doesn't move. All he does is hold onto me. That's all I could have needed.

After what felt like hours of just crying into Carter's shoulder, he pulls away and looks me in my eyes. "Nobody will ever hurt you like that again, I promise" he sincerely whispers. His chocolate-brown eyes glisten over slightly as they tell no lie.

I see stars in his eyes, a bunch of them. His eyes hold galaxies. 

"What about your dad?" He questions gingerly, unsure of what my response will be. "I don't know, he went on a business trip the night before and when he heard of mom he never came back. He couldn't bare to even attempt living the same life if she wasn't around. So when I was 16, Katherine moved back in and 'raised' me."

Carter nods his head, I try to refrain from telling him but I promised myself to tell him the whole truth. And I will. "I couldn't bare living with what I had witnessed, I tried everything to forget about what I saw but nothing worked. Then, I decided that I couldn't ever truly live with it, so I slit my wrists", Carter's eyes widen as an unexplainable expression crosses his face, his grip around my arms tighten. "Mark, Katherine's husband, found me and took me to the hospital, they treated me and of course Katherine was too busy to show up. When I was there, they gave me these painkillers. I discovered that they made everything stop hurting, not just my wounds but my heart too"

Carter's face flashes with recognition, back to our first argument. He's putting everything together in this moment. "I got hooked on them, I couldn't survive without them. But after multiple hospital visits due to them, I decided to change my life. I promised I wouldn't take them again and I never have. Instead, I hired Angelo to try finding out everything about my mom's death and to find my father.

Katherine found out and tried making me give it up, but I never did and I will never stop until I find out." Carter's eyes don't leave me, he just stares causing me to feel a sort of uncomfort. "Okay" he finally speaks up, "you're not doing this alone anymore. We're going to find out everything together." As happy as I was to hear Carter say those words, I couldn't help but wonder "why?" He hesitates for a moment, "you mean more to me than you think" he responds, not a single stutter in between. The tears flow out at an unstoppable rate as I smile genuinely and fall back into him.

I never noticed this before, but for the first time ever, despite everything; I felt alive.

My heart practically bursted at his reaction, I don't know how I was expecting him to react but in no way could I have ever imagined him to react in this way. It's been leading on for a while but I suppose the anger and hatred I felt for him was just a cover up, I never would have expected to be glad to hear him, of all people, say those words.

I pull away from him, staring into his beautiful eyes. Before I know it, his face was millimeters away from mine and our lips were touching.

It's that moment, that moment where you have tried so hard to keep those walls up and in that one moment, you choose to give up. You let them fall and you let him in. This could either resurrect me, or kill me slowly and painfully. Hopefully it's the first.