✎dearest, author belle ⿻

❏ʚ prompt 1

prompt: Write a story called 'The Path that led to Nowhere'.

The chances of Estelle being a rebel was as low as dinosaurs re-existing. Straight A student with zero bad grades and absolutely no disciplinary records, everyone thought she had a bright future ahead of her. She was that one girl whose uniform was always impeccably ironed complete with regulation length skirt, tucked in shirt, ankle-covering socks and straightened tie pinned firmly in place with her prefect's badge, a universal symbol of honour across school. Even if she didn't have many friends, she was popular.

She was sporty, calculative enough to be chairperson in the chess club, creative enough to have edited the yearbook and even went to church every Sunday. Estelle graduated high school as valedictorian, with a full scholarship to Yonsei. Her path to success had never been clearer, or closer, and it had been. Everything was all set to embark on the road that she had so diligently carved out for herself over her eighteen long years in this small English town.

All was well, till she met him.

He was nothing like she had ever experienced before. He burst into Estelle's meticulously controlled life when he moved to town, with his messy dusty bubblegum pink hair and his tempestuous nature annihilated Estelle's entire existence in more ways than one could imagine. He was pandemonium personified.

At first, it was just casual drinking at the parties he dragged her to every weekend. Weekends quickly turned into weekdays, and drinking became Estelle's escape from the life she had bullied herself into. For the first time in her life, Estelle was free of the shackles she had unknowingly allowed to bind her her entire life, and he was the key.

Drinking parties eventually morphed into all-night bashes. He had introduced her to the difficult stuff, and Estelle was in no position to let it go, just as she was in no position to let go of him. The thrill of waking up every morning with him on top of her, completely and blissfully unaware of the events of the night before, was too strong for her to resist. She was on a high and couldn't bear the thought of living in any other way.

And then they got caught.

The police raids were becoming more frequent, and this time we weren't so lucky.

All of the nights their only daughter should have spent preparing for Yonsei had instead been spent partying with "dissident adults." All of the money she had saved from her scholarship fund had been squandered on drugs and alcohol. All sense and sensibility had been swept away by a boy with dusty pink hair and hazel eyes who held the universe in his hands. She, on the other hand, had no regrets.

They confined Estelle back into that life, the life she had worked so hard to break free. A taste of the freedom the world had to offer had removed any remaining inhibitions. Estelle didn't mind that she was forbidden from ever leaving their presence again. She didn't mind that Yonsei had rescinded their scholarship after taking a "clearer look at her personality." She didn't mind their flinches and winces whenever she came within a few metres of their personal space. And Estelle didn't mind the odd looks she got from strangers the few times she dared to leave the house.

All Estelle wanted was to be with him again.

So, on Christmas Eve, for the first time in a long time, they trusted me to be on my own, and while they were in God's presence, she called him over. They drove to the bridge just across the raging river, each holding the other's hand. He was the only way Estelle could live her life. He was the only way she could even consider going. Estelle locked her chocolate eyes on his hazel ones, his rose-colored hair blowing around his face in the chilly December breeze.

And together, they jumped down the path that led to nowhere.

(664 words)

note: the last part gave me literal chills ;-;