MAFIA'S PIANIST ✔

36| Veiled Past - 2

Aria will be called Aria again from this chapter.
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"What are you doing?"

A 12-year-old Aria looked up at a younger sunkissed boy looking down at her with a huge grin.

"I like throwing pebbles in the pond" she replied as she tore her gaze away and threw another pebble at the pond, a small splash sound resonated around the quiet surroundings.

Kahlil bent down and settled beside Aria, grabbing a pebble from the pile she had gathered.

It had been almost 2 years since Aria had lived in this secluded orphanage. Mrs. Dias, the headmistress of this orphanage had tried several times to ask Aria about her origins.

But when Aria gave away nothing except her fake name, she had eventually given up.

Kahlil, on the other hand, had not. He had never once left Aria's side these two years and followed her almost everywhere, even when the other kids had announced her rude and refused to even look in her direction.

"Is this what you want then?" Kahlil asked as Aria's hand froze midway through her fun pebble-throwing activity.

His question pricked her heart. She had never gotten over her mother's death, she would still lay down with the photo frame every night as nightmares would haunt her every passing second.

Sleep was an unachievable feat to her.

She would get scared every time she looked at herself in the mirror. The chocolate brown eyes reflected in the mirror made her shiver. The whole scene of her mother dying all over again would swim in front of her eyes.

"It's quiet, serene and humble. I cannot ask for anything more" Aria replied. It was a fact that the two kids were way too mature for their age.

At this point it was just a daily occurrence when they would talk to each other as if they were grown adults, the others had even stopped pointing it out.

"So your goal. ." Kahlil sighed as he threw a rock at full force, the pebble bounced against the water surface and landed on the other side ". .is to live and die peacefully?"

Aria nodded, still amazed by the pebble now sitting on the other side of the pond. She picked up a pebble again and tried the same trick, but hers just sank down, before it even started its journey.

"You'd fail," Kahlil remarked, making her head snap at him "You'll never find peace"

Aria gritted her teeth in bubbling rage. Kahlil would often find her crying and sobbing in the middle of the night, so he had a vague idea about her trauma.

Aria tried again. The pebble sank just like the other one.

"You'd never succeed this way sis" he pushed again.

"Shut up" Aria barked before gathering her few books laying on the grass and walking away.

She was frustrated too, but what could she even do? The police and government didn't care who died in the crossfire of the mafia wars; and; the American mafia is not even an option worth considering.

She had heard that a peace pact had been formed between the two, to cease the possibilities of future attacks. They didn't care who died in the past.