'Some people think that the truth can be hidden with a little cover-up and decoration. But as time goes by, what is true is revealed, and what is fake fades away' -Ismail Haniyeh
Adrian POV
How dare she. Hailey went way too far and Ashley snapped. Throughout her speech Ash went from angry to full out silently furious and when Ash goes silent and looks like that I feel very sorry for the person on the receiving end of her wrath. I was confused as to how she knew the information she did, Ash only told Penny, Mason, Will and myself. Speaking of Will, where was he?
"I had help in finding out this information," Hailey said once Ash had left the cafeteria. "Will Newman deserves your thanks too, he provided me with the information." I snapped. Growling I stood up, my hands in fists and took one step before Penny stepped in front of me.
"Don't do this Adrian," she warned but I took no notice. Pushing past Penny I walked up to Hailey and Will, who had joined her.
"What on earth do you think you are doing!" I roared, "What purpose did that serve other than ruining another persons life?"
"So what if it means her pathetic life is ruined?" Hailey asked.
"So what? So what? Really Hailey I thought you had much more sense than that!" She looked appropriately terrified.
"She stole you from me and now that she is gone you can come back to me! Isn't that what you want?"
"No, Hailey!" I yelled at her, "I never wanted you, I never even kissed you for Gods sake! You have some sick and twisted version of reality where you and I are together. I don't want to be with you Hailey, I never have, because I love someone else!"
"Who?" she asked jealously.
"Ashley Summers, the very the girl you just sent flying out the doors in a rage!" She looked stunned.
"How can you love her?"
"I lover her for many reasons, none which you can comprehend! And you," I seethed, turning to Will, "What the hell were you thinking? You were my best friend!"
"I was thinking of you!" Will yelled in reply. "You can't see it but you have gone soft around her, she has made you into a completely different person and you can't think straight!"
"I don't know what happened to you Will, but consider yourself lost to the rest of us. Both of you better watch out because once Ash calms down she will be coming for you and neither of you know the full extent of her anger and how much harm she could do to you. Hailey she threw a knife in your shoe, imagine what she could do with a proper knife if she threw it higher," I said and they both visibly paled. Without any further wait I ran out into the woods towards Ash.
When I found her I stopped dead in my tracks. The blood was running freely down her knuckles and the tree she was punching had several indentations in it.
"Ash!" I yelled, "Stop!"
"I can't!" she replied.
"Yes, you can," I said softly walking over to her and gently grabbing her arms. She didn't resist as I led her to a log and sat her down, slowly uncurling her fists, not caring about the blood that poured onto my hands. She just sat there and stared at her hands for a little while before talking.
"Please excuse me if this is a little disjointed, I haven't told anyone about it before. You already know about Claudia but there is a second part to my story. My mother is not Lily Summers and neither is my father Nick Summers. I never knew my father, he abandoned my mother when she gave birth to me. My mother was Anne May." Despite the fact that I already knew this it still shocked me to hear it from her lips. "I don't know why she hated me but she did. Some people say hate is such a strong word and as such should never be used but that is the only way to describe the true depths of her feelings for me as her only child. She didn't hate me because I looked like my father, although I do, she hated me because I was smart I think. I knew what was right and wrong at a very young age and I could comprehend situations to a great degree. For example when she drank a bit too much alcohol I told her that she shouldn't because she would hurt herself. She got to the point where she started beating me. Every night, sometimes every morning too, she would beat me saying things like 'it's your fault your father left' and that I was a 'worthless rat with no meaning'. I went to school in very plain long clothes every day and eventually the teachers started wondering what was wrong with me. They weren't very observant though because it took them 2 years before they asked questions. Anne had a power complex, she felt like she needed to be better than me and make me like her idea of a perfect child. Obedient. Silent. Nonexistent. After a few years I realised that what she was doing to me was wrong and that I shouldn't have to hide the black marks that littered my skin although I still believed that I was worthless. That was the day I stopped crying and I haven't since that day.
'When I was about 8 years old Anne went a bit too far. She was beating me for hours until the neighbours heard my screaming. The police weren't fast enough. She managed to get a knife and cut my back very, very slowly and throw me through a few glass cabinets. When they found me I was almost dead and they arrested Anne. The worst thing was that she wasn't intoxicated and she didn't have any kind of mental disorder, it was all her choice. I spent months on end in hospital recovering. Since my father had left nobody knew who he was and I was an orphan. A went through two foster homes but I suffered, still suffer, night terrors and they didn't know what to do. They thought I was going insane so I was sent to insane hospitals and all of this was covered by the media. I was constantly under pressure not to mess up and that had a massive impact on my mental health which was fragile. Eventually the Summers came into contact with me and somehow managed to convince me to live with them after a few months of getting to know them. That was probably the best decision of my life.
'Once I moved in I met Claudia and she, along with her parents, started to repair me. My night terrors weren't as frequent and I wasn't as plagued with the memories that my very own mother tried to kill me. Other than Claudia I also found solace in my books and between them everything was good for a while. The day Claudia died was the day I went back into the shell I came from. Years later I met you and Penny and everyone else and I slowly start repairing again. Then Anne was released and Hailey just had to go and msay the things that I have thought about everyday and I just broke. Shattered into a million pieces and now I don't know what to do." She finished with a short, sad sigh that was filled with indescribable emotion.
"You are incredible strong you know that right?" I said to her and she nodded and then looked up.
"Is it raining?" she asked confused.
"No," I replied as she looked back at me, "You're crying, fiammella."
"Oh," she said softly as she pulled her knees up to her chest as the tears rolled down her cheeks. I brought her onto my lap where her quiet sobs turned in to great hiccupping cries. I held her as she let go of 10 years worth of sorrow and suffering. Time ceased to exist as she clung onto my shirt support herself until, slowly, the tears ceased to roll down her cheeks.
"Don't let me go," she whispered.
"You know what I think?" I asked softly, "I think that I love a girl. A girl with hair like golden silk, and eyes like the bluest sky that shine with emotion. A girl who has an incredible intelligence and doesn't let me get away with everything. A girl who has an obsession with books and a tightly locked past. I love you Ashley Summers and I'm not letting you go."
"It took me awhile but I think I finally gave my heart to someone else too. I love you Adrian Forsyth so please don't break my heart," she told me and I couldn't help but kiss her. I wasn't a particularly hard or long kiss but I portrayed exactly what we were feeling. Neither of us needed anything more than that one soft kiss to see the truth behind what we were saying. When we broke apart I brushed a stray tear from her cheek and smiled.
"We should get someone to look at your hands," I suggested. Ash looked at her hands for the first time and looked at the damage she had caused herself. Blood coated her entire hands yet it looked like she had not broken anything.
"Who told Hailey all of that stuff about me?" she asked.
"Will," I said darkly, "I could kill him for what he did."
"Let me," she replied in an equally dangerous voice, "I need to teach them a lesson in manners." Laughing a little I kissed her again.
"Lets just get you back to school first." She laughed as well and that is when I knew that it would be alright, if we could laugh then all was not lost.
And there you have it, Ash's life story. I finally have this chapter out of my head and you can read it. I have imagined this scene in so many different ways and I'm still not happy with how I wrote it but it's the best one so far. I originally planned for this chapter to be about Chapter 25... so much for that!! TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK!!!
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Unchain Me
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