Turning Point||Book 2

31: Xenia.

Shapes and shadows danced around me, slippery and fleeting like wisps of smoke teasing my grasp. The air was clogged due anticipation, as if something momentous lay just beyond my reach, waiting to be revealed.

I stumbled forward, my footsteps echoing in the void, like a rhythmic cadence in the silence of a closed room. Each step was heavy, uncertainty and foreboding.

I strained to pierce the veil of fog that shrouded my surroundings, but every effort was met with frustration as the mist closed in around me. My senses were being swallowed whole.

And then, like a masterful filmmaker switching to a new scene of their own creation, a familiar tableau unfolded before me. But I'd say it was conjured by the whims of something inexplicable.

I watched, as a silent observer, my ten-year-old self traversing the very dull hallway of our house in London. We really were back at this house again?

I hated it here.

The shutters slammed shut with a deafening resonance, the thunder reverberating through the walls, and the rain splattered against the roof like a relentless drumbeat.

I hated it here.

With each hesitant step, my younger self drew closer to the red door at the end of the hallway, her hand trembling as she reached out to grasp the handle. And then, with a creak of protest, the door swung open, revealing a sight that would forever haunt my life.

Red.

Blood.

Blood staining the walls, dripping from the curtains in morbid patterns. My mind recoiled in horror, refusing to accept the gruesome scene in front of me.

Paint?

No, it couldn't be paint, not with this metallic scent hanging heavy in the air, not with this sticky viscosity clinging to my fingertips.

As I neared, my heart clenched, a heavy thud echoing in my chest, steady yet urgent. Doo-dum. Doo-dum. Doo-dum. The rhythm held firm, refusing to waver.

I saw him. My father, lying motionless on the floor, his eyes vacant, mouth frozen in a silent scream. And in his hand, clutched tightly as if in defiance of fate itself, the gun that had silenced him forever.

I reached out, my fingers trembling as they brushed against the crimson-stained walls, feeling the slickness of the blood beneath my touch. It was real. Too real to be a mere figment of my imagination, too vivid to be dismissed as a dream.

The echoes of thunder faded into the distance before returning with a vengeance, as though it emphasized the seriousness of the moment. I stood there, frozen in place, grappling with the horrifying truth that lay before me. The truth that no amount of denial could erase, no amount of time could heal. The truth that my father was gone, taken from me in a moment of senselessness, leaving nothing but unanswered questions.

He had killed himself.

"Joanna!" I screamed, tearing my eyes open.

It took roughly five seconds for me to fully process my surroundings, that I wasn't in London or ten years old, and in a flash of lightning, I realized I wasn't alone. I felt a sudden jolt of fear. My breath caught in my throat as I didn't exactly make out the face of the person nearly leaned over me.

"How the fuck are you sleeping with so much commotion going on around you!"

It was Romano's voice. The darkness could not drown that out. His husky timbre had weaved right through the darkness in a near-seductive whisper. Though I already knew it was him, instinctively I pushed against his approaching hands to defend myself from his touch. But they met only air, as he intended to close the window near my head, not reach out to me.