Losing Her Wings

Chapter 45

Ryan quickly decided not to acknowledge his snooping to Skylar or that he knew all about her big secret and her life with Zeke. He figured that if he mentioned it then she would only either deny it or get upset by it and he couldn’t do that to her. He couldn’t ask her to explain it to him or even just to face it when she obviously wasn’t ready…it wasn’t exactly something people had to admit to on a regular basis. She had died! Quite literally, been murdered and died. She was no longer living and yet…he had kissed her…he could touch her…he could see her and feel her as he could see and feel every other person in his world. It was a difficult thing to comprehend himself, never mind to ask her about. But, although he was still finding it difficult to process the news that he had seen with his own eyes and reasoned out so well since he had first found it out, Devin was still insensitive enough to provoke him about their relationship. He was just walking through the campus gardens when he came up to him and started harping on about how he was ‘hurting’ Skylar. “You know you’re no good for her…you’re just as toxic for her as Zeke was. Why do you keep persisting on chasing after her like some lovesick idiot?” Devin asked, having heard a rumour that the two were an item and he couldn’t have disapproved more. Apparently Eliza had found out all the gossip and told her sister in happiness at seeing her new friend in a happy relationship. But Ryan didn’t like the way he chose to approach him. Instead of talking about it logically and when he claimed he was just as bad as Zeke, knowing now what he had done to Skylar during their relationship and how it had ended, he couldn’t stop his immediate reaction. Before anyone could stop him, his fist made contact with his brothers jaw, sending him stumbling back in surprise.

“I’m not an idiot. And I’m nothing like Zeke.” Ryan protested in frustration, well aware that a crowd was beginning to gather round to find out why the two brothers were arguing but he didn’t see why he had to be a piece of public entertainment. He was being serious and honest for once, why was no-one taking him seriously? He decided he wasn’t taking any more from Devin, he stood there, face to face with him and told him the truth…how he felt about Skylar, about their relationship and her relationship with Zeke. Not to mention the complete ineptitude of her supposed ‘friends’ as they tried to make her happy. “I love her more than you’ll ever know. I love her so much that if I ever even thought I might hurt her, I’d rather let her go than risk being like that bastard.” Devin decided not to hit back at him and create an even bigger scene so he listened to him with the inability to believe anything he said. He knew he was going to hurt Skylar from the simple fact that they were an item already after everything he’d done to her and said to her that should have made her see enough sense to get as far from him as possible. But if she wasn’t going to do that, then he had to push Ryan into leaving her behind in the dust because she obviously wasn’t going to listen.

“Then you should let her go.” He sighed, trying to reason with him the best he could but he just wasn’t listening. He was as blind about the whole thing as Skylar was and it drove him insane. If no-one was going to listen, then why was he wasting his breath on them? It wasn’t going to do any good.

“I can’t! She needs me. I love her enough to know what she wants.” Ryan insisted desperately, determined to make him understand. He was his brother, he should have been able to hear him and understand what he was saying, what he felt, without judging him and trying to convince him that he was wrong, no matter how strongly he felt about it. Devin tried once more to say that it was in Skylar’s best interest to be without him and have time to get herself together. “As much as you keep spouting off about what you say is best for her, you have no idea who she really is or what she went through just to be alive today. So don’t go telling me to leave her because its best for her…all that would do was break her heart. I think you lot are doing a good enough job of that without me joining in.” He really couldn’t believe that no-one realised what they were doing to her, how much they were hurting her and reminding her of all the reasons she felt they could never be together. Her history told him, now that he knew about it, that she had perfectly valid reasons to be scared and to think they had no future together. But he wasn’t about to let anyone else, with no knowledge of the real facts, to butt in where they weren’t wanted or needed. “So no, I won’t leave her. But you…you can forget I exist because I don’t know you anymore.”