When the Rain Stopped Falling (Published under Pop Fiction)

25: Stolen from Fate

Different colored neon lights flashed before my eyes as I hurried past the people in the busy street to the POW bookstore. It's almost time. Nikolas could be waiting for me at this very moment so I had to move fast. I have to try one more time.

I pushed against the sea of people until I reached the alley that leads to the door of the POW bookstore.

"Good evening miss!" the same store personnel from the other night greeted me when I had finally entered the store. She stared at me rather different this time and I almost knew what it meant.

"Good evening, is he..." I peeked around the corner and I saw a person sitting at our usual table. I immediately walked towards the table and checked if he's the person I'm looking for.

"Nikolas?"

The guy turned his head and that old sharp look he gave made me shiver.

"Elois," Nikolas recognized me. He stood up from his seat and I literally ran to him and gave him a hug. I'm almost into tears. No, I'm already in tears.

"I missed you," I said to him. "I missed you, I missed you!" I repeated over and over just in case he didn't hear. I feel so much emotion, I think I'm going to explode.

"You missed me?"

"Where have you been?" I asked still not letting him go.

"Nostalgia had some issues. I had to fix my time machine for some time,"

"Some issues?"

"Yeah. And for some reason, Nostalgia had impaired my past memory I couldn't go back way before this time period."

"That means..."

"That means I had forgotten the exact details of how we have met," his eyes were gleaming with sadness but there is something else too.

"Hey," I took his hand, his palm against mine, our fingers intertwined together. "We could always create new memories together, right? And I would always tell you the story of how we have met."

"Yeah, I guess so. Thank you." I could feel that there is something different. Nikolas is somewhat preoccupied. There must be something bothering Nikolas right now.

"I thought you were gone. I thought I changed the future and you were gone."

"Well, I'm still here, right?"

I released my hand from his grip and frowned involuntarily. "Is there something wrong?"

Nikolas didn't answer my question right away. Instead, he pulled the chair by my side to let me sit. He then sat right across from me. "We should order first," I wanted to catch his gaze. To see some truth he's hiding from me.

"'We'd always talk about the present, Nikolas."

"That's not true, we also talk about the future," his voice noticeably spiked. I gaze out the window and realized that it was drizzling outside. The city lights from outside were blurred by the dripping tears of the sky and painted the clear window pane of the coffee shop with swirling colors. "We talked about virtual reality, remember? And-and about how it was possible to have holoteloportation,"

"Yes but not our future," Nikolas was obviously hiding something. Usually, he's calm and collected as if every word that he says was prepared, written, and was practiced before. And honestly, that is what bothers me the most to his character. But he seems not that kind of person anymore. "Tell me. Our future is tragic, isn't it?" In a split of a second, there! I caught Nikolas's eyes widened out of surprise. I caught him off guard.

"Elois, we should take this slowly. We don't want any sudden difference on this timeline, don't we?"

"You're so selfish!" Such words spilled from my lips. "Why can't you tell me the future that you're going to change. How could I trust you for that? If you're changing the future, you're doing the most selfish thing in this Universe. And you wouldn't even justify your case. Why, why would you want to change the future? Because right now, I think I'm satisfied." I was thinking of him in my future when I said I was satisfied. I got so scared of losing him that I wanted to make sure that he'll still be in my future.

"Satisfied? Selfish?" Nikolas mumbled. "You're satisfied with this kind of life where you are suffering inside of your head with your depression that is eating you up? I think you know too well why people become selfish. It is because they were hurt. They were robbed by fate. People become selfish because they wanted to protect what is left of their life for the fear that someday they would lose it all,"

I snapped. "Nikolas, please! Stop talking in riddles. Let me know everything I needed to know. And only at that point I could understand you,"

"Alright," Nikolas said after gulping down the coffee he ordered. "You, Elois is my wife in the future. We were married when we were 27. We became a professor at a University here in Manila. But most of the time, I was out of the country to collaborate a scientific project with other scientists from different nations.

We had worked so hard for our future until we finally bought our own house and lot in a subdivision in Cavite. It was nice. You said that it was your dream house. A bright yellow vintage house where the fence is built from bricks and you have a beautiful garden full of flowers of a different sort that you always have tended. You and that memory is lovely." My heartbeat pitter-pattered. Yes. It is my kind of dream house. Nikolas saying that it would happen in the future made me feel excited and happy.

"In some days in summer," Nikolas continued "when we're not busy, we usually stay in your garden. I usually slack by the hammock we made together and you by the table, drinking coffee. I remember you catching me looking at you. You always give me your warmest smile that always had my heart melt. The walls of that house made those kinds of memories etched not only on my mind but also in my heart."

Rain continued to pour and constant rumbles of thunder from the heavens could already be heard. "And then what happened?" I asked almost in disbelief of the future that he experienced. Future that I will soon to know as well.

"Just like I said, I was usually out of the country, out of your sight, and what was left for us to do is build a family. I thought you wouldn't be so lonely if we have a child. But...Elois, we had tried so much,"

I felt a pang of pain on my chest. What does he mean?

"We wished for a child. We tried plenty of times until you had finally become pregnant. We are the happiest at those times until we learned that you have an incompetent cervix."

"Incompetent...cervix?"

"It means that your cervix couldn't support our child," Nikolas's eye began to tear up. "So we lost our first," I was startled. This is our future? "Of course, there are surgeries to help you bear a child but the lost of our first left us heartbroken and traumatized. Especially you honey. I'm really sorry if you felt that you are all to blame." Nikolas took my hand and he held it up to his lips. Tears now streaming down his face and it reached my hand. It was warm.

"I'm sorry too, you, I mean we, don't deserve that kind of fate," I managed to muster some words but this is too much of an information. Knowing that someday, I would lose a child made my heart sink. Another flaw. Another kind of my abnormality. Nikolas continued to bawl. His face was extremely sad that I began to cry too. "I'm sure the future me would want you to be strong for her," I comforted him.

He shook his head. Then he shut his eyes, stopping the rain like tears from falling. Then he kissed my hand once again. "You're right. Everything you said was right. We don't deserve any of that. So Elois, honey, why? Why did you kill yourself after? Elois, you chose suicide and killed yourself. That's why I'm here." 

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A/N: Hey guys! Only a few chapters more till the end of When the Rain Stopped Fallling. Please bear with me. I have given it all to the next chapters. Expect the best! On a side note, if you crave for more of my work, you can follow and read my story How to End the World in 100 days (more or less). Maybe you'll like it too!  Just go to my profile and start reading. Cheers!