Fire

14. Ashes

THURSDAY
(Lana's point of view)

It has been a month since I've been out of his fucking house.
A month... since I last saw Lily.

Salvador has been keeping me inside the house ever since the ball, and I think I am beggining to loose my mind. The only thing that is keeping me sane, is my writing, and the memory of her.

I opened my eyes today in the mundanity of another day locked up in my own house. I go to the bathroom to take a bath and I look at my face in the mirror. Who is that girl? I don't know her anymore. Only ashes remain of me.

I feel lonely. I feel paranoid. Salvador watches me like some kind of bird in a cage. I feel his stare and shadow behind me at all times. He hits me sometimes, and makes me have sex with him. I can't keep going like this. I need to break free.

And I'm always wondering... What will Lily be doing right this instant? Is she thinking as much of me as I think of her? Does she hate me because I haven't even tried contacting her even after the four letters she wrote to me? When she came by my window, I couldn't speak to her.

I am nothing but a coward. And the guilt is consuming me.

Salvador entered to my room and I simply kept on doing my make up without aknowledging him.

"Lana." he said.

"What." I answered with no emotion.

"I guess you could go out to town and take a walk if you'd like. Before you have to come back and help Martha with dinner." He told me coldly.

I could go out of the house. Finally.
But I couldn't treat my luck, I needed to remain obedient to my husband's eyes.

"Okay. I will." I responded coldly. I got up from my chair and grabbed my bag before heading out.

"I want you back before six." He said before I made my way through the door.

As soon as they opened the metal gate for me, I breathed in all the scent from the town. The old marble and stone road. I made my way downtown. I passed by the market, and I could feel the stare and whispers of some of the housewives that were shopping for groceries, but I tried not paying attention to them and bought some beautiful sunflowers for my bedside. I just needed something to cheer me up in the morning.

Then, as I was paying I noticed a silhoutte.
Long brown hair and big eyes, walking on the same market street, approaching to my side.

I looked to my right and my heart stopped. I couldn't help but feel a thousand things at a time when her brown eyes conected with mine from afar.

Lily stopped walking and looked at me for probably five seconds. We were just a few meters apart, and I froze.

(Lily's Point of view)

I had just gone out to the market to pick some
things for my mom, I would have never expected to bump into Lana here.

I hadn't seen her in one month. I hadn't recieved any responses after I sent her a letter every week. And now she was just standing, meters away from me. We looked at each other almost in shock for a couple of seconds. I didn't know if it was okay to just walk up to her. How could I if we hadn't spoken ever since the ball?

Give me a sign, just give me one look.

She turned on me and kept on walking the other way. And with that action she had let me know all my hopes of us were nothing but ashes after a fire.

"Miss Alarconte, your change!" The woman of the flower shop yelled, but she didn't look back.

My eyes started watering, I felt like the air in my lungs had suddenly dissapeared. I turned around and swallowed hard before I made my way back home in a quick pace, helplessy teying to contain my tears. As soon as I got into my house, I stopped the resistance and I started sobbing, letting out everything I couldn't before as I droppef myself on my bed.

Lana hadn't broke my heart, she took it from me and left me empty chested. I literally felt a black hole that was making me breathless.

(Lana's Point of view)

I kept on walking as fast as I could. I entered and alleyway and held on to the wall before the tears started cascading through my cheeks.

How after one month of not seeing her, did one simple look of hers brought me to pieces?
Lily... How I wanted to run to your arms and kiss you, tell you how much I've missed you in my prison of solitude. How much I love you. But I couldn't. I felt like the entire town had it's eyes on me.

I couldn't do anything and that was killing me inside. The fear left me paralyzed once more.
But just now, after looking at her and being defenseless did I understood.

I needed to do something. I couldn't live in that house anymore, I couldn't keep on being a prisoner in my own marriage. I couldn't keep on ignoring Lily out of fear that Salvador might caught us once more.

I needed to come up with a plan to escape.

I headed home before six, like Salvador told me to. I helped Martha with dinner, acted like the perfect wife for another five hours until he fell asleep. I wrote a letter afterwards. A letter I had been afraid to write since I got my imprisionment.

"...I became fire for you, Lily, but now there are only ashes remaining. The remainders of me. I became everything at once, but without you, I feel like I'm slowly disappearing. because I lost myself when I lost you..."

I'll deliver this letter to her the next time Salvador lets me out of the house. For now I need to keep my act up, so he and the rest of pueblo blanco think I am back to being the perfectly, well behaved, Miss Alarconte.

There's six more chapters remaining on this story, after FIRE I'll take a little break of writing before I finish Old Money. Keep on Voting and have a beautiful Day

xx