Finding New Love

Back So Soon?

The drive had been quiet and relatively short. Mal had just say in the limo, and stared. Her eyes were dull, red, and lifeless. Her hair was matted with her tears. And when the door opened, she remained seated. "Come on, Mal. We're going to the apartment," Jay said, holding his hand out. 

Mal took his hand and stepped out. She would show how heartbroken she was inside. She would hide them away just like she always did. Her emotions would only be shown as anger or violence. Nothing had changed. She hadn't fallen in love with a sniveling prince, only to have her heart broken by him.  She hadn't gone to Auradon and actually started to act like she belonged there. 

Because she never would. She had no heart. She was rotten to the core. Just like she had always been. 

Except, she felt that she was rotten for another reason completely. It felt like her heart had rotten from the inside out. It was like, everything she had found- those damn emotions that Ben had gotten her to feel- they were gone. They were replaced by an empty feeling that she didn't like. She was to empty to even feel hate and anger like she should. 

"Are you okay?" Jay asked, a concerned expression shadowing over his features. He didn't like the way her eyes looked so dead. It wasn't her act, when she would make her eyes look dead for an effect of anger, they were dead. They were hollow. There was no spirit behind those green eyes of hers. 

"No, Jay," she responded, her voice soft. "Ben- He- I loved him, Jay," she said, trying to make words out of the emotions that she was feeling. "And he took that away from me. He turned me into this, pathetic thing," she said, gesturing to herself. Her hair was wet and matted from the tears that she had cried on the way to the island, and the tears that were flowing freely down her cheeks at that moment. "I don't know what to do anymore." 

Jay could only look at Mal with concern and pity. And he knew that she would kill him if she ever found out that he pitied the great Mal, but it wasn't like it was by choice. It just naturally came. It was because she was the great Mal, and she had been reduced to this state from her previous form. She had been strong. She had been powerful. She had been feared. And now....She was nothing of her former self. 

"Let's go to the apartment," Jay suggested. "We don't need any unnecessary eavesdroppers." Because he knew that there were people listening at that very moment. There were always people around the Island that didn't know how to keep to themselves. 

He took Mal's hand and led her to the apartment. He was concerned because she wasn't even really walking by herself. 

They arrived at the apartment, and Jay led Mal up the steps to her part of it. "Do you want me to stay?" he offered. 

Mal shook her head once and just stared at the walls in front of her. She hated the paint that she had put on them when she ran away from Auradon the first time. She hated that she had actually thought that someone like her could be loved by someone like Ben. She just waned to be alone. She didn't want any of her friends to see her... Broken. 

"I'll come back," Jay promised Mal. "And if you ever need help, I'll be here."

It would have warmed her heart to hear those words from her friends that were basically family to her. "I'll be fine," she said softly as Jay left the apartment. He closed the door gently, which made Mal shake her head with disgust. She lied to her family. She wouldn't even be around when he came back. She had an old score she had to settle, and this time, she was hoping it would get her killed. 

She went to the window, making sure that Jay had left before walking towards the door. She looked back at her apartment one last time before leaving.

It was a quick walk into town, where Mal knew she would find the pirate she was looking for. Where he usually was with the others. 

She opened the doors, immediately searching for the man in question. The man that had sworn to kill her if she ever set foot on his turf again. "Mal!" a booming voice announced. "Back so soon?" 

A man named Harry Hook gave her a sadistic grin that had death and trouble written all over it.