Heart of Fire

🔥Fifty-Two🔥

Song: Somebody I Used to Know- Gotye

After the news that Theo and I would be spending a whole 24 hours together-- not to mention, spending the night in the same hotel room-- things weren't exactly what I would call peachy. In fact, every time I saw Theo, he would shoot me a deadly glare, as if saying he planned on killing me in my sleep, but me being me, I still took it like a champ. Every time he would say something rude or try to get under my skin, I would always come back with my usual sassy comments, no matter how hurt I was from what he said. Ever since he brought me to that damn house, I swore to myself I would never let him see me weak. If he knew my weaknesses, he could easily kill me. He could easily ruin me. Once someone found out your weakness, they had the ultimate power over you. It was kind of like having your own personal Pinocchio.

Besides my everyday Theo problems (trust me, that is A LOT of problems), I had been trying to salvage the things Theo and Harmony burned. My mattress was charcoal black, and it was about as thin as a piece of paper. I barely recognized it until I noticed my headboard (which was also ashes), still had its gold sparkles on it. Do not even question the sparkles, because that would be another long story to explain.

All of my clothes were tiny ashes. I wasn't able to decipher what was my clothes, but it was easy to tell they were ashes, while my shoes were rough to the touch. The only thing I had left was Theo's t-shirt and sweatpants I had on. A part of me wanted to burn his t-shirt, as if it would substitute for a voodoo doll, and when I did something terrible to it, something bad would happen to Theo. But the other part of me, the soft, insecure, sensitive part of me, wanted to keep it on me forever, because that part of me could imagine that old shirt of Theo's as the man himself with his warm, muscular arms wrapped around me, telling me everything would be okay. A girl can dream, right?

Perhaps the part that hurt me the most was the smithereens of the last photo I had of me, mom, dad, and Jessie. That picture was one I held extremely close to my heart. Jessie was still alive, young, and healthy, dad hadn't aged one bit, and mom-- oh, mom-- she was just as beautiful as an angel. It was the last family picture we took together, and every time I looked at it, I felt a sense of peace wash over me, as if my two angels and dad were always with me-- even if we were thousands of miles apart. When I found a piece of the gold frame I kept the picture in, along with a corner of the picture in the pile of rubbish, I broke down crying. It felt as if I had lost a piece of all three of them. The picture meant the world to me, and Theo and Harmony destroyed it. I loathed them for it. I loathed Harmony for the way she changed Theo, and I loathed Theo for letting her make him into the monster he was.

"We are having a pack meeting." Hazel broke me out of my thoughts, and I let out a sigh as I leaned my head against the cool fence that closed in my balcony. Hazel sat down beside me, watching the slow sunset before she asked, "What's on your mind, Mel?"

For a minute, all I did was watch the sunset. I didn't want to speak, but I also wanted to vent about everything I felt inside. I knew it wasn't good to keep everything you felt bottled up, but I felt so alone in the world then, even when I was in a house with a dozen people. That was the part that sucked most-- feeling so alone in a place where there was so many people. Being alone was okay, but feeling lonely did bad things to your mind. It wrecked you until you were nothing but a million broken pieces inside, and that was not okay.

"Theo burned the last family picture I had before Jessie and mom died." I murmured, my voice cracking at the end, and a single, hot tear trickled down my cheek. I quickly wiped it away with my hand, returning my gaze to the horizon.

"I'm sorry, Mel. I wish I understood what was going on with him, but this time, it's different." She sighed, glancing at me. "Theo has become someone that none of us know. We have never seen him as bad as he is now."