NOT GIVING UP ON FOREVER

Chapter 49 (b)

The excluded additional chapter for those who paid attention to even the smallest details. Thank you so much for being such devoted fans of the novel. I hope you could match the pieces of the mosaic and understand so much more.

I took this chapter out and placed it at the end for a reason, so you could understand that there is never one truth to the story. Unless you have witnessed something with your own eyes, you cannot know things for sure and have to act according to the facts you are told.

No matter what, I believe that the truth always comes out.

I hope you would be thrilled to read a bit more in depth about some events from the story.

And from all my heart- thank you.

***

Teo's eyes burned with rage. He stormed out of the house, yelling to Ricardo to get in the car with him. The friend quickly put out the cigarette he had been puffing a few minutes calmly before and hurled questions at Teo, to which he received only an irritated snarl in response.

"I'll smear his pretty face on the door of his art-house!" Teo shouted as he started the engine.

"What is he doing? He said he was coming to pick her up at five-thirty! This is how brazen you have to be!"

"Hey, calm down!" Ri snapped at him." We'll sort it out now."

"Sort it out? Oh, no. You will keep me from going to jail for murder."

"Where's Anna?"

"Staying home."

"What did you do to her?"

Teo stopped the car abruptly and gazed at Ricardo.

"What did I do to her? What kind of question is this, Ri? Do you think I can hurt Anna? Can't you see that I love her?"

"I can see that! And I can see that she doesn't love you, and such stories are rare to end on a good note."

"I would never hurt her, no matter what." Teo slammed his fists on the steering wheel and started the car again. "She mocks me, but only because I let her. I can't help it."

Teo lowered his voice to a whisper.

"Because I love her. Even if she doesn't love me."

Ricardo sighed heavily. They spent the rest of the way to Randall's house in silence.

Teo parked on the next street and went straight to Randall's without waiting for Ricardo to finish his cigarette.

After a couple of knocks, the door opened, and Teo's fist landed on Randall's face.

"What in the world?" Randall roared, falling inside the house.

Teo fell on him with punches, and a fight ensued.

"I'm going to kill you right now, Randall!" Teo yelled, showering the guy with punches and getting punched in return.

"So I've been waiting for this moment!" Randall shouted. His eyes were bloodshot. He was hitting his opponent with full force, rolling with him all over the living room.

There was a clink of falling China, vases, and figurines breaking into small fragments. As the guys threw each other in different directions, pieces of furniture, paintings, photos on the walls, and all sorts of decorative elements have been shattering.

"I can't understand," Randall blurted out, taking a moment to catch his breath between two broken floor vases, "how do you not hate being with someone who dreams of me?"

"Come down from heaven to earth!" Teo barked at him. "Anna dreams not of you but of love, which she drew in her head and mistakenly assumed that you can make this dream come true. You can't do that. You don't know what love is."

With that, Teo bumped into Randall again and slapped him across the face.

"You're desperate!" Randall grinned. "I'm sorry for you. Came here to fight because you don't know what you have to do to get me out of Anna's heart."

"I came here to fight because you don't know what you can do to keep Anna from being a poor confused girl, a toy in your hands. It's so convenient always to have one who comes running to you when the other switches the brain on. And you can't lose a fan club. It's dangerous for your self-esteem. You have a lot of chicks like her, but the situation with Anna makes you so angry because Anna is with me now."

"That's right. With you. Let it be with anyone but you. You sing your snotty love songs and stuff girls with drugs."

"How dare you!" Teo leaped at Randall and knocked him to the floor, beating him in a rage.

There were no more opportunities for constructive, or indeed, any dialogue.

Ricardo, knowing that he should not be in a hurry but should only arrive at the end—either to spread the roosters apart, or help Teo with the corpse—calmly finished his other cigarette and went to Randall's house, only when there was an unusual noise from inside.

As soon as he entered the living room, he saw them fighting and hurried to separate them. By his second's objective assessment, Randall was losing consciousness, and Teo was trying to strangle him. Ricardo hoicked Teo back and spent the next couple of minutes making sure that his friend would not attack Randall with the desire to finish him off but rather aim for the exit.

It gave Randall time to catch his breath. Coughing and rubbing his neck, he muttered after them:

"She will never love you. Not because she loves me. But because all your weaknesses can be sensed a mile away. You make yourself seem strong, but you can't fool women. She feels everything, Teo. You're weak."

Teo made another attempt to break out of Ricardo's grip and strangle Randall, but the lad himself suddenly jumped on both guys and began handing out punches with an animal growl. Ricardo and Teo held Randall back the best they could because two against one would have been a low, dishonest fight. But Randall grew insane and threw punches and insults simultaneously, and Teo, with one movement, sharply blocked him and broke his striking arm.

Randall howled in pain and fell to the floor.

"You are pathetic!" he yelled to Teo and Ricardo as they were heading out.

In the living room, next to the door, Randall's phone was ringing on the floor. Teo picked it up and darted a glance at the screen.

It was "Liz pretty from the bar." Teo snorted and threw the phone against the wall.

"You are pathetic!" he shouted back to Randall and followed Ricardo out of the house.

***

The door slammed. Dropping the books, Anna ran down the stairs.

Teo and Ricardo spoke sharply in Italian.

"Teo!" Anna cried out. "What did you do, Teo??"

"Calm down. Your lover is safe and sound, Anna. He was not at home. He was nowhere to be found, actually."