Bar Red's Redemption ✔

c h a p t e r. 27

"Grief is the price we pay for love."
—Queen Elizabeth II

chapter 27

Clementine stared at Bar's tattoos as she traced them with her finger, as if she couldn't see his reaction as she spoke.

Her voice was like a cold, autumn day. It was chilled, and it was full of loss; the memories in her eyes making her heart sink like acorns falling from an oak tree, her eyes as wet as the mud puddles leaves fell into, and her skin cool to the touch as if wind had just swept through her entirety and shook each thin branch-like thought.

Clementine seemed ready to snap in half.

In this moment, she was more dead than alive and Bar knew exactly what that felt like.

He could see emotions that often stared back at him from the mirror now in her eyes and it terrified him.

"When I-I was fifteen, it was a, a year after you left, and I was getting bullied a lot." The little goddess started to explain her scar. "So much that my, that my parents-- my uncaring, a-absentee, undeserving of, of the title parents-- came down to the school to sort some things out. They did, but it was a, a futile attempt. They j-just, they just bought out Mrs. Burns to keep it quiet, to m-make sure I wouldn't speak out about how my parents and her and everyone else let me get t-tor-tormented... tormented like that. I wish," Clementine laughed and it was bitter and sad and it made Bar's chest ache. "I wish I just stuck to myself. That I didn't t-tell anyone about the bullying. I should've known that's not the, not the worse thing I'd g-go through."

Bar watched Clementine's face as she spoke, wondering how many people she told what she's about to tell him. Wondering how much it still keeps her up at night.

"My parents," The little goddess swallowed thickly as if those words were like molasses in her mouth. "Thought it would be a, would be a good idea to go to a re-restaurant. It was such an i-innocent-- an innocent decision. There was no-nothing wrong with that. Nothing."

Clementine's fingers shook against Bar's skin, and her expression was... unforgettable. It was filled with so much shame, so much pain, and hate and grief.

It was like she was trying to convince herself of the truth but she didn't even know which way was up or down anymore.

Bar couldn't stand the tears in her eyes. His whole body became sore down to his bones, like it could feel her pain and was mimicking it.

No one warned him that he could grieve for someone like this. Someone still alive. Someone breaking apart in his arms. Someone that was his.

No one told him that there pain like this.

"What happened at the restaurant?" Bar asked, hands holding her safe as she tried to hold herself together.

Clementine gave a low gasp of air, tears now falling down her flushed cheeks, and Bar wiped them away, dreading what came next.

Because Bar knew, just like him, she'd be part tragedy, too.

He wasn't the only one who was broken but he wished, in that aspect, that he was still alone.

Bar wished he was the only one with scars in his skin; in his mind.

"I... I got k-kidnapped, he grabbed me w-when-- when I went to the bathroom a-alone." Clementine confessed. Bar remained silent, frozen. "That's the downfall of being rich. People want, people want money. Bad people. People w-willing to hurt a, a fifteen-year-old. People who hold grudges, and who enact them on t-the wrong ones."