Chapter 18:

Katelyn Bishop

With the loss of Flint, Katelyn's heart crashed to the ground floor of her stomach. Pitting inside her bones, she felt helpless and broken. Katelyn quickly closed the space between her and Lewis. Her ruby nails landed softly on his cotton collar. Her blue eyes chased up to his brown eyes.

Katelyn lifted her head up towards him to kiss him, but then she felt a hand on her chest.

Looking down, she saw Lewis's hands shakily trying to push her away from him.

Confusion lit in her sapphire eyes. Looking back up at Lewis, his lips began to stutter a feeble explanation.

Lewis's brown eyes screamed a merciful final blow to her shattering to her heart.

“Look, Kate, I think that I was still a little raw and vulnerable after this morning. I think we both know that we don’t mean anything to each other. You just pitied me…and…and that  just happened.”

His lips drew a fearful frown. Lewis tucked her a strand of her black hair behind her ear, trying to let her down easy.

He paused trying to make her not feel bad. But damn didn't that make her feel worse.

He continued. “We're no good together." He began to count on his fingers all the reasons they weren't good together. “We fight. You know. A lot. You like basketball and I like football. You eat spicy foods for lunch and I can't stand that stuff. We work together. You like books.” 

Oh God, this could not get more embarrassing.

Continuing his barrage of let-downs, he began to hollow her out like he was the ice-cream scoop and she was the unlucky pint he'd chosen.

“Furthermore…” What is this an essay of reasons they shouldn't be together? “ We're just too different. I just don't think we'd work out.”

Alright put a hold on the dowry and marriage, this man was crazy.

They just had one kiss…okay…maybe more than one, but she wasn't going to settle down with him.

Still, it hurt.

A stabbing pain lodged in her chest as Lewis offered consolation by splaying his hands over her arms.

Katelyn's brows furrowed angrily at this attempt to sate her.

Concern steeped in his tapered brows and murky, brown eyes.

Katelyn just couldn't fathom it all. In one short half hour she'd lost the Flint; the only man she ever really cared about, and, then Lewis.

God. This was terrible. Agony bubbled in her chest as a tear involuntarily slid down her cheek. Katelyn ran out of that copy room.

Her head chased her down the rabbit hole. She tried to avoid the eyes of her coworkers.

It was all so anticlimactic.

All this time she had been trying to get people to notice her, but now she wished she still had her anonymity to fall back on.

Tears blurred her eyes as her cheeks flamed a tomato soup redness.

Katelyn headed to the bathroom to try to escape the looks of her coworkers. All their faces quipped at her. Silently she could hear their thoughts. “Why is she crying? Is that the girl who gave it to Carter? Seems she can't take it back, I hear." Her mind painted a sea of mockery and laughter around her.

Katelyn's heels tapped faster along the patterned tile. Her ruby red nails and messed up lip stick raged as silent battle wounds in the war of life.

Now, her only camouflage against the world was gone. She was stripped of her snarky comments and left with her bare, ugly self.

The tears almost became too much for her.

She had sworn not to become one of those emotional people…but it all just hit her when Lewis rejected her.

Flint was really a killer…and she was in love with him…but she couldn't have him.

And she shouldn't want him…

But damn, when Life gives you lemons, you ask the chicken to cross the road and get some sugar to make some lemonade.

But when the chicken's on his way there he gets hit by car.

Then you're just stuck with Life's stupid lemons.

Gahhh. That made no sense at all…but she was so scatterbrained by this point that her head felt like utter mush.

Still, all the eyes in the office poured to hers. Katelyn grunted as she felt their stares and looks. In return , she loudly opened the swinging bathroom door and maybe she threw up a middle fingered salute behind her. Who says how you're really supposed to say goodbye to coworkers?

Katelyn quickly closed the door and then looked into the mirror.

Of course she'd stopped crying, but tears had dried on her cheeks and her makeup was looking like a Pennywise horror movie.

Her cheeks still bore red indentations foretelling anyone who looked at her that she'd been crying.

Looking at her own deep and devastated ocean eyes, she yelled at herself. “You weren't supposed to fall for the man who killed your mother! You weren't supposed to but you did! You're such a bumbling idiot, Kate!”

Suddenly, a laughing voice sounded from the furthest stall. Katelyn tilted her head back. Great! That's all she needed. An audience to all her misfortune. Listening closer however, she heard that laughter disappear and the voice began sniffling.

Katelyn became quiet for a second to better hear the voice, however, the voice seemed to be waiting for her exit.

Cleverly, Katelyn opened the door and closed it making the voice think that she'd gone.

Once she did that, the voice sounded again pawing to get more toilet paper from the roll. Then the voice blew, assumingly, her nose.

Slowly, Katelyn creeped along the bathroom tiles to the last stall. Looking down at the lock, Katelyn realized it hadn't been locked properly.

She leaned on it barely and the door swung open with little to no coaxing at all.

There, in her sights laid a woman around her age with brilliantly fiery red hair burning brightly in this dim lit bathroom. Her eyes sparkled a blue diamond-like quality. Tears laid curved at her cheeks and her eyes collected in a wide and fearful stare once the woman caught hers.

Katelyn didn't know what to say to her, but she was obviously upset.

Katelyn cautiously stepped towards her as the woman's eyes were locked on hers.

Katelyn spoke softly. This woman looked like a deer in the headlights. “Hey, I'm Kate. I heard you earlier and I just wanted to check if you were okay.”

The woman still looked at her with fear. She almost looked like she didn't hear what Katelyn had said.

Katelyn was just about to repeat her statement when she stuttered out, “Dr…Drake…Drake...uh...Rr...Riley. Drake Riley. Th…that's…my…name.”

Katelyn raised an eyebrow at her. Highly unusual name, but that wasn't Katelyn's main concern.

Her main concern was why she was crying here.

Katelyn's brows narrowed at Drake but then she quickly softened when she recognized the look in her eye.

She was hurt.

Carefully Katelyn approached her. “What's wrong?”

Drake looked up at her fearfully yet again.

For a moment her features were unsure of Katelyn but after a second her shoulders sighed.

She sniffled out slowly and hoarsely one phrase. “I'm pregnant with Carter's kid.”

Katelyn's eyes went wide. “Wait…how?…why?…you…and…him?”

Drake wiped off tears from her swollen face and continued.

“He told me if I did what he said, that he would give me a raise and I wouldn't be his secretary anymore. I needed the money from my raise to clear the debts that my parents left me. But when I told him about my pregnancy…"

She paused momentarily and then hoarsely spoke again.

“He fired me. Then, to make matters worse, my landlord kicked me out because I missed the last payment."

She continued to sniffle and it broke Katelyn's heart to see her like this.

Katelyn dug a paper and pen out of her purse. “Here, if you need someone to talk to and a place to stay, I have a mattress you could take. I could sleep on the couch until you find somewhere else stay, but I want you to stay with me.”

Drake's features were unsure. Katelyn still forced her number and address into Drake's shaky hands.

Drake looked up at Katelyn probably wondering if she was really serious.

For a moment it looked like Drake was really considering it, but then she vehemently shook her head no.

“Thank you, but I can't. I wouldn't feel right about it. I'd be a burden on you and ever since my mama and my papa passed, I swear I'd be a burden on no one else.”

Her voice shook with that single admisson and it broke Katelyn's heart even more.

Katelyn looked at her forcing the issue, “Please just take it. You wouldn't be a burden to me…just think about it okay…I want to make sure you and your baby are safe.”

Drake nodded and Katelyn took that as her cue to leave.

Picking up her purse, Katelyn headed to the door. 

She swung it open and decided that it was time for another sick day.

*cough* *cough*.

*******
The subway home was a dark trip without Flint but she finally made it home and her body hit the couch like a sinking boulder. Her heart was so torn at the moment. She wanted to forget about Flint but there he was everywhere in her head. The thought of him lurked in the darkest part of her. She absolutely hated that she loved him.

Part of her begged for his death and the revenge for her mother's death, but the other part of said that she couldn't hurt him.

Suddenly, a knock chattered at the door.

Katelyn was pulled out of her deep digging thoughts as she heaved her lead body off of the couch.

Yawning, she twisted the knob and peered out.

As she did so, her eyes caught on the swirling sea foam eyes that, to her, had turned into more of a seaweed growing unbearably around her.

Katelyn's brows furrowed.

“Flint?” She asked, trying to hold in her anger. Looking at him now just cemented the truth in her head. Every time she saw him sje would picture those sea foam eye looking down at her mother as he mercilessly killed her.

Flint stuttered out, “I…I don’t care that you kissed that guy. Look, I just need you not to hate me. For your sake and mine. Please, you can forget me… I just can't live with you hating me.”

Katelyn slammed the door in his face screaming at him, “I do hate you! Don't try to convince me that I don't! You killed my mother! I will never forgive you! All you Morgans deserve to rot in a hole!”

Flint softly replied. “Please, your hate will destroy us both. Don't you realize this. Besides…I'm in love with you. Don't you love me as well…I thought we had something. Look, I know you wont believe this, but this is all Phoenix, can't you see! We can't just give it all up because of a misunderstanding.”

Misunderstanding?!?! YOU Killed her. Its not that hard to understand that! And really! Blaming Phoenix! Such a scapegoat. You Morgans can't admit to anything you've done! You just walk through people! All the freaking time! And you think this admission of love cancels out your crimes! Newsflash, we all don't fall at your feet Morgans! Especially not me!

Katelyn threw a vase from her counter at the door.

A shattering sound followed and she screamed at him.

“We're not in love, Flint. We're at war! I will find a way to kill you and your brother, if it's the last thing I do!”

And by that she meant that she deeply cared about him.

She cared about him deep enough for every word he said to scar her even further.

And with every word he spoke, it threw additonal salt to hear already well-seasoned wounds.

She just didn't know how to hate him without loving him at the same time.

Katelyn waited at the door for response to what she said to him. Shattered silence followed her for a moment until she heard him mutter something as his footsteps receded. Listening closely, she heard the mutter loud and it rung in her head like a church bell.

“It may very well be the last thing you do."

Anger seethed through her like a lightning bolt.

Slowly, Katelyn retreated back to her comfortable couch.

More tears muddled at the bay of her cheeks.

They were at war.

She hated him more than words express…but she also had this feeling boiling in her chest.

She still did love him and that admittance to herself made her angry.

Katelyn felt like she was betraying herself and her dead mother.

Those sparks in her chest unsettled her and tied knots around her already twisted heart.

She bit back more tears as her heart churned another bitter and minor symphony.

Katelyn's cheek were flamed in a thorny rose color. Her eyes fixated on her popcorn patterned ceiling.

She just needed the world to stop spinning like this.

Both Phoenix and her morals told her not to love this man…

But something inside of her disagreed…

And that scared the hell out of her.

Another knock tapered at the door, pushing her out of her thoughts, yet again.

Katelyn yelled at the door, “Flint, I thought I told you that we're at war!”

The voice at the door responded, “I think you have the wrong person.”

Katelyn swung the door open looking at the figure with furrowed brows, “Drake Riley?”

Drake nodded and then looked up at Katelyn, “I thought about your offer and would like to accept…but I don't know... wouldn't you feel weird about a stranger being in your house?”

Katelyn shook her head no. “You're not a stranger.”

Drake looked at her with a cocked eyebrow, “Are you sure about that? We hardly know each other outside of work.”

Katelyn's eyebrow shot up in confusion, they had worked on a couple projects together but Drake always seemed so sweet and nice. She never said anything to offend anyone. She was eternally a spot of sunshine in that bleak office. Katelyn was happy to offer her a place to stay... but there seemed to be something about her now... Katelyn just couldn't put her finger on it.

Then Drake stepped forward shining a glimmering knife in her hands.

Fear glinted on Katelyn's drowning ocean eyes and Drake quickly plunged the knife into Katelyn's side.

A crimson tide recoiled on her skin as pain bled through her unevenly.

Drake got closer to Katelyn and pushed the knife in even further.

Blood gushed out of her like tsunami of scarlet pain.

Confusion dripped out of her as Drake whispered in her ear. “ I'm actually more familiar to you than you'd think.”

Drake paused to look into Katelyn's eyes with a shattered second of a bitter apology.

Then Drake continued to rip the knife jaggedly through her body.

Soon the blood had gotten to Katelyn.

The world around her began to darken as she heard the last few droplets of Drake's words.

“And by the way…my last name isn't Riley. Its Baxter, b#tch!”

" If you stand for nothing, you will fall for anything" - Alex Hamilton

Thank you for reading! So... Katelyn's denying her feelings about Flint because of his supposed crimes. How will that play out? She still doesn't believe him and she's only growing stronger in her hate. Also...Lewis rejected her...how do you feel about that? Did she deserve that? And... Carter got Drake Riley (Baxter) pregnant apparently. Plus she's probably the sister of Annie. So... do Phoenix and Annie know about Drake stabbing her? Is this all part of the plan...or is Drake making up her own plans? Find out in chapter 19 of Blank Slate.

Love you guys and thank you for all the support ❤❤❤❤