6 years later

"Sage- where the Hell are all the hot pockets?" Violet complains, pulling at the refrigerator. I lean back in the lounge chair and tilt my computer screen so I'm able to see what I'm typing.

Some things never change.

"Digesting in my stomach." Sage mumbles as she appears through the beach door.

She's wearing her new bikini, showing off her little tum. Sage remained around the same weight since we graduated and has not tried to change that. She still stuffed her face.

"We bought those two days ago!" Violet complains and Sage snorts and lays down in the sand.

We were all vacationing in the Bahamas as a celebration for my book release. I still updated on Wattpad from time to time but ever since I published. Things weren't the same. I was now a well known and famous author. I was as famous as all of my favorite erotic and teen-fiction authors but something was different. People reached out to me to talk to young teens. I was interviewed as if I were as famous as a Kardashian. I was known almost everywhere.

I was still adjusting.

"Tell Ary to buy some more." I suggest and I hear giggling and smile to myself. "She just came back with Eliza." Violet informs me.

I turn my back and see my daughter Eliza and Aryiana running after us, giggling.

Eliza's white dress was now had ice cream stains covered on the front and I noticed that she now had a flower headband in. No doubt, Aryiana bought it for her. She spoils Eliza.

"Did you two have fun at the carnival?" I ask and Aryiana picks her up by her arms, twirling her around and causing her to giggle.

"Mommy! We went on the big kid Ferris Wheel!" Eliza exclaims. Her brown hair was cut short- since she experimented with scissors a few weeks ago, Violet who became a nurse ever since she recovered from cancer, offered to give her a haircut and she did so.

"You did? You faced your fear of heights." I point out to her as she falls into my arms. I caress my 6 year-olds hair and cling onto her.

"I know. I was told not to be afraid, because I would always have a parachute to catch me." Eliza says and looks over at Aryiana who's grinning from ear to ear.

When Ian Valente was still alive and we had sex in his playroom- he didn't use a condom. I was informed that I was pregnant a few weeks after I was released from the hospital. They thought Eliza would't have made it through the pregnancy due to fact I was shot, but she made it.

Since Aryiana got her abortion, she's cared for Eliza as if she were her own. The two have been inseparable since she was born.

Eliza knows that her father is dead but I have reached out to Ian's family including his mother named Eliza. I wanted them included in her life, she deserved to know where she came from.

The media was curious to who she was the child of, but I never spoke of it. No one needed to know that story. That was sacred.

"Eliza, want to make bracelets?" Sage asks and Eliza jumps up. Sage works at a wellness center in California, where we all live. She talks to many teenagers who deal with eating disorders and have just been released from hospitals.

Aryiana worked alongside me, mostly at hotline networks where she'd talk got distressed people. But that was non-profit. She was paid for being the co-owner, but turned half of the money over to woman who have received abortions. Everyone worked around their past traumas and that helped us all become successful.

"Yes! I want to make one to match my princess dress!" Eliza says and then she pauses and turns to me. My beautiful beautiful daughter. "But I don't need to wait to be rescued. I already am." She says with a wide smile and skips off with Sage.

"She's so intelligent." Aryiana says in admiration and sits down next to me.

"That's because she's around all of us. She's being raised the way I'd always dreamed." I reply.

"She probably thinks we're all sister-wives because we basically live together." Aryiana teases as she pulls up her jeans. I playfully slap her arm and she giggles and lays back near me.

"How's your mom?" She then asks and I exhale. "Ever since she got out of jail last month, her and my dad have been trying to rebuild their relationship. So I guess she's doing alright." I answer truthfully.

"How are you?" Aryiana's question comes out soft as if she know's somethings been troubling me.

"Am I doing the right thing? With Eliza? With my books?" I ask and Aryiana nods, "You've changed so much just with writing books and you don't even realize it." She pauses as the wind blows, the smell of sea salt filling the air.

The ocean always did calm me.

"You're a voice for the silenced. You write about the things people wish to mute you on. You showed that the image of beauty actually comes from the heart and not the eyes. You're a role model to all and most importantly your daughter." Aryiana then adds and relief settles in.

"You always know the right thing to say." I condemn her and reaches out for my hand and grasps it.

"You're following your heart. You're thinking things through and you aren't acting on Impulse." 

"I'm just trying to be a better person." I admit, I felt so vulnerable and in ways I hated that but I could always be that way in front of the girls.

"You were never a bad person. Just a human trying to find her way." Aryiana assures.

"I think I found it." I admit and she stands to her feet and tilts her head to the side.

"Then finish it. How do you want to end the book Marley Winter? What's your last piece of advice for th young and lost?" Aryiana leaves me with that question as she retreats inside and I gaze back over at the screen. I was writing the last of the book. I couldn't bare to finish it. It took 6 years and I didn't lose any readers, I just gained. Now I finally knew....so I wrote:

She believed in Love. She knew it would come in many forms and as she expected it to come in the form of a man, she was sadly mistaken. She was given disappointment and even in that she found a lesson to be learned. She found the truth and the reality; she witnessed a change in herself. She was her own hero. She wasn't lost. She was not...ever. And even though she didn't end up with who she thought. She ended up with a new and improved version of herself. With friends, family and tranquility.

She wiped her own tears at night. She provided for herself. She calmed herself down in the midnight hour. She healed her own tears. She was no victim and in no need of saving. She didn't die when her lover died. She just realized what it was like to prosper and survive. She grew as a flower, adding her sunshine and even some rain. But even though it felt some of her would always wither, the next season she'd come back multiplied. The beauty of her petals and her imperfections living forever. 

Her tragedy became her testimony. Whether she'd end up alone or madly in love. She knew who she was."

I ended the chapter and pressed publish. I finished a book...that I thought I'd never finish which was in some aspect my life. But now it was time to leave it all behind and step into the future with who mattered. I was ready to grow and blossom.

As I went to put my computer down and go join the rest of my loved ones, I recieved an email. I had already gotten a comment!

'Author, what happens next for her? What does she do next?' The comment said and I smiled to myself, inhaling the fresh air and looking over to my right to see my new published book lying there. That was how I saved myself. I continued to do what I love but I helped others along the way. I wasn't impulsive anymore.

All I did was simply reply two words- the only words that help me survive and realized that I needed to. It never made sense at the time...but now....it spoke to me in a different way. And I hoped, it would reach to many more people....maybe we could all see a little growth and flower in us all.

All I say is,

She lived.

~*~*~*~*~*~*

This is it guys. The end of the book. I hope you all enjoyed it! This was such a joy to write for you all and I'm going to post what the book is about in another chapter and post it tomorrow. I hope you guys liked it.....this is my last book on Wattpad for awhile so it really hit home.

How's that for a #FlowerFinale

That's the end of the #ImpulseEra

Are you guys ready to know what it's about?

Stay tuned for a few more authors note!

Thank you for reading!

Love always and forever,

x flower