*This chapter contains sensitive material*

Edited 17/12/15

He felt as if he was consumed by fire yet he had consumed the fire itself.

There was not a cell in his body that did not cry out in pain as it was ignited by the poison entering his system. He paid it no mind.

It was his love for her that compelled him to carry on. And it was that love that compelled him to hurt himself, that caused him to hate her.

He didn't know when it was that he had fallen to the ground. He would never recall the seizures that overtook his body nor taste the bile and froth that left his mouth as his body rejected what it was forced to intake. He would never even know the exact second that his heart had stopped nor would he know how long it took for it to start beating again.

All he knew was that his father had killed him.

And he was never sorry about it.

"Miss Phillips, Please recite the poem on page 63 out loud."

Where had I heard this wind before

Change like this to a deeper roar?

What would it take my standing there for,

Holding upon a restive door,

Looking downhill to a frothy shore?

Summer was past and the day was past.

Sombre clouds in the west were massed.

Out on the porch's sagging floor,

Leaves got up in a coil and hissed,

Blindly struck at my knee and missed.

Something sinister in the tone

Told me my secret must be known...

He hated the ocean.

His father had taken him for his first and last holiday a few months before Farhana was born and he would never forget it for as long as he would live. The memories of that week would play as a film reel in his mind that was never ending; that was infinite. It would haunt him in the form of those dreams that overtook his nights and those dreams that invaded his days.

His father was very fair and was often mistaken as a white man. It was the only reason they allowed them to stay at one of the more upper-classed hotels overlooking the most pristine waters there was to offer. His mother had dyed her hair back to her normal blond and was donned in the most beautiful blue swimsuit. She looked like a mermaid as she laid back to watch the water curl in towards the shore to gently play with all the little toddlers' feet as their mothers held them protectively to their sides.

There was laughter and delightful screams yet he was confounded and awed at the sight before him.

He had never seen something as vast and as endless as the blue waters in front of him. The ocean had dwarfed even Zaheer. He looked small in front of the gentle body before him and that was a feat Riaz never thought would occur. His feet burnt as he plodded through the sand, trying to navigate his way over the little dunes that never seemed to disappear. He hated the way the sand brushed up against his legs as the wind started to hum around him. It stung him as if they were thousands of tiny mosquitoes attacking him all at once.

He remembered lying down next to his mother as his father went into the water. The sun was hot and heavy on his stomach and he knew it would be a shiny red by the time he would reach home. But he didn't mind. His mother looked peaceful, more peaceful than she had ever been. She was humming a gentle tune and he sidled up closer to her in order to hear it. It was beautiful. He had never heard his mother singing before and he didn't understand why she had never done it more often. It calmed him and it made his heart feel as if it were as light as a feather and with one gust of wind, it might go soaring up to the heavens.

"Let's go inside." She stood up quickly, wiping off the excess sand from her legs.

"I'm scared Mama."

"Don't be scared. I'll hold your hand the entire time." She offered him her large, warm hand.

"Promise?" He looked at her hand indecisively.

"I promise." She smiled down at him. She looked like an angel when she smiled and it was that smile than convinced him.

She held his small hand in hers as she hauled him up and hugged him close to her side. "Come on, we need to run." She laughed at him as he danced from foot to foot, trying to ward off the hot sand from scorching his feet.

She held his hand firmly in hers as she ran straight for the water, crying out in delight as her feet hit the cool foam of the waves.

Riaz gasped. He had never felt anything like it before. The water swirled at his feet, coaxing him to play with it. It was heavenly. He didn't even mind the little pebbles that scraped against his shins as they went deeper in to the water. The mix between the hot sun above him and the cold water below him had him feeling as he had never felt before.

"It's not so scary, is it?" His mother knelt down, speaking in his ear in order to be heard above the loud crashes of the waves as it hit the sand below.

He shook his head as he smiled up at her. She was free and she was happy and that made him happy. If he would fall in love with the ocean, it would be only because it had caused his mother to smile and he loved it when she smiled at him.

"Let's go in a little further." She tugged him forward, allowing him to feel the strong hold of the water as if it had embraced him, not wanting to let him go. He looked down, awed at the water as it rushed past his knees in two long rivers that curved past his legs.

This huge, vast, magnificent being was making way for him. He had never felt more significant in all his life than in that moment when the waters parted for him. He wasn't scared- not anymore. Not when he could feel the little droplets of water as they skipped from his mother's hand to his. How could he be scared when she held him so closely?

He was distracted by the synchronised dance of the water droplets- too distracted to hear his mother shout for him to watch out as a huge wave raced towards them. It was a giant running, leaping, hurtling angrily towards them and he never noticed until he felt his mother's hand slip from his as he was dragged under the water. The salt burned him as it went up his nose and seemed to rush towards his lungs. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't hear, he couldn't think. All he could see was a blurry image before him as he held his hands up in front of him trying to grab onto something.

The water that had gave way for him mere seconds ago had sought revenge upon him as his body was hurled and tossed over countless of hard bodies. He could feel himself twisting and turning with the relentless wave as it grabbed him in a hold too strong for him to escape.

The water let him go... he didn't know it until he felt the hot sun beating upon his back as he felt the little swirls of water beneath him. He was on the shore again, trying hard to breathe around the ache in his nose.

None of it mattered though...

His mother let go off him after she promised that she would never leave him.

She let go of him and had never found him again.

... Word I was in the house alone

Somehow must have gotten abroad,

Word I was in my life alone,

Word I had no one left but God.

...

"Mum," Tasneem stood before her mother, her knees trembling with nerves.

"Hmm." Her eyes stayed glued to her papers as she listened half-heartedly.

"Could I please have a lock for my door?"

"Excuse me." Her eyes seemed to pierce right through to her heart, causing it to stutter erratically.

"Could I please have a lock for my door?" Her voice a mere tremor as her brother walked into the room.

"Why do you want a lock for your door?"

She eyed him nervously, fear causing her breath to rasp out in shallow gasps. Her throat seemed to constrict as he stared at her, unflinching and unwavering.

"Why do you want a lock on your door?" Her mother asked again.

"I..." Her lungs burnt from lack of air as she eyed him again, noting the way his face darkened with anger. Her eyes burnt as dry tears began to knock at it.

She was terrified.

She was so terrified yet she couldn't say a word before him.

"No, you can't. You know my rules."

Tasneem turned around. Her legs seemed heavier with each step she took. She could feel his eyes on her back and knew in that second- knew it with every fibre of her being- that something bad was going to happen.

She walked slowly, trying to appear steady and calm yet her cheeks had become drenched in her tears. They had become sticky and hot as more and more of her fear seemed to escape her body. Yet it would never escape.

Her fear was eternal and limitless and it would never stop no matter how many tears it sailed on.

The eyes are not here

There are no eyes here

In this valley of dying stars

In this hollow valley

This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms.

He had come.

He was there at the foot of her bed.

She did not hide her tears. He would see them, he would feel them. So it would be no use to hide them.

She could hear every step thud against the thick carpet as he walked slowly towards her.

Tonight was the night that he would release her from the cage, if only for a brief torturous moment. She knew this. She knew he would.

She was scared. She was terrified. Her heart ached at what was to come. He stomach turned, making her feel nauseous as she felt his hand on her thigh.

"Don't please..." She whispered into the darkness yet it echoed throughout her whole body.

"You know she won't believe you. Why do you keep trying?" He spoke softly near her ear as he knelt down next to her.

She shook her head, unable to talk as his hands moved upwards slowly... allowing her to feel every juncture of his palm. His fingers trailed beneath her t-shirt, delighting in the warm skin that he felt.

"Please, I'm begging you."

"You're begging me?" His lips twisted up in a semblance of a smile as those words left her mouth.

"Yes." She choked out hating the way he licked his lips as his eyes followed the rise and fall of her chest.

"I like the sound of that." He leaned closer, brushing a light kiss to her lips.

To her it felt as if it were Death coming to claim her. His lips felt heavy as if they were metal clamps ripping her skin apart.

She turned her face yet his lips only followed a trail up her cheek as he kissed every last tear. He could taste her fear in every tear drop and he revelled in it. She wanted it back. She wanted every tear and every breath that he stole from her. She wanted it back. She hated the idea of him having it. She didn't want to give him her tears. He couldn't have it yet he stole it.

He stole it selfishly and greedily. He stole it with a smile on his face knowing that he had stolen her very essence. He had her in the palm of his hand as every tear that he tasted contained every part of her. It was filled with her fear and her anguish and her pain and those were the truest things about her.

And he had it and he would never let it go.

She had given up. All that gave her hope had vanished leaving her empty. She was a lifeless shell yet she breathed. 

 Riaz was wrong. She wasn't the star in the stoneboat.

 She was the stoneboat.

And she had become his puppet as he tugged on his strings turning her head to face him.

"Don't ever ask for a lock again."

How could she? When it was him who had the lock. He had the key to her freedom and he would never give it up.

His finger trailed over her pursed lips as if they were a precious jewel.

He carried on stroking her lips- slowly, deliberately till she gasped for air.

He dipped his forefinger into her mouth- just barely yet it was enough for him.

He slid his finger across the swell of her inner lip. She had stopped breathing. He could see it. Her chest stopped moving as his finger invaded her mouth. He watched her for a moment- then another before he removed his finger and sucked it into his own mouth, tasting her.

"Sleep now." He brushed one last kiss to her lips before he stood up and walked away.

...

He found her in the parking lot, tucked away behind an unassuming white car.

She didn't even know that he had sat down next to her nor did she register the brush of his shoulders against hers. Her tears trailed as sparkling drops of glitter against the sunlight as she stared at all the cars that passed them.

He leaned towards her till his lips were right next to her ear, so close that he could kiss the little diamond earring that she wore, "Smile, little bee."

She turned to him, her pale pink lips tilted up into a smile before she looked forward once again.

"I'm scared." She whispered, afraid that speaking any louder would make her nightmares come true.

"Me too." He said softly before he leaned back to rest against the car, not even caring that his shoulder brushed against hers as she leaned back beside him.

A/N The 2 beautiful poems used in this chapter are Bereft by Robert Frost, Hollow Men by T.S. Elliot.

Also,unfortunately, this is not the end of Riaz's holiday memory. However I didn'twant to add it in because I felt the chapter ended at just the right spot