May, 2019

Two emerald eyes stared at me with unbridled hatred. "So this whole time, you were simply trying to make up for what you failed to do?" she asked me.

I tried to speak. I tried to defend myself and my decisions. I tried to tell her, shout at her, that this was all her idea. But my voice was trapped, unable to leave my mouth.

"I'm done with this. I'm done with you," she then said as she shook her head.

No, don't give up, I wanted to reply. But once again, my words never made it out.

"All your love has done is destroy lives," she threw at me before hanging up the phone. Pivoting on her heel, I watched her leave my vision, all the while tears poured in relentless streams down my face. My heart tore in two as I banged on the glass, begging her to come back.

And then my eyes flew open to the darkness.

Watermelon.

Vanilla.

Hibiscus.

The first thing I noticed was her scent embedded in the pillow beneath my head, quickly followed by the silver bangle on the bedside table.

Though unlike the last time I woke up remembering she had returned, this time the desperate urge to leap out of bed and find her didn't consume me.

In fact, for a moment, I started to wonder if there was a way out without being noticed.

I could climb through the window... sneak out the backyard and jump through the neighbours' yards until I found a way back to the street.

I could just walk up those stairs and out the front door, ignoring anyone who tried to stop me. It's not like they'd be fast enough if I ran.

Rolling onto my back to stare at the ceiling, I heaved a deep sigh.

How pathetic do you want to seem, Lukas? You were all over her last night and this morning and then the moment you're actually feeling yourself you run?

With that, I decided it was time to brave my decisions that had brought me to this point. Throwing the blanket off me and my legs onto the floor, I took another deep breath before getting to my feet.

Though before I exited her room, I stopped by the mirror to glance in, stupidly fixing my hair as though it mattered. But as I realised how ridiculous my actions were, I pivoted away and out of the room, taking the stairs two at a time until I was on the ground floor.

I didn't listen out for where she was, not wanting to give myself the opportunity to overthink anything. Instead, I strutted through the rooms with purpose, as if I belonged here. As if this were just another day.

When I finally came across Theodora cozied up on the couch by the TV—though the other two sirens nowhere in sight—her head immediately turned up in my presence.

As my mouth opened to ask the anticipated question, she was quick to give me the answer, "You just missed her."

"What do you mean I just—"

"She headed out."

"Out where?"

"Patrolling."

"Pat—"

"Looking for Mades."

My mind raced with questions, but none of them had use with the person in front of me. So instead, I asked the one necessary. "When you say just—"

"About a minute ago."

"Thanks, Thea."

And, this time, I ran.

Dropping the shoes clutched in my hand to the floor as I reached the door, I quickly fastened them before I exited the house. My head was quick to twist this way and that in the twilight as I looked for any sign of her down the long, straight cobblestone street.

And as I glanced towards my right, I just caught sight of copper curls as she rounded the corner.

I began to jog after the figure, calling out as I neared, "Olivia."

If she heard me, she didn't stop.

So I picked up my pace.

"Olivia!" I tried again as I rounded the corner she had turned down.

The person walked up ahead halted, pausing for a few moments. Then her head whipped around, green gaze meeting mine. "Lukas," she said back, almost shocked.

"You said you'd be there," I accused as I caught up to her, hating the words as they exited my mouth.

They made me sound needy.

They made me sound like I cared.

And I didn't.

Looking at her now, with my mind level-headed, the months of loathing finally caught up as I properly took her in.

She was somehow shorter than I remembered. Smaller and more fragile it seemed. But her hair was longer, and shinier. And her once-pasty skin slightly sunkissed—though only slightly. She looked good. She looked more comfortable in her skin. Though she was far from the woman I remembered.

But even more foreign than her altered appearance was the way she looked at me: like she was wary, like she was nervous, like she was sorry, but also like she missed me. The expressions didn't match the one I had dreamed of moments ago.

"I'm done with you... all your love has done is destroy lives," the memory reminded me.

Red clouded my vision as I took in the woman who once filled me with so much love, now replaced with my unwavering disdain.

"I'm sorry," she mumbled before looking down. "I didn't know how long you would be," she began to prattle. "And as the sky got darker I got more nervous so I thought I'd go for a walk to prepare myself. I was going to come back, I swear. All my things were still in my room. I just... I needed some air."

"Thea said you're patrolling," I then countered, crossing my arms over my chest. Was she lying to me or her friends?

Heaving a sigh, her forestry eyes finally met mine again. "I am. Technically. I mean, I go out every evening around this time to see if I can find a Made. But I never do."

"They don't hang out in this part of the city. We're all here."

She nodded. "I started to wonder if that was it... but I haven't killed one yet so—"

"Why are you even trying to hunt them anyway?" I countered.

She shrugged. "I don't know, Lukas. I don't have a game plan or anything. All I know is my blood kills them so I want to be useful. It's why I came back."

Her words hit me at full force with the explanation finally in the air.

She came back because of the deaths... not for us.

Though she didn't notice my sudden further deflation, going on instead. "And I would have been more useful. I was learning how to fight them until not long ago, but... my training stopped before I made my first kill."

My gaze narrowed impossibly further at her as I wondered if the twitchiness that was consuming her was a sign of more lies... or if perhaps I really made her that uneasy. "Who was training you?" I pressed next.

She shook her head as she met my wary stare. "You wouldn't know her. I simply ran into her on my first day here and she kind of took me under her wing. Until suddenly she... stopped responding to me a couple of weeks ago."

Though there was something off in what Olivia said that had me probing further into the story. "A couple of weeks ago?"

"Yeah. I was late to a meet up because I had just moved in with the girls and she ended up getting attacked by two Mades when I wasn't there. I thought we had made up but then next I knew she kicked me out of her house and hasn't spoken to me since."

Attacked by two Mades?

My heart began to pound in my chest as my stomach sunk.

It couldn't be.

There's no way...

But it would explain so much...

"Olivia... How was this person able to train you, a Terra Fairy?" I asked.

"Because she's also one."

A bitter taste swelled in my mouth.

It could be someone else.

"What's her name?" I demanded next.

The emerald-eyed fairy hesitated. Snagging her bottom lip between her teeth—in a way that used to mesmerise me, though now only irked me—I felt my anger swell as she avoided the truth.

"Name, Olivia."

But her brows furrowed at my tone. "Why do you care? You don't—"

"Tell me her name!" I then growled, not caring about our onlookers.

She stepped back in shock... in fear. A look that I had never seen wash over Olivia's face. An expression I never, in my wildest dreams, thought I'd see her sport.

And while I did feel a little guilty for snapping, I wasn't able to think too far about those emotions. Because getting this information was more important right now.

"E-Emma," she mumbled.

"For fuck's sake. Of course." I shook my head in disbelief at the expected news.

No wonder she started freaking out suddenly. That must have been when she met Olivia.

At once, I began to storm down the street, passing the bewildered redhead and in the direction of the underground.

"Lukas, where are you—" she started to call behind me.

But I merely snapped over my shoulder, "Go back home, Olivia. Or... to the Siren's house—whatever you refer to it as while you're on your little vacation. Just don't be an idiot and go out looking for trouble that you have no clue how to deal with, okay?"

"You don't get to tell me—" she started to say, her voice never getting further away as she clearly began to chase after me.

I spun on my heel, stopping before she could realise. Her small frame almost collided with mine, but I took a step away before she could, watching her stumble. "I don't tell you anything anymore, I know. You and I have no connection. But as one mutant to another who doesn't want to see our friends upset when you get yourself killed, stay out of business you don't know about."

Her eyes began to water as she looked at me as though we didn't know each other anymore.

But I didn't care.

Because we didn't know each other.

She was a stranger to me.

And that was how she was going to remain from hereon.

Without waiting to see if she had anything further to say or if she was going to follow my instructions, I pivoted around again and headed towards the underground, this time without looking back.

· · ───── ∘☽༓☾∘ ───── · ·

My fist pounded on the door, the wooden surface rattling in protest, threatening to come off the hinges.

"Emma, open this door before I open it myself," I called out after a couple of minutes of waiting.

Was I starting to sound like an obsessive ex?

You bet.

Would someone call the police on me soon?

Most likely.

Though good thing I could magic my way through all of this.

I banged on the door a couple more times, when, finally it swung open.

"What's your prob—" she started to shout at me. Her hair was dishevelled, she already sported her pyjamas, but I could see the pen marks on the side of her hand, telling me she was in the midst of marking when I turned up.

Though before she could get her question all the way out, I barged on in, surprisingly gently closing the door behind me. "Is your housemate home?" I started with.

"No. She's out," she mumbled, chocolate gaze avoiding mine as she pushed a pout. "What do you want? I was in the middle of—"

"Did you seriously end our relationship because Olivia is back?" I demanded, deciding we were going to have this out in her hallway rather than venturing further into the house.

Chagrin washed over her face for a split second, but was quickly washed away with a determined glare back at me. "What makes you think—"

"Oh, I don't know. The fact that you became distant around the time you met her just after she arrived? The fact that you avoided me after that? The fact that you asked me to kiss you after crying about how you were so convinced that I couldn't get over Olivia? And then pushed me away claiming you couldn't end up like Ben? Though I haven't quite figured what you meant by that one."

She heaved a sigh. "So you know she's here then?"

"Yup. Was quite the fun shock last night. Especially considering I seem to be the last one to know, too. But even worse was finding out you two had already met from her just before I got here and that you were training her to fight Mades?"

Emma rolled her eyes before crossing her arms over her chest. "Oh, don't worry, Lukas. She'll be fine. She's built for—"

"Do you seriously think the part I'm so angry about is you training her to kill Mades?"

"Of course. Why else—"

"Because," I growled, "You threw away a good thing between us because you assumed I still have feelings for her. I told you multiple times she means nothing to me. Even meeting her again, I can confirm, she means nothing. But I was more than ready to commit to you forever and not even that was enough. I just don't understand—"

"No, you don't understand. Not yet at least. But you will," she replied calmly, a complete contrast to my tone right now.

"Can you please just stop talking in riddles and tell me what you—"

"What was it like seeing her again? How did it feel?" she then pried.

"I was shit-faced, Emma. I can't tell you how I—"

"Hmm. I bet you do remember, but—"

"I don't. I was drunk." I tried to keep my voice firm. I tried to make us both believe that the initial encounter didn't happen. But then...

"Then what was it like just before seeing her? Y'know... As you had this conversation that led to me coming up?"

Shaking my head, I replied, "Terrible. I can't stand her. And I want nothing to do with—"

"You should try touching her."

"Excuse me?"

"See if the spark still exists between—"

"Oh a spark exists. One where I'm electrocuted. What do you really think is going to happen between—"

"Ah, so you did touch her. How?"

"What does—"

"Did you hug?" Her words sounded like those of a jealous lover, but all envy was far from Emma's eyes... like she was simply genuinely curious.

Flashes of the pool last night, of stumbling home drunk wrapped around Olivia, of running straight up to her in my tired state this morning, washed through my mind. "Of course not," I tried to make sound real.

But Emma could see through it. Even if she didn't call me out on it then, her eyes turned down with disappointment and a touch of knowing.

"What does the way I touch her when I'm drunk have anything to do with—" I started to ask.

Until she hit me with, "Why did you even come here to fight with me, Lukas?"

I blinked at her in disbelief at the question. "Because," I said slowly, repeating the first words I said when I arrived, "You broke up with me because of Oliv—"

"My insecurities about your relationship with Olivia weren't a new thing. You know that. They existed from the day we began. And I always knew we weren't permanent. Eventually she'd turn up, and I'd know our time would come to an end—"

"Why do you care so much about her out of all my exes? Erica never bothered you."

"She's different and you know it. Everyone knows it. The bond you two had—"

"Was broken before I met you."

"And yet you still care about her."

"When are you going to get through your head that—"

"Be honest with yourself, Lukas. The reason you're here, shouting at me, is because you want to be mad at someone who is not yourself."

"You think I'm not mad at myself for making you feel—"

"No. You're mad that, standing in front of me, despite our broken bond, you know you feel nothing. You don't want to reach for me. You don't want to hold me. You feel nothing for me, just as I feel nothing for you."

"That's not true. Ever since you broke our bond, I've been drinking—"

"Drinking to fill the hole I could no longer distract you from. The hole not having Olivia around had created."

"Why do you always link this back to—"

"But when she shows up again, it's like the world made sense, right?"

"My bond is broken with her, Emma. It has been for a long—"

"And yet you still missed her. So much that you tried to lie to me about how it felt to see her again, after all this time."

"You're delusional," I gave her, shaking my head as I realised we were going to keep going in circles.

"No. You are. Because you're more mad I never told you she's back, not that I broke up with you because she's back."

"That's not true. I don't care that she's—"

"You do. You saw her yesterday at the party and again today. Evidently you rushed back to see her."

"I... I didn't." Was she watching? Did she follow me?

"Lukas... you can't fool me. Are you forgetting what happened the day we met?"

"How could I—"

"You told me everything about your relationship with her."

"You asked! You told me to get it all off my chest and—"

"Even after she forgot you existed, you still had an invitation with her. Even after she bonded with another guy, you still loved her. Barely any time after he died, that invitation came back. And even a week after a broken bond, you admitted then that you still had feelings for her. And even now, months on, she's still the person you go running to. Maybe not in your sober mind, but at least it's what your subconscious self wants."

"Sometimes bonds take time to—"

"But they don't."

"They can—"

"Oh yeah? Then how come you felt nothing for Erica after you rejected her? And how come, two weeks on from our breakup, we also both feel nothing? You never came running after me."

My lips pressed together as I ran out of replies.

"You readily admitted you still felt strongly about her the day we met. But you can't even lie to me right now that you have any lingering feelings for me or have had any after the bond fully disappeared between us. Because you know, deep down, there's something different tying you and Olivia together."

"It's just that she was a good friend," I whispered back, tired of fighting now.

Heaving a sigh, Emma took a step closer. "You know it's more than that."

Nostrils flaring, anger still consuming me, I forced back, "If you're so sure, then explain it to me. What is it that you think is still between us, huh? And why?"

The corners of her lips turned up before she said softly, "I'm sure you will find that out in time."

Realising I was never going to get a straight answer from her, that we were never going to see eye-to-eye, I spun around and started heading from the door.

But she was quick behind me, already talking as I made my exit. "While I know you came here to try to unleash the anger you have for yourself onto me, know that, if any part of you does feel bad about using me to fill that hole, I don't hate you for it, Lukas. Our time together was beautiful. But I knew the moment I fell for you that you'd never be mine forever. I knew you'd always belong to her. So don't worry about me, okay? Even though I know you won't."

Pausing at the door, I mumbled back, "If you don't hate me, then how come you've disappeared from our lives?"

"I needed a bit of time and distance. And I needed you to meet her again without my interference."

Craning my head back to look at Emma as I lingered in the doorway, I said, "I really feel nothing for her."

She nodded, though her face was full of disbelief. "Sure, Lukas. Sure."

"And I do miss you," I added, voice full of earnestness.

The corners of her mouth turned up as her eyes softened, believing me this time. "I miss you too, Lukas. You're an amazing friend. And I'm not gone for good, okay? I'm doing fine, and I technically would be ready to come back into your life as your friend again right now. But that's simply going to have to wait until I've finished all my marking."

Heaving a sigh, I said, "Sorry for interrupting you."

"It's fine. You and I had to do this at some point."

My eyes narrowed at her. "You haven't even been fully honest though. And you're wrong."

She shrugged and smiled at me again, as if we were just always going to be at this impasse. "You'll understand eventually. But don't let her slip away again, Lukas."

Shaking my head, I said, "There is absolutely nothing between—"

"Uh-huh."

"I'm serious. I don't even want to be her friend again. I might run into her while she's here, but under no circumstance do I plan to—"

"Well, that's just silly."

"Why?"

"Because. Whether you believe my view about your romantic tie or not, she's always going to be your best friend. She's always going to understand you in ways no one else will."

I scoffed. "I don't care if she gets me. She left, and—"

"And now she's back. And willing to be your friend again, yes?"

I shrugged, looking anywhere but her gaze now. "The topic didn't come up."

"You can be mad at her for hurting you. You're justified in feeling those feelings and making sure she understands what she did was wrong. But life is too short to hold grudges, Lukas. You should know that better than anyone."

I didn't have any words to say back to her. Because it's not like I didn't understand how short life can be even for mutants who are supposed to have longer lives than humans.

But before I could process a thought long enough to string it into a sentence to say back to her, her hand grabbed the opened door. "Now, if you don't mind, please leave. I've got a lot of work to get through tonight."

"Okay, okay," I mumbled, finally stepping out of her house and into the night.

Though I quickly turned on my heel to face her, just as Emma paused in closing the door.

"I really do miss you, Em. And it really did hurt to lose you. I've done my damn best to mourn the loss of you."

Her mouth turned up once more into a sorrowful smile as she nodded her acceptance of my words. "You can stop grieving now, Lukas. This was more than enough. I'll most certainly forgive you for moving on."

We didn't say anything beyond that.

I simply faced away from her and forced myself out from the courtyard and onto the busy street again. And Emma most likely retreated to her marking once again.

But a part of me did feel lighter having spoken to her. I wasn't sure why at that point, though I knew eventually I'd find out.

I'm not very happy with this chapter, but... oh well.