May 3, 2023

Queen

I knew the answer to his question before he even finished asking, but he was so cute when he was anxious. He'd start pretending he was completely unfazed, but you could catch him bouncing his knee and sneaking glances. It was a welcome change from him being so serious all the time.

Would we still be married if you hadn't died?...

"If you hadn't died..." I paused, looking for the right words to say. "We would be on kid number three, and buying a minivan."

"Saying that we would be..."

"Still married. Yes. I'm positive we'd still be married...if that was the case."

"Ouch."

I raised my brow, a small smile appearing on my face at his slight look of disappointment. "Not the answer you wanted?"

"I mean, of course, it is," he said lowly. "It's just that...now I can confirm that if I had been a little bit more careful with making sure there were no threats, we'd still be together. James would still be here with us and Xavia would've been perfectly fine."

My chest aches at the mention of my daughter, but I held back the pain and turned to Syn, who seemed to be more distraught than I thought. "It's not your fault, Syn."

"Isn't it?" He whispered as he stared out of the car in thought. "I had so many opportunities to do something. If I had followed through with my father's plan...the plan you gave me the 'okay' to go through with—"

"Syn..."

"I could've just killed Lilith...same with Sebastian when I kidnapped him..." My heart broke as he kept going and I wondered how long he had been having these thoughts.

"Okay! Stop!" I exclaimed. He turned to me, taken aback by my outburst and I took a deep breath. "If these are the things that make you at fault for what happened, them I'M the person who's responsible for everything that happened."

"Queen, don't say-"

"Every single fucking one of those decisions you made, and things you decided against doing...it was because of me. You held back, even when you didn't want to, because of me, Syn," I said sincerely. I took his hand into mine and ran my fingers gently across his scarred knuckles. "If you're going to blame anyone, blame me."

"I'd never do that."

"Then stop." Our eyes met, expressing the raw emotions we were both holding back. Of course, he looked away first, not wanting to expose yet another part of himself. "Sure things happen, but right now it's like...should've, could've, would've...it's in the past and we need to move on."

"Without one another?" He questioned.

"I honestly have no idea. I only know one thing."

"What is that?"

"We're endgame." I smiled at him.

He scrunched his brows in confusion and shook his head slowly. "What is that?"

"Umm, I'm not sure how to explain it," I grimaced as I searched my mind for a definition. "It's like this; if we were characters in a book—"

"Oh no," he grimaced as he rubbed his temples with his free hand.

"Listen for a second," I whined. He dropped his hand and sighed, looking back at me and waiting patiently for me to continue. "It means that if we were characters, we'd be the ones that end up together in the end. Endgame couples no matter the time, or circumstances...they always have a happy ending together."

"You don't believe in happy endings, Queen."

"I'd like to," I whispered sincerely. "At least when it comes to us."

"And what would a happy ending for us entail?"

"You finally trusting me enough to let me in completely," I admitted. His words from earlier about never opening up flashed through my mind once again, making my chest ache and I let go of his hand.

He must've known the reason why I let go because he didn't reach out again. Instead, the relaxed expression on his face was now replaced with a serious one, obviously ending our conversation. He opened the door to the car and cleared his throat. "We should go-"

"What's your version of our happy ending, Syn?"

"One where you'd stop pushing me to tell you things I never will." He closed the door before I could say anything else and I closed my eyes, shaking my head.

Maybe if our visions were the same I would've let myself run back into his arms, but he was adamant about his. And I couldn't let myself be with somebody I'd always have to have questions about. I wanted to be with someone who I would fully give myself to and they'd do the same in return.

Is that too much to want?

I just wanted to understand him.

With a sigh, I opened the car door and stepped out. Maybe our happy endings aren't together. He seemed like he wanted some girl that would be with him and not question his actions. He wanted a boundary between his mind and heart, and someone that wouldn't want to own both.

Was Stella submissive to his wishes? I wondered if they argued about things the way that we did. She seemed nice enough, but I couldn't help but internally compare myself with her ever since breakfast.

I was confident, more than I had been in a long ass time, but this was Syn. His even glancing twice at another girl romantically was cause enough for questions to arise in my mind. If it had been any other guys, it would've been whatever, but Syn hardly looked once. That's how he was. So twice or more was noticeable.

As I stepped onto the crushed stone driveway and walked towards him, small insecurities and questions kept popping up in my mind. What made it worse was that I was jealous, and had absolutely no reason or right to be. He was with other people just as I was. I needed to deal with it. Every fiber of my being knew this...but I was still upset.

Just a little bit.

His arms were shoved into his pockets as he waited for me at the bottom of the steps, and I sucked in a breath before striding past him. I didn't say a word as I continued walking, up the steps, and neither did he. I could feel his eyes on me from behind, but I collected all of my feelings for him and stuffed it into a box inside of me, and locked it. My jealousy made that easy enough, but my stupid heart wasn't letting me throw away the damn key. That meant I couldn't be mad forever, but I'd let myself feel how I felt for now.

I arrived at the door quicker than I meant to and immediately rummaged through my bag for my keys. Syn stepped behind me onto the porch, and I ignored the butterflies swarming through my body when his arm unintentionally bumped into mine.

"What's wrong with you?" He asked.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?" He questioned in disbelief, raising a brow and looking down at me unamused. "You walked up those steps with an attitude...which should be impossible."

"Mhmm." My "attitude" truly wasn't intentionally meant to be something to make him angry. I just couldn't vocalize how I was feeling without feeling like a hypocrite. What I wanted to truly say in return came out through my body language.

"Queen."

I opened the front door and stepped through the threshold, suddenly met with the cold breeze that was always met with the house. The AC running nonstop seemed to be a thing everyone wanted except for me.

"Do you want my jacket?" Syn asked, noticing me wrap my arms around myself. "I can go to the car and get it if you—"

"No, thanks," I mumbled. I walked past him deeper into the foyer and to the hallway that led into the living room where I could hear small chatter. I heard Syn groan in annoyance from behind me as he followed and I walked into the living room, practically gagging at the sight of what I was seeing.

"Eww!" I cried. Cain immediately grabbed a blanket from the couch and practically jumped on his wife to cover her.

Iris tightly held the blanket around us and they both flashed us huge grins as if they weren't doing anything. Iris patted her now messy hair down and Cain held a throw pillow on his lap, wiggling his fingers in the air to greet us. He must have not noticed Syn when we walked in, because he immediately paused his movements and his eyes widened. Hopping off the couch, he darted towards Syn and pulled him into a bear hug.

"Baby brother!" He yelled.

"Oh my gosh." I winced, holding a hand over my eyes. I could've gone an eternity without seeing my brother naked.

"Babe!" Iris called. "Leave the man alone." I gave Iris a 'seriously' look and she shrugged before laughing at the situation that just happened.

"You're insane," I mouthed.

"You two." She pointed towards Syn and raised a perfectly sculpted brow in question. I only shook my head in response and I could hear the loud 'mhmm' from the way she looked at me, making me roll my eyes.

"Okay, okay, that's enough," Syn said seriously before pulling away and adjusting his clothes.

"I've missed you so much, man," Cain said excitedly. He looked back at me then to Syn and a slow smile spread across his lips. "Are we back together? Is this a marriage announcement? Are we pregnant? What's going on?"

"He's just here to see Saint," I corrected as Syn and I exchanged an awkward glance. Him giving me a longing look, and me wanting to get as far away from here as I could.

"Oh well, he's with Abel and Iris's grandfather," he said.

"And where are they?"

"They went to the movies. We didn't expect you to be back until tonight...clearly." He glanced at Iris, who was getting up from the couch, tightly holding the blanket around her.

"When will they be back?" I asked.

He glanced at the Rolex on his wrist, wrapping his other arm around Iris, and shrugged. "Approximately five hours. He said they'd be back around six."

Shit. "Oh okay."

"Umm, Syn," Cain said as he pulled Iris in front of him and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, placing his head on top of hers. "You've both briefly met in the past, but I'd like to formally introduce you to my wife, Iris Romano."

Syn nodded in greeting. "And Iris, I'd like to formally introduce you to the King of Hell, and Queen's future husband."

"Why do you have to make things so weird?" I groaned, running my hand down my face.

"It's nice to see you again, Syn. I hope the past years have treated you well?" Iris spoke.

"They've been fine. Same to you."

"Well, we're going to get cleaned up. Maybe we can all catch up a little later?" Cain asked.

"Sure." Syn nodded.

"You guys better buy a new couch." I winced in disgust. They both burst into laughter before Cain assured me they would, and they walked down the hall to the stairwell, leaving Syn and me alone. He crossed his arms in his spot as he glanced around the room, and I looked up at him nervously.

"Are you going to leave?"

"If you'd like me to."

"You do you." I shrugged.

"Me do me?"

"Mhmm."

"Hmm." He nodded slowly, eyeing my demeanor. I was sure he could feel the coldness radiating off of me, but I couldn't help it right now. "If that's the case then I'd like to see your room."

"Why?"

"I'd like to get to know this version of you, Queen. See what she reads, what color she paints her room...if she's messy or not...I want to know everything."

"Do you see how hypocritical that sounds, Syn?" I finally elaborated.

"How is it hypocritical?"

"If I said the same thing to you I'm sure you'd shit yourself," I mumbled. "You're saying you want to know me, but when I—"

"I'm going to stop you right there," he said lowly. "You and I are asking for two different fucking things."

"How?"

"You're asking to know a me that no longer exists. You want me to revisit old memories and reopen wounds that open and close every night, Queen. I'm asking you to show me who you are now because that's the woman I love. Why am I being pushed to share my past when you haven't either?"

"If I remembered mine, I'd tell you everything."

"We'll take it from someone who remembers their own, you're lucky," he said softly. "It hurts, Queen. And when you ask me to tell you everything. You're asking me to bring all those horrible events to my safe space."

"Your safe space?"

"You, Queen. I'm fucking talking about you."

꧁꧂

Author's Note

😭 ughhh this book said: You haven't cried in a week Ayisha, it's time😤. I hate it here lmao.
Anywho, I wanna ask y'all who's side you're on now that you see Syn's point of view. Should he open up, it should Queen give up?
Lmk your thoughts✨