They faced each other in the desolate car park. Grey occupied their overcast world, dark clouds twisted above them. Painted lines worn by time and rubber marked the concrete like rows of scars. Lillian stood unprotected from the shards of water shredding the clouds above. She was clutching the ends of her sleeves in a death grip.
Her eyes were wide with emotion. She faced Blake. With each heart beat she could feel a drop of contempt pulse with the gallons of blood. The pelting rain had soaked through her hoodie, bleeding into her now sodden t-shirt. She scanned the boy standing before her, noting how his hand shook as he held the brightly coloured, out of place umbrella. Lillian moved her eyes from his hand to his feet––soaked of course––and back up to his shadow cloaked eyes.
Blake shifted where he stood, curling his numbing toes in his waterlogged shoes. It was cold, very cold. The early spring winds caught his jacket, blowing it away from his body like a billowing sail. It made a harsh flapping noise as it plumed around him, the dark material clawing away from him, so desperate to run free with the wind. Blake swallowed a fist sized lump in his throat, trying to quell the roaring anxiety that squirmed inside him.
Lillian’s short cropped copper hair hung stuck to her face, snaking strands barely concealed the dark marks smudged beneath her eyes. Fatigue pulled on her eyelids, coaxing them to droop and envelope her vision in gloom. She tensed the muscles in her eyes, forcing them to widen, her irises blots of emerald ink staining a white page. Lillian didn’t wince as the rain splattered her face, breaking on her unblinking lashes. So she continued her analysis of the youth in front of her.
Blake stared back at her, umbrella raised above his head––though this was barely shielding his damp body from the onslaught of falling beads. Her dark eyes bore through him, emotions he couldn’t identify danced through them. What was it? Contempt? Longing? Hostility?
Time creped slowly, ticking, ticking, and ticking past. Lillian hadn’t blinked in what seemed like an eternity. Or at least that’s what it felt like to Blake. If it were any other circumstance he would have let out a chuckle at this. She had always had an uncanny ability to keep her eyes open for extended periods of time. Even doing it unconsciously when she was focusing…or angry.
The crunching of tarmac snapped Blake out of the thought process. A car peeled into the parking lot in an attempt to change its direction. Tires scraped the stone as the car swivelled and exited.
Light passed over them both for a short moment, slicing through the murky dark. It illuminated his face for just long enough to show his red, tear swollen eyes. Closing them for a brief moment, he winced at the sudden blinding light. He exhaled for the first time since he had arrived. A breath that had held for so long that the cold, fresh air stung his lungs. He could only fathom how painful speaking would be. Good thing something held all the words he wanted to cry captive.
Her sharp glare stung him, gouging a whole in his heart. A flash of light split the sky, lightning fracturing the clouds it sprang to and from. A clap of thunder followed, booming overhead––he leaped in fright, dropping his umbrella. The wind caught it and dragged it across the tarmac before carrying it away in a gust of air.
Lillian didn’t move, refusing to give into the stabbing rain or screaming cold. She even made herself immune to his pleading gaze. To her, this person did not deserve her empathy. The memories that his face was branded to, they pricked at her tear ducts, bursting the film holding back her tears of anger and fear. With each memory she recalled a tear fell. Her eyes narrowed at him, a steady rage boiled inside her.
Lillian’s cold eyes locked with his once again. Her expression changing from a blank mask to a fiery glare. Emotions spiralled through him. He had to do something and fast. All the things he had planned to say to her had faded in his panic. He tried to gather his thoughts, calculating every consequence of each word his mind pushed him to scream. Every outcome was dark. Each road that branched out in front of him was a twisted mess of briars and pain. So he said nothing, continuing his frozen stance.
She blinked slowly. Clearing the tears blurring her vision. Her teeth gnashed against each other in an almost audible mill like grinding. It felt like her body had shut down, she had to will her eyes to close and open, forcing her diaphragm to bend and flex to accommodate her shallow breaths. A cold rage slowly tore her heart. She clamped down on her tongue, supressing a shiver a blast of icy wind had triggered. One more crushing breath shook her body. She could smell the dampness of the world as she took one deep breath, sucking air through her nose.
Biting his lip, he broke the battle their eyes were waging. She never looked away, her glare gradually darkening. Her soft features twisting with contempt. He didn’t, couldn’t look back into her leafy eyes. They burned with an anger he had only seen from her a handful of times. It had never been aimed at him. It scared him.
The rain lightened slightly before halting abruptly. The ground held a silver sheen as the gentle mist of light that seeped from the dark evening sky reflected off the pockets or water filling its pockmarked surface. The world felt so quiet.
A small flicker of pain shot across her face as she loosened her chest, breaking their silence.
“What do you want?” She spat.
Her voice yanked even further at the growing gouge in him. He shook nervously “I...” he paused, compiling his thoughts into a format he could attempt to put into words “Lilith I…”
Her breath hitched “Lillian,” she cut him off with a snarl, it hurt to hear him say her pet name “its Lillian”
Her words sliced him even deeper. He dragged his hand through his hair in agitation, brushing it back from his face.
He wanted to scream, to run both into her warmth and as far away from this barren place as possible. Away from her, that rage still fluttered through her eyes. Something about the small girl in front of him terrified him. His body stayed fixed to the spot.
“Lillian I…I wanted to tell you,” he stuttered, very conscious of the growing impatience in her glare. “I’m…I’m sorry.”
She scoffed, folding her arms. Leaning back into a swagger swollen stance. She flashed him a spiteful smile.
“I don’t care”
Her words knocked the breath from him. He stood in shock for a moment before he glanced at her for barely a second. Desperately searching, looking for some shredded piece of empathy. He didn’t find it
“And what I did was wrong” he continued. Hoping something, anything would break the hate that cloaked her face. All he wanted was to see the Lillian he knew. “You were right and I never listened”
His breathing was sporadic, heaving with sharp jerks of his chest.
He was going into full blown panic.
She giggled, her accent thickening with spite, becoming strong and biting. “Yeah Blake… y’ should’ve listened”
Tears streamed down his face, hot and painful. He bit his lip, tearing off a strip of skin. A sharp sting throbbed through his lower lip as a drop of blood pushed its way out, hanging onto the curve of his lip like a crimson jewel. He didn’t know what to say. What to do. So he just stood, confusion furrowing his brow.
Lillian flourished her arms around her, gesturing as her sarcastic voice hissed between her teeth “But no. No you just had to––to…” she trailed off, grunting in frustration as she began pacing in a loop. Stomping her rain stained boots against the asphalt.
“Look, I wasn’t always right ok? But you betrayed me, you––you made me feel like I could trust you and you spat that back in my face. You hurt me Blake”
His begging eyes cut through her, but she ignored it. Still not giving into the small part of her that cared for him. Her tears had evaporated, boiled away by her rage. The waterfall no longer mingled with the puddle of rain water she stood in.
Blake looked to her again, and with a sob he said “All I can say is that I’m so sorry…”
His pitiful cry frayed her heart strings. Lillian took a step toward him, her expression becoming more contorted with each moment. A hands breath separated them, she looked up at him, standing on her toes.
“I. Don’t. Care” she slowly growled.
Blake grabbed her shoulder, pushing her away from him.
“All I want to do is for us to go back to normal––” he shouted in her face. Retaliating against her calm hostility.
She didn’t flinch. Instead she violently slapped his hand away from her.
“Don’t touch me!”
Panic flashed through his face as he cradled his pain hand, pain flared through his fingers.
“Blake,” she spoke, now meters away from him. Pacing again. “Things will never…just never go back to normal. And do you want to know why? It’s because I never want to see your sorry face again” distain poisoned her words, tainting every syllable.
“Lilli, I’m sorry” Blake pleaded, reaching a hand out to her.
“No,” she feigned back, walking backwards as she backed away from him. “You’re not” she poured all the hurt and hate he had caused into her last words. She made sure he heard her pain.
“Lillian!” He cried out to her. Hoping for…something, something he couldn’t even identify anymore.
“Goodbye Blake” her expression became a stark mask of disinterest once more, her words liquid ice. She turned, stripping off her jumper as she strode away, her t-shirt clung translucently to her skin. She walked away with confidence, Lillian wanted to hurt the mess that stood behind her. To her, he deserved nothing but the same suffering he had dealt her. But she was done with him. So she left him behind.
Blake traced his eyes over the gentle curve of her retreating back, remembering something of the past. So he pulled out his last card, the only thing he could think of that would bring her back and he cried out to her one last time.
“Lillian…Wait!” He took a stride towards her before sinking to his knees. “I still love you!” Blake sobbed, clutching at his last, desperate hope
Lillian slung her jumper over her shoulder. Halting but refusing to face the piteous boy behind her. She sighed.
“I know.”
She walked away.
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