“I can hear everyone” She states, her tone completely emotionless and cold, sending a shiver up my spine.
My phone rings in my pocket and I pull it out, looking at the screen. Aria. Walking away, I answer it.
“Aria, I’m sorry for your loss” I tell her.
“Where is Lily?” She asks.
“With me” I hear her breathe a sigh of relief.
“I am on my way don’t let her out of your sight”
“Why?”
“That’s not Lily in case you haven’t noticed”
“I noticed, but she seems fine,” I tell her. I can feel Layla watching and listening in. Literally feel her eyes boring into my back.
“Yeah, for now. This is only the calm before the storm” Aria says hanging up. I turn to Lily, but she is gone. Scanning around only to see her retreating frame walking into the house. I let out a breath of relief before chasing after her.
Walking inside, everyone is busy cleaning and a few are patching the hole in the wall. Lily walks past everyone and they part, stepping away from her as she heads toward the stairs.
“Layla, when is Lily coming back?” I ask, chasing after her.
“She’s not” She says walking up the stairs not even looking back.
Chapter 32
Lily POV
The moment I heard Aria’s voice on the other end of the phone, the dam wall burst, and a tidal wave of emotion rushed through me, freezing my veins and I couldn’t speak. Aria’s frantic voice coming through the phone, laced with panic. Yet I couldn’t utter a word. Completely consumed by sadness. I can’t fix this, what has been done, cannot be undone. And that realisation cut deeply, bleeding my soul out of me.
“I can't because it hurts. Just make it go away” I tell Layla. Anything to take this feeling away, anything to stop my already broken pieces from sharpening more and slicing through me.
“Let me take over, Lily” Layla spoke, her voice pained as she watched me struggle with myself. Struggle with my new reality. Struggle with everything I had been holding in. I feel her pull on the veil that separated us, letting her move forward, the darkness swallowing me and I let her. Shoving her forward as she came closer.
Everyone has a breaking point, those that say they don’t, is because they haven’t reached it yet. They don’t know the soul shattering pain of when everything weighing you down becomes too much. Everyone has a breaking point. A point when they no longer feel like it is worth the pain of living. When the weight becomes too much, where you feel like you can no longer breathe. When you no longer want to.
“Don’t think like that” Layla says listening in on my thoughts. I retreat, going to where she can’t reach me.
“Let me know when you want to come back” She says.
“I’m not coming back” I tell her as I let the darkness swallow me whole. Letting it numb me as it pulls me into the darkest parts of myself where you're no longer conscious, where the pain is gone. I feel like I am just floating merely existing with no purpose, no thoughts to plague me, just nothing and a feeling of peace washing over me, numbing me from everything I ever knew and thought of.
Layla POV
I felt her slipping away, moving where not even I will go. To the part of us that is nothing but a black hole. I tried to force her back, pulling on the line leading to her, but it was like pulling on a never-ending piece of string until you get halfway through and the line snaps. Panic coursing through me when I couldn’t find her. Is this what Lily feels when she can’t reach me? I suddenly feel empty, hollow, the silence maddening. The piece of us that is her now gone, slipped into the abyss.
“Lily, Lily” I hear Aria’s voice screaming through the phone. I look at the phone in my hand, placing it to my ear. Her voice is so loud as she screams through the phone at me, making my ears hurt.
“Dad is dead, Lily is gone” I tell her, trying to make sure I articulate my words.
“Layla? Give Lily control, now” She yells. I shake my head before realising she can’t actually see me.
“Lily left, she won’t come back” I tell her.
“What do you mean, Layla?”
“Goodbye Aria” I tell her, hanging up the phone. Walking out of the room, I head downstairs. Everyone was being so loud. Hear their voices racing through my head a million miles an hour. I try to block them out with my hands until I realise it is the mind-Link. And I can feel the makings of a migraine coming on.