He'll come. He's missed so many times, but now he'll come.
From inside the building, I hear the bass of the first song, and I know right now my coach is looking for me. I know if I run it'll take me two minutes and forty seconds to reach the hall, so I still have time.
To wait for him. Because he'll come.
He always has time to make it to Aria's recitals, but I shake my head at those thoughts and the jealousy stabbing into my chest. Because he's always loved Aria. From day one.
And I wonder if that's how he used to look at me when I was little. Before The Bloody Dahlia. Before Mom. But it's been eight years since then. You shouldn't hate your child for that long. You shouldn't forget they exist for that long.
One more minute, I whisper to myself, but I already feel the moisture gathering behind my eyelids.
He's not coming. And my hands tighten around those glittery strings on my pants.
What am I not doing right that everyone keeps forgetting about me? Why doesn't anyone remember me?
That was the first night I thought it would be easier for them to handle everything if I didn't exist anymore. I didn't exist anyway, but at least I'd be doing them a favor. I'd make my disappearance official. They'd probably put on a grieving face for the neighbors and friends. The first month, they'd probably go every week to that gravestone marked with my name. After that, they'd officially move on with their lives. Free of me. Free of the stress I brought into their lives by simply breathing near them.
I don't know what stopped me then. Maybe Luna, who found me seconds before the entrance and told me we had to run so we could start our dance.
Maybe the way she looked at me and my eyes, how she took me in her arms and promised she'd always stay by my side. Or maybe the way she wiped my tears while assuring me we'd win, that we'd go to high school, to college, and that we'd find boyfriends who looked like Damon Salvatore.
What's certain is that Dad didn't make it to that competition. And when I got home late that night, I found a single note saying there was food in the fridge.
No excuse. No apology. He didn't even look at me. And I swallow the lump in my throat, hating that I still feel these emotions so strongly at those memories.
I barely settle into my chair when I hear the front door, and I freeze with a napkin in my hand.
Within moments, Damien enters the room, and I don't want to look at him. I refuse to look at him when I know why he came. I know why he's breathing hard.
"Sorry,slonko. Two idiots crashed on the highway, and we had to detour."
I nod slightly as I place the napkin in my lap.
I sense him come up next to my chair, and that scent of leather and musk wraps around my reason and, with it, my soul.
Damien leans toward me and takes my face in his hands. I know he doesn't understand why I have tears in my eyes and my face is contorted trying not to cry.
"Give me a name and I promise my blade will cut through every layer of skin," he tells me with such certainty that I almost laugh.
Almost.
"You came," I whisper, and my voice breaks.
He frowns, and his hands tense.
"I promised you," he whispers back.
But I don't think he understands that he's the first man who's kept his promises to me.
He's the first person who truly saw me. The first person who, no matter how much I push him away, still comes close to me. Because I learned one thing from Dad and from my entire relationship with him: you can't be rejected if you're the one who rejects. You can't be the one abandoned if you abandon first. And this man is the first one I want to try for. To try letting these feelings grow. To try accepting that someone wants me near him, without any hidden motive.
I put my hands around his neck, pushing away that annoying voice telling me he'll break my heart, and I kiss him.
At first he's too shocked by my gesture and it takes him a few moments to recover, but when his mouth opens for me, I put all the frustration, all the stress from the past week, all the fear that I might lose him, into this kiss.
All the insecurity that he might abandon me too. That he might forget about me, just like the most important man in a girl's life did.
It doesn't take him long to take control, and I feel him exploring every inch, kissing my upper and lower lips in turn, then leaving a trail of kisses on my cheek.
