SHE (Book #1)

21

**Tempest***

We didn't stay at the party long. It only took a brush against each other's lips to know that we were in deep trouble. We stayed long enough, bringing a wave of tension into the crowded room. As soon as people started to leave, I gave Olivia her gift and we left.

The car ride was silent. pin-drop silent. All anyone would hear was the breathing of two lost people trying to piece the past hour of their lives. Trying to understand the circumstances they stand.

As for myself.
I am afraid.

I haven't been afraid in such a long time, and I forgot how sickening the feeling was. To have fear. To have a weakness. To have overwhelming emotions. There are moments where I think I am in way over my head, or I haven't thought well into this. I am jumping off the deep end without the proper training of how to swim.

I am drowning.
My lungs are about to collapse.
My head is about to burst.
I am drowning.

Malachi doesn't drive me home. Instead, we both walk into his apartment, sit directly across from each other, and say nothing.

My mind goes blank.

the silence is eerie.

"We can't do this, Malachi," I whisper, looking far off into the distance.

He looks up from where his head is placed in his hands, "Don't say that," He looks insane. His hair looks like an untamed fire after he rakes his hands through it one too many times. Yet, he is unnaturally beautiful still.

My heart is touched by the sight of a man who is fighting through emotions... for me. And all this time I treated him like he was some inconsiderate fool who knew nothing about how to feel. Who was I to say such a thing? 

"Listen to me, Malachi," I tell him, "I am not-"

"You are not what? Dammit, Tempest, stop it. Just stop it. You are always contradicting yourself. Always saying one thing, but the saying another. Just stop. It hurts to hear you say this to me, okay," he slams his hands against the table and gets up, pacing the room, "I know, we are not meant for each other, but you can't deny what happened earlier. You can't deny what you felt," He stops to look at me, challenging me to deny.

I have been in denial for far too long.
I remember the first I saw him. I thought of how someones can look so mesmerizing, yet I was new and tried to keep my head down. But our worlds kept clashing one too many times.
We meet at the mall three times, all by accident.
We find each other in the same friend group.
We find each other with the same title as soon-to-be heirs.

After him, my world shifted just a little. I refused to see it. I am trained to think of him as a challenge, an enemy, a competitor. I didn't take a second to see him as a person. to build an actual friendship with him, instead of skipping so many steps. My head is hurting. It's agonizing to think I have mistreated him in such a way. I was prejudice. I labeled him. I was trying to protect myself.

But I saw glimpses of who he is.
I can see he is also fighting his own demons.
He has never seen a glimpse of who I really am. 

"What do you suggest we do?" I ask him. ready to receive a foolish response.

He stands in front of me, looking back and forth between my eyes, "We see where this goes," he takes my hands in his.

I feel a laugh erupt from the pain I am feeling. I laugh hysterically, menacingly, crazily. He lets my hands go. 

"Do you think this is a fucking fairytale?" I look at him, suddenly enraged by his lack of thought process, "You think love is going to solve everything? Did you forget who we are? Actually, did you forget who I am? I am Tempest Moore, the girl who came from literal hell on earth to take the lovely spot you have warmed up," I stand and walk towards him, "I am... I was in so much pain after losing my mother. I paid a price to take my place, the place that you wouldn't even have a chance to go after if I hadn't been taken away from where I belong," My voice is cracking, and I am swallowing ugly tears as I start to remember everything I promised to forget.
"I will not allow whatever the hell is growing between us to stop me. Do you hear me? I am not going to choose you over my title, because I paid my last drop of sanity for this,"