Dependent on You

Chapter 34

Chapter 34

Third Person

The next day, Adrian sat outside in her backyard, cutting through air and pumping her legs on her wooden swing set her dad built her when she was just a toddler. Morning light bronzed her skin with a sheen of warmth and around the robins chirped a sing-song sound as they fluttered from tree to tree, sometimes landing on the green ground pecking at the dew coated grass. Adrian breathed in the fresh musky air, her fingers gripping the blue plastic-covered chains as she soared up, up, up, and then down, hearing the whoosh in her ears as she did.

It was nice she thought, swinging alone, repeating the same movement over and over again. It was something constant, that wouldn't change unless of course the swing broke and she fell flat onto the hard earth. Constant. That meant there'd be no surprises, only monotonous motion and that's exactly what she wanted. She'd been swinging all morning and hadn't yet gotten dressed from her baby blue star-covered pajama shorts and big Rolling Stones t-shirt. This activity was painstakingly normal, and it was nice to simply do something normal when her life has steadily drifted from slightly different to full-out bizarre.

She didn't even think 'bizarre' fully explained it either. Murder isn't just bizarre, it's grotesque, incredulous. Murder, Elliot had murdered someone. Not just someone, his mother! He had murdered his mother and that completely, utterly terrified her. She had no idea what to do with this information. But she kept asking, asking, asking, and not even thinking about the consequences of knowing the knowledge she wanted to know. She didn't like being left in the dark, hopelessly ignorant, but now she was beginning to reconsider if ignorance wasn't such a bad thing after all.

It was like a meteor had sailed through the white bubbled sky in incomprehensible speed, captivated in a scape of furious sunset flames, and she had fallen target to its lethal landing. Though she wasn't dead, she was still shocked. Still, a mess of emotions, buzzing like annoying honey bees circling her head and invading her mind. She sure felt like she'd been stung at least. She couldn't sleep last night even though after Elliot dropped her off she felt exhausted. But exhaustion didn't beat her wired-up mind.

She kept turning things over, analyzing each word, each expression, seeing Elliot's red-rimmed cobalt eyes shining every time she blinked. She didn't think she'd ever forget that look. It made the blood to her heart stop pumping, it made her feel like she'd been punched so hard in the chest that her ribs broke and splintered into her heart as the marrow drained and suffocated her lungs. How could she forget a look like that? How could she forget when she tried to memorize every second they spent together?

She knew then with absolute—tongue-tying, gut-wrenching certainty that she loved this fatally-flawed, hot-tempered, abrupt-talking boy. She loved him. And seeing him vulnerable crushed her to pieces, to absolute shambles.

It was a revelation.

Adrian loved him. She knew his deepest darkest secret (or at least one of them) and as insane as it was it didn't even put a dent into how she felt. That scared her. It should scare her. She couldn't tell anyone, she wouldn't. She loved him and she didn't want anything to happen to him. Even if his secret chewed her up and swallowed her whole. She swore she would keep it and she would until her lungs collapsed and her ribs caved and there was no air left to breathe but her own blood. She didn't want him taken from her; she didn't want him to leave her.

"Adrian," Her father's voice had her head snapping up, as her heart just about pummeled out of her chest and outside her body. He startled her. She had been so invested in her own thoughts that she hadn't known what was going on around her. "What are you doing out here so early?"

Exhaling, Adrian loosened her death grip on the blue swing chains and put on the best smile she could muster as she continued to leisurely pump her legs. "I thought I'd swing since it's a nice day out, captain." She wondered if her smile looked real or if it looked forced, she hoped it looked real. She didn't need her parents thinking something was wrong or that something was bothering her. Even though she was an anchor on a ship, waiting on edge for the time to come when she was forcefully thrown overboard to a depthless sea of darkness.