When Clyde Parker, the wayward son and the rotten-apple of the Parker family-tree, storms his way back into Avery Fields, he sets out a flurry of butterfly effect in Dawn Marshal's life.
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WHEN SHE WAS OUT she didn't notice the sky turning a flamingo pink nor the wind getting colder. She just ran, her scurrying footsteps chasing pavements and driveways and esplanades.
She wanted to escape, just like a spaceship needed to acquire an escape velocity to rip through the earth's surface, she thought if she ran just fast enough she could crack through her personal-bubble and possibly escape.
But the fact remained, the world was small and round and at the end of the day, like a boomerang no matter how far it's thrown, she will always have to come back home.
She found herself back where it all started, the night where she learnt how it felt to escape for the very first time. She crumpled down like rag-doll on the edge of the cliff, her knees grazed by the gravel with its grassy flank.
Her teary eyes wilted down the hole that was swallowed into the earth, the black hole Of nothingness and for the very first time, she wondered what was there, down below? The very thought of being swallowed into nothingness appeared tempting.
The bitter wind tugged her somewhere faraway. Hey eyes were bleary of tears and just like that she was fading, drifting away.
"Give them a razor and everyone's suicidal!" A voice echoed through the battering of wind against the treetops.
"Fancy seeing you here" she peered at him through the web of her tears, "Trust me, you are not the last person I needed to see today."
Clyde Parker hovered over her head, his eyes scrutinizing her like a complex Calculus problem. He stared at her for the longest time not saying anything. Perhaps he didn't care and that's what she wanted for someone to not care, to not question but slowly watch her break, slowly watch her destroy herself.
But he didn't look at her like she was a broken toy that needed mending. He looked at her like a reader flicking through the pages of a book, eyes gently washing over the words, cherishing the best parts. He looked at her as if he was reading her. But he didn't know that he was the hardest to read.
"Why are crying over something you can't control?" He dropped beside her, his legs dangling from the cliff. Tears streamed down her eyes and cracked her face. She turned away, wiping the fallen tears with her sleeves.
"It feels like I am stuck in a sinking ship, the water is filling in and I can't breathe. It's so hard and I just wanna escape; leave everything behind, pack my bags and run away somewhere really, really far" she said in a broken voice like a child throwing tantrums, "You make it all seem so easy-"
"It's easier to leave when you have no reason to stay", he didn't meet her gaze, "it makes it so dang easier to disappear when you have no one holding you back, no one waiting for you to return or expecting you home. The less you care, the easier it is. I don't let myself stay long enough to find a reason to care. But Dawn Marshal, you are like a river. Wherever you flow you carry pieces of people with you and leave behind pieces of yourself. With your sunny smile, you walk into their hearts and melt, leaving your imprint."
