When Night Falls

What Hurts the Most – Rascal Flatts
It would be good if you would listen to this while reading this chapter. (: Thanks

-Ryan’s POV-

Jealousy, thick, overwhelming, uncontrollable... The blackness twisted painfully in my chest, extending its reach like dark ivy stretching over a crumbling wall. It filled out within me, and I battled against it, weak and vulnerable.

I struggled.

If my heart could beat, would it be more unbearable? Would the pain be less cutting, or would it be even sharper?

Christine would be safer, much safer with Jamier… He was, as Hades said, very humane, as ironic as it sounded. I could read it in his thoughts. It was amazing, the way his thirst didn’t seem to matter to him, not even the slightest. He looked at every human, and saw a life. His kindness was overwhelming, almost unbelievable.

It was bewildering how someone who had been through so much sadness, and had suffered so much in the past could embrace and treasure life the way he did. Not even Sarah, who had been exposed to this life so much earlier, had the remarkable self-control that he seemed to have. However, in the slightest possibility that he would lose his control over his thirst, at least I knew that he would never hurt Christine…

Christine…
I gritted my teeth, the anger almost explosive within my chest. When he had hugged her, I almost lost my mind. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand his feelings for her. She was like the blazing, bright star in his pitch-black sky. Her kindness towards him had changed him, pulled him away from his dark past. He looked at her and saw a future; a happier future that he once thought was only in dreams.

After seeing his past in his memories and thoughts, a part of me was happy for him… Glad that he found someone to love and care for. Glad that he was, for once in his life, happy.

But when she hugged him back… It felt as though some part of me had died.

Did she… feel the same for him as well?

Perhaps then, my decision would make her happy.

I would suffer in silence. I would watch her smile; watch her laugh from a distance. That smile did not belong to me. Though I ached for it to be mine, though I yearned for her to be near… Even though she was my soul-mate, it didn’t mean that I was hers. Maybe I was destined to be alone for the rest of eternity. As long as she was happy, nothing else mattered.

Nothing else.

-Christine’s POV-

I could feel Ryan’s eyes on me, or rather, us, as we left the cafeteria.

What was he thinking?

I sighed softly.

Jamier and I walked beside each other, not saying a word. It was a comfortable silence. I smiled gently to myself. It felt nice, not to be racking my head for a topic of conversation. I didn’t know him that long, in fact, I hardly had time to get to know him or speak to him, yet he felt like an old friend.

“Where’s your locker?” I asked him as I stopped in front of my own locker.

He glanced up from the floor, absent-mindedly pushing his messy, silver blonde hair out of his face.

“I haven’t gotten mine yet. I just sent in the application for the empty locker next to yours today.” And he smiled, the brilliance of it lightning up the dull hallways.

I smiled back easily.

“So, I take it that you’ll have to sit with me and share books with me today?” I asked, twirling the combination to the lock on my locker. I spun it round twice, then once to the right, then to the left, and to the right again, before the lock clicked open.

“Yep. I’ll have to partner you.”

“Drats.” I said teasingly. “I miss sitting alone already.”

He laughed, swiftly catching the algebra textbook that I had hurled playfully in his face.

“You shall carry all my books today then,” I grinned. His midnight blue eyes glinted with amusement.

“Yes, Madam!” He saluted. “Anything you say, Madam!”

I swatted him with my pencil case.

“Onward, Soldier!”

And I laughed at him as he began to march forward stiffly.

It was amazing how much I liked him already.