𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄 [18+]

50: Wilted Writ

"I think about you. But I don't say it anymore."

― Marguerite Duras, Hiroshima Mon Amour.

Marienne's POV:

Scorching hot water was sprayed over my skin, leaving a burning sensation all over my naked skin as I leaned back in the shower glass.

The coldness of the glass and the warmth of my skin raised a contrasting sensitivity through my body. I ran a hand through my hair, letting those moments I had left behind in the pages of past pour over me like the boiling water.

I let out a sigh of relaxation, feeling my rigid muscles loosen up. My eyes closed on their own accord, my mind transpiring from dream to reality, reality to dresm.

Almost like a trance-state.

I didn't know how to feel, how to behave, how to sink in the information of my ex's diary being found......

After three agonizing months.

Three months. I had spent three anticipating months contemplating, wondering, praying...... just to find those pages.....

All these months I had spent wishing, begging that may those pages held something.... anything.... that hints me why, just why she had been killed.

Madeline had been cheating on me, I know that, but, I also knew that she wasn't the kind of person who takes enmity against the wrong person. She was a good person.

And now when I think about back to the time when we were together......

I had done a lot of injustice to her.

The 10 long years we had spent together, it was just there. To be frank, I was beginning to see her side now as well. I never let her have her freedom, I made her quit her job, I fought with her for every single thing and never really tried listening to her.

Madeline wasn't guilty of her actions alone, I had a part in it too....

She had seeked out love in someone other than me because she grew tired of me and I was too stubborn to recognize her will of freedom. I saw her side of the story and it was true. I was truly a heartless bastard who tried to burden the whole relationship over her rather than sharing responsibilties with her.

I was the reason, my behaviour was the reason why she had been attracted to Ardent in the first place.

He wasn't even that special.

If only, if only my condition..... schizophrenia was found out sooner.

All I saw was canitude behind my closed leads. Darkness blending into gray and then turning white.

A sigh left me. I had enough time to get over my fiancee, I had done enough.

I had done things of which's guilt and burden will continue to weight down on me for a lifetime. And now when I think about her, my heart doesn't skip a beat like before, I don't get that euphoric rush like before.

It was true that I had loved her, she was my first love. But, at some point, that love became an act of convinience for both of us. We stopped talking regularly, we stopped watching stars together, we stopped buying each other gifts. We stopped having dinner together.

We were together because it seemed right, because it was supposed to be. Both of us made an act of compromise.

We gave each other space, but that space eventually created a rift between us and our hearts.

I loved her, she loved me too.... but sometimes, love is not enough. And when love wasn't enough for us, we fell out of it, unbeknownst to us. I was not a fool; I knew this was what had happened when I think about it now,