epilogue

                                    

                                          
EPILOGUE​


                          
All lives end — all hearts are broken.
                          
​It had been unbearable. The whole thing; every second worse than the last. It hurt so bad that she couldn't breathe, seemed as though the oxygen around her refused to fill her lungs. Love wasn't supposed to feel like pain; she didn't want to live in pain any longer.
                          
​The worst day of loving someone, is the day that you lose them.
                          
​She never got the chance to say goodbye, regretting every second as she cried and screamed that night — warm blood soaking her clothes while she tried to keep that agony alive. For the first time in her life, she wanted the pain; welcomed it with open arms, the longer she felt the agony the more hope filled her system but she wailed in despair when the pain subsided and total numbness settled within. And people believed that pain is the worst feeling but nothing is worse than the numbness inside that comes after the pain — and to a Pheanix, that's worse than being skinned alive, having each piece of flesh torn from their body.
                          
​But in the end, death didn't let you say goodbye. And in reality, Carter knew that she couldn't move on and she didn't want to because she couldn't handle the fact Allison was gone, she couldn't handle the numbness coursing through her veins. She knew that she had no one to turn to, no one to talk to, no way to escape the agony that infiltrated her life. But did the demons within her hear her crying?
                          
​She sat in her room for hours sobbing hysterically — the big gulping kind of sobs that made everyone look like an oversized toddler — but she hadn't cared what she looked like as she finally grieved the death of a lost friend. But Allison had been the lucky one; death is peaceful – easy. It's life that's hard. And learning to move on from the fact that they had lost one of their closest friends is what makes it so hard.
                          
Carter was completely drained — physically and emotionally depleted.
                          
​She clutched her stomach for hours that night; salty tears bouncing against her forearms as she prayed with all her might to feel the pain. Something — anything that would disrupt the numbness that settled there when Allison took her final breath. The slightest fragment of agony would've been enough for her to convince herself that the past twenty-four hours had been a horrifically disturbing nightmare.
                          
​But, Carter knew all too well that it hadn't been something she could wake up from and that was what scared her the most.
                          
​People say that when you lose someone you love, all that person wants is to forget ever meeting that loved one; wishing they could take back all of the memories, the meaningless bantering, the stomach-cramping laughs, and all of the tears. But it's impossible, because in the end, those are the things that make them worth being missed. When you lose someone who had become a necessity to living your day-to-day life, you lose a part of yourself.
                          
​And she refused to believe that there was nothing left for her now.
                          
​Carter hastily tucked her hands under her arms, shaky legs carried her across her apartment until she stood in front of the stainless steel refrigerator with arched shoulders. She could feel her sanity sinking just beneath her surface, desperately trying to keep herself together when the harsh reality was that she was a small nudge away from breaking down completely. There were warm pools in her eyes as she closed them, taking a few deep breaths to calm her nerves. If she let all of her emotions run on the adrenaline of everything she did, she would lose the dangerously loose grip she had on herself.
                          
​When she opened the machinery in front of her, a spine-tingling chill ran down her spine like wet slippery spiders. All of the warmth was seemingly sucked out of her body as her breath caught in the back of her throat; entire body shuddered as she slowly allowed herself to turn around. When she had made a complete one-eighty, a startled scream escaped her lips and the glass container of milk slipped out of her fingers. Pieces of glass embedded themselves into Carter's exposed flesh as the chilling milk splashed against her legs, creating a pool around her feet.
                          
​"How are — aren't you supposed to be—?" Carter panted, a blinding pressure building up at the base of her skull.
                          
​An all too familiar figure stood before her; sculpted cheekbones, sloped button nose, perfectly plump lips, long sleek chocolate hair — nothing about her seemed real — everything about the person was perfect, like it were some sort of illusion. Carter blinked several times, trying to prove to herself that she was hallucinating, but much to her dismay, she wasn't. The figure leaning against her kitchen counter was completely and utterly real.
                          
​There was a sickening smirk on the intruder's face as she took several steps toward Carter, the Were-Pheanix cowering further into the refrigerator wishing that she could magically disappear into its confines. She was practically convulsing in her position; muscles trembling as the feeling of getting hypothermia settled in her body.
                          
​"You must be Carter — and we're going to have so much fun together."​