Hello sexy people. This is a slow-burn romance set in the fictional town of Spritehill. All characters involved in sexy scenes are over 18. I apologize if there are any typos. Do enjoy!
THE START
Dreary...that's how I and the weather felt I guess, because it was drizzling and the color of the sky matched my exact mood at the moment. Maybe, the sky had also just had it's whole life turned around...just like me.
Oh hi there, of course you must be wondering, 'who is this weird girl and what the heck is she going on about'. A little back story...or sob story then shall we?
My name is Corn (weird name huh?) it's actually short for Cornelia but Corn's what I prefer now. It reminds me of him, that's what he always called me. 'Called'...not 'Call' because for the rest of my life I would never hear him call my name...ever.
When I was four, I had fallen off the monkey bars at a playgroud, landing on my short legs and spraining both my ankles. Back then I was convinced that there was no greater pain in the world. Boy was I wrong...boy was I so incredibly wrong.
James...my brother. I recall the words my father had said to me a few weeks ago 'well, at least we can smile a little knowing he's now an angel'. It was a little funny 'cause he had always been an angel to me.
My very own personal guardian angel sent to me by God in the form of a brother. It seemed sick to me though, because I'd always heard that the devil was the one who took back the gifts he gave to humans but it seemed to me that 'The Lord' had succeeded in taking away the gift he had given to my family...our light.
It was dark now, atleast that's how it seemed to me. I could definitely see it in my parents..the darkness and I could feel it that something had changed for us.
I had always visualized my demise in many many ways. Relax! I'm not planning to harm myself. If you haven't noticed, I spend a great deal amount of time in my head and I like to let my imagination run wild.
Most times, I see myself living a long and fulfilled life and then going out due to natural causes. Other times, I'm convinced there is no possibility of me making it to 25. These days however, it seems I may actually die (sooner than 25) of guilt.
Guilt-the crushing feeling that eats at your very soul and threatens to kill you excrutiatingly slowly, from the inside out.
My brother had overdosed...on a drug concoction. I would never know what it was for certain. The hospital said it was a mixture of different harmful substances with long scientific names that none of us could really remember.
That day will forever be imprinted on my mind. My mother's feral scream had caused I and my father to rush up the stairs in record breaking speed. Right in his room...on the carpeted floor he lay...still...with foam leaving his mouth and going down the side of his face.
Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion that day. My mother, sitting by the side of the door on the floor with her back against the wall, her knees up,both her hands over her mouth, staring at James' body. She looked frozen in place. My father, yelling into his phone our address and the current situation.
I could feel my feet moving, I was walking. Walking towards James. Walking towards the body that appeared to be lifeless. Walking with every intention to confirm for myself...to check if maybe he was just asleep and had fancied doing it on the floor today. I could feel the strong arm pulling me away. Pulling me away and out of his room.
I could hear a voice saying things to me...saying things in a calm voice. I could not make out my father's words but I could tell they were words meant to soothe me. I could not hear him though, I actually could not hear anything atall.
My brain seemed to not be registering anything anymore. Not the red and blue lights of the ambulance outside our house, not the people in uniform moving hurriedly up our stairs to his room, not the professional steady voices saying 'lift him on three'.
James was buried a week later. I'd like to call that day, the darkest day of our lives. It even rained that day. The sky was a very dark gloom, casting down heavy drops. Making it hard to differentiate our tears from the rain...it seemed even the earth was expressing it's pain of having lost a special one.
I guess you might be wondering 'Am I here to read all about James?'. I apologize but he is a very special part of my life and a very important part of this story. He is the reason why we were currently parked in our new driveway staring through the windows at our new home.
We had had to move, a decision that as far as I was concerned, was due to the selfishness of my parents. Well, I mean can I blame them?. Calling my parents conservative, would be the understatement of history...I actually do think that the right word to better describe just how conservative they were had not been discovered and could not yet be found in any dictionary.
I'm talking gospel music only, only reading novels they approve, only having friends they approve. They told my brother he wasn't getting a cell phone until he got into college. We had a computer we could use for school research and every weekend my father checked the browser history religiously.
The only reason I was allowed to wear shorts and trousers was because when I was little it was hard for my mother to get me to sit with my legs together. She had gotten fed up and embarrased enough about me revealing my drawls every chance I got, that she had somehow convinced my father to let me wear shorts. I guess we all got used to it that the topic of me transitioning back to skirts and dresses never came up.
My mother had actually been born in the church...and I don't mean that in the way you think. I mean her mother had actually gone into labour in the middle of a Sunday service and had been delivered by the priest. In her words, she had been 'born for Christ'. My father had always been a devoted member of the church.
They were both strong Catholics and were recognized in many ways by the church back home. When the news had gotten around that James overdosed on drugs, my parents couldn't seem to face the church anymore.
They couldn't even answer the Priest's call for a meeting he had requested few weeks after James' funeral. The visits of our family friends who were ofcourse also members of the church, always seemed so strained. Everyone seemed to try their best to avoid talking about the way James died.
They all seemed so supportive...like all they really wanted was to comfort us in our time of grief. But I think we could all tell it was only a matter of time before it was...adressed.
In my opinion, we kinda lived the next three weeks in hiding. At some point during the first week, my father had decided that we had to leave, and then we had spent the next two, indoors packing. Ofcourse my Mother had to leave at some point for a (very quick) grocery run, and my father to finalize some stuff at his work, but yeah...one month later, sees us in a new, little (very little), town...trying to start our life over. Spritehill.
The flash across the sky and the crack of thunder that followed seemed to me like the earth expressing it's anger at my current situation. It brought a little smile to my lips. Something that hasn't happened in a long, long time.
