A Love Restored

The rhythmic hum of the refrigerator was the only music in the kitchen as I scrubbed crusted flour off the countertop.

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alone in the kitchen before he walked in. He didn’t spare me a glance, or maybe he did side eye me a bit. But I pretended not to notice.

He guzzled water from a glass, the ice clinking against the silence. His back was ramrod straight, shoulders tense. He looked worried about something. It guess he was stressed.

Suddenly, his head snapped up, eyes finding mine like the jolt of a live wire.

“Good morning.” I murmured

“Morning.” He answered distractedly. His eyes were zeroed in on my face. I prayed in my head that he couldn’t see the remnants of last night’s fight with my father. I had tried my best to hide it with makeup. But putting on makeup had hurt.

I remembered seeing the mark in the morning – a stark purple bloom that marred the pale canvas of my cheek and my temple, it looked like a venomous spider web. It was scary, actually. I could only hope he hadn’t done some serious damage.

My breath hitched as Felix gazed at me. Panic coiled in my gut,

Please, don’t ask me about it. Please, just leave.

His eyes narrowed, the green depths swirling with concern. Flora,” his voice was rough, sandpaper against silk, “what happened to your face?”

Words jumbled in my throat, desperate to form a lie, a shield against the truth his concern threatened to expose. When Felix asked me something with so much concern, how could I lie to him? My body wasn’t accustomed to not listening to him.

“Just… tripped,” I mumbled, forcing a smile that felt painted on with ice. “It was really funny, actually.” I giggled, “I fell and it was a whole thing.”

He didn’t return the mirth on my face. Instead, his features darkened. He knew I was lying. It was easy to see. I had clearly been punched in the face.

“You’ve become so good at lying, Flora.” He said lowly. His fists were clenched at his side. “This isn’t the first time I’m seeing you hurt. Answer me.”

“It’s really nothing.” I looked down at the floor.

One. Two. Three. One, Two. Three.

He moved toward me, a predator closing in on prey. When he approached me, his gaze on me was unwavering and searching. Interrogative.

“Tripped?” His voice was a low growl, disbelief laced with something I couldn’t name. “Flora, I’ve seen my fair share of injuries, Worse than this. That’s not a wound from tripping, that’s someone’s fist.”

My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic drum beating against the backdrop of a crumbling façade of being alright. “No, Felix,” I choked out, the lie heavy on my tongue, it left a bad taste in my mouth. “It’s nothing like that, really.”

His eyes wouldn’t leave the purple bruise. He wouldn’t even look into my eyes. His own were filled with a silent rage I had only seen in him a few times.

–

And even while all this was happening and I was panicking, the only things I could think of was – Oh, he still cares about me. Enough to be angry for me. But oh, there is no way he can find out.

“Don’t lie to me, Flora.” He snarled.

His voice, raw and pained, ripped through the carefully constructed armor I’d worn for years.

His expression changed, and his lips thinned, pressed together. “Was it your boyfriend?”

“I don’t have a boyfriend.” I answered.

“Then who?” He thundered. It was so loud I almost jumped.

“There’s no one, Felix,” I whispered, my voice thin and threadbare. “It’s just… me. I swear. I tripped.”

His jaw clenched, his hands fisted into tight balls. He reached for me, his fingers lightly encircled my wrist. He pulled me to him. Towering over me, his face was bent so our eyes met. My breath hitched. “Who hurt you, Flora?”

I gulped. “No one.”

I was feeding him white lies that he wasn’t accepting.

*. But what else could I do?

He pulled me impossibly closer, our chests were touching, and my labored breaths fanned his lips. I shivered, my breath coming out shaky.

“For fuck’s sake, Flora,” his words were a menacing whisper, “For once in your life, don’t be a fool.”

“I am the fool, Felix.”

“Always taking the blam

the blame, aren’t you,

au, Flora? Even for things you have no control over.” He pushed me away. “I thought you’d grown up,”

He turned

ay, his silhouette a stark statue against the window that poured in the sun. “Just tell me, Flora, Please, just fucking tell me.”

away.

His voice, low and choked. He sounded so desperate. It was almost a plea.

I fled the kitchen, the clatter of my retreating footsteps the only punctuation in the heavy silence. I ran until my lungs burned, down the stairs to the attic. I found myself a dark, lonely corner.

A wave of dizziness washed over me, followed by a crushing tightness in my chest. My breath hitched, each inhale a shallow rasp against the roaring in my ears. My vision blurred.

ny warmth. I counted till a hundred till the panic subsided.

Collapsing on the ground. I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to create any

Minutes bled into hours, the only sound the frantic hammering of my own heart. A raw ache had settled in my bones, a dull throb mirroring the hollowness in my soul, I was so tired. So tired. I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t want to be here.

My gaze, landed on the crate beside me. Hesitantly, I reached out, tracing the rough grain of the wood. It creaked open under my touch.

I looked inside. It was too dark to see much. I used the flashlight in my mobile phone to try to see.

The first thing I saw was a stack of faded photographs, their edges softened by age. In one, two gap–toothed grins beamed up at the camera, Felix’s arm slung possessively around my seven–year–old self. We were pirates that day, wielding sticks as swords, the world our oyster.

Laughter bubbled up from somewhere within me picked up another picture, this one capturing the awkward grace of our teenage years. Felix was fourteen in this. Me, twelve. I remembered the day like yesterday. It was taken in my yard by his mother. Tilly and I had forced him to make flower wreaths with us. We were both holding ours in the picture. I was looking at his pink wreath. He was looking at me.

Deeper into the crate, I unearthed more mementos of our shared past: a chipped seashell from our first trip to the beach, a pair of mittens knitted by my grandmother for him, a half–finished drawing of Felix I’d abandoned in a fit of rage after he had made fun of me for making it. Each object, a whisper of a life we once lived, a life far gone.

As I sifted through the mementos, the basement transformed into a time capsule. For a fleeting moment, the harsh realities of the present faded. And it was just me and him again. Kids. Happy, innocent. With dreams in our eyes and love in our hands.

I could almost hear the rustle of leaves as we built our fort in the woods, our shrieks echoing through the summer air. I could almost feel the warmth of his hand in mine as we danced under the hall at our high school prom. I could feel his hand in my back as he walked me to class every day. I remembered the scent of strawberries in his car that he would buy fresh for me every few days in the season.

In this basement, time stood still, frozen like it had never passed. Here, I could pretend the world hadn’t crumbled, that Felix and I were still writing our forever, one stolen moment at a time. If things hadn’t gone south, we’d probably be married by now. What a pleasure it would be, to be called his wife. I could see it so clearly. We’d be happy together. He’d take care of me. I’d make a beautiful home. In a few years, we’d have children. A boy and a girl we would adore.

I leaned my head against the wall and dreamt and dreami and dreamt for God knows how long

With a sigh that seemed to echo through the room, I closed the

The memories, though bittersweet, had offered a moment of

I stood, legs shaky beneath me, the weight of the present settling back onto my shoulders. The impite, a glimpse of the girl I once was, the girl who dared to dream of a forever with Felis.

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