Hellbound With You

Reason

Abigail knew she sounded like a mad woman.

"You're crazy, Aby," a whisper in her head told her but the oddest thing was that she didn't feel it. She was totally sane and completely clearheaded.

This was the most daring thing she had ever done in her life and the most terrifying, too. Yet, she was calmer than ever; more certain about this than anything else.

The man directed a gaze of disbelief at her. His eyes pierced through her as if he was trying to pry into her soul, but when he saw the unwavering look in her eyes, he shook his head.

He failed to understand this little fragile creature before him. Everyone yearned for heaven, yet this girl wished to experience hell? He was simply stupefied. This little girl might be the most intriguing person he'd ever met.

"Yellow, what's your name?" he finally asked.

"Aby… Abigail Lee."

"Abigail…" he echoed her name as he fiddled her yellow scarf again. Her name on his lips sounded so nice.

He seemed to be thinking about something as he looked into her eyes again before a wicked, devastating smile appeared on his glorious face.

"Sorry but…" he started as his gaze once again traveled from her head down to her to toes. "I'm not interested in unattractive girls."

His comment, and that playful smirk on his face aggravated her. She was usually unaffected by these kinds of judgmental comments that boys and girls often threw at her. She simply didn't care what they said about her looks but why was it that this man's comment riled her up this much?

"Just you wait! I will prove to you how attractive I can be!" Abigail was quick to retort. She didn't even know how she managed to speak like this. She was used to not giving any attention to what other people said. She wouldn't even bother justifying herself so what she was saying right now was actually a shock even to herself. She didn't know she was capable of speaking this way, until now.

But then, the man's response was another fascinating chuckle.

"Yellow, you really are unbelievable." He said before his expression abruptly shifted again. The corner of his lips turned down in disapproval. "But I'm serious. I'm not into little girls."

"Ina Moore is just two years older than me." She argued, not backing down.

"Miss Moore is… a mature, sexy woman. And you're…" He raised an eyebrow. "Even though you're two years younger than her, you look like a granny."

Abigail was getting more and more aggravated. No one ever made her feel like this before. The way she dressed up today was, as always, purposely unfashionable. Her hair was braided in pigtails; she was wearing fake thick eyeglasses and her winter coat was boring and unfashionably thick and long. She knew she looked really unappealing at the moment. After all, this was the appearance she was aiming for today – for her to look so damned unattractive that no man would bother to look at her.

"I purposely dressed like this today." She hissed, bravely. If only she knew that she would meet this man at the end of the day, she would've at least made herself a little more presentable.

"Oh... really?"

"I will show you."

The man snickered, shaking his head. He was looking at her with wonder and disbelief and for a moment, there was a strange and dangerous glimmer in his eyes as he stared at her. But it abruptly disappeared as his hand landed on her head.

"Go home, Yellow. It's late." He smiled and entered his car.

"Wait!" she called out but the man only waved at her before the car left, leaving her astounded and unexpectedly upset.

Abigail was incredibly frustrated. She was pouting, her brows were pulled together as she entered her car. She couldn't understand why that rude man had this unnerving effect on her. Was it because he rejected and mocked her appearance? But she was truly used to this kind of thing. Something like that definitely shouldn't frustrate her to this extent. More importantly, her heart was still pounding. The man was long gone, and yet, she was still nervous?! What was going on? Could it be that this nervousness was the aftershock of her bravery? That was the only sensible reason she could think of.

Shaking her head to clear her mind, Abigail just started the engine when someone knocked on the car's window.

A man was standing there, smiling at her. The man was wearing a black leather jacket and he was also unbelievably pleasing to the eyes. Was there something wrong with this place? Why do overly good looking men keep popping out of nowhere?!

Abigail didn't dare roll down her window. What her eyes looked for first were the locations of the CCTV's. When she spotted one right above her car, she relaxed a little but she was still hesitant.

"You're so damn outrageous Abigail! You didn't fear offering yourself to that scary stranger but now you're afraid to open your window to this pleasant looking one?!" she mumbled to herself, shaking her head, as though she was now convinced that she was crazy.

The man knocked again, flashing his pleasant smile, as if he was using his beauty to lure her out.

'I have something to give you.' She read his lips.

Heaving a sigh, she finally rolled down the car's window.

"Hello, Miss…" he grinned, flashing his white teeth. He was truly another out of this world beauty. Although, to her, that ruthless man still beat him good when she compared their looks.

"What is it? Do you need something?" she asked politely. The man leaned in on her and gave her a piece of paper.

"If you want to meet that man again, just contact me and I'll tell you where to find him," he said, smiling kindly at her. He had a pleasant atmosphere about him that made one not feel that he had any ulterior motives. He looked like the kind of man that would easily entice people with just his sweet smile. Still, Abigail had a hunch that this one was dangerous, too.

"That man?" Abigail creased her brows, trying to confirm, even though she already knew, who he was talking about.

"Mm. That cold man who told you that you're unattractive." He grinned and Abigail blinked at him. Her frustration somehow came back.

"You know him?" she finally asked and the man nodded.

"He's my friend."

"W-why would you want me to meet him?"

"Because you want to show him that his judgement is wrong. So let's just say, I'm helping you prove your point." He grinned again, looking as though he was encouraging her.

Abigail was even more confused but before she could say anything more, he spoke again.

"You don't want to? Did you already change your mind?" he asked, seemingly disappointed.

But the moment he began retracting his hand, Abigail took the piece of paper he was holding out to her.

The man smiled in satisfaction before he moved away. "Bye bye, Miss Yellow! See you!" he waved and then before she knew it, he disappeared from her sight, leaving her blinking in confusion and curiosity as she stared at the note in her hand.

As she left the city, Abigail's mind began to wander.

She was already twenty-two and still never had a boyfriend. She grew up within a peaceful, loving family and she had grown up into a really good girl. Some even compared her to an untainted snow, well-mannered and pure, but most mocked her, calling her, Miss goody-two-shoes or little Miss Priss.

As she was growing up, Abigail had gotten used to other people mocking her but her grandparents always encouraged and advised her to not let the water around her enter her ship, otherwise, she would drown. She had been raised to keep a positive mindset and she herself decided that there was no way she would let those kinds of people drown her.

She had a reason for why she had never had a boyfriend in her twenty-two years of existence. When she was seventeen, she realized that she had developed a trauma – she was afraid of having someone fall in love with her.

Abigail had witnessed just how much her father suffered day by day, even years after her mother died. It was unbearable for her to even watch him. Her father loved her mother so much that even after nearly two decades her death, she still saw her dad crying at night, looking at his wife's photo. She had seen just how painful it was to lose someone you loved through her father – it was nothing but torture. She even once heard her father saying that he didn't feel alive anymore since that day her mother died. She knew that her father was only holding on because of her.

Years after her mother's death, Abigail was diagnosed with the same illness that killed her mother. It appeared that she inherited the illness from her and since then, she'd been battling with it. She was only seventeen that time and she knew that just like her mother, she only had 5 more years to live.

That was why she always rejected the boys who showed any interest in her. There were a few of them but her fear would always be triggered especially when someone confessed to her. All she could say to them was 'sorry'. Due to that, Abigail avoided boys as much as she could. She even purposely dressed quite unfashionably in order to become less attractive.

However, as years passed by, Abigail started to question herself. 'Will I die just like this?'

The desires that she had been suppressing all this time were getting out of control. She had been dreaming of wanting to experience how it would feel like to love someone. She wanted to know how it would feel to have butterflies in one's stomach, and how it would feel to kiss and embrace that person you loved with all your heart, romantically. She had read many webnovels and she couldn't help but wish she could at least experience this so called love before she died. That was her only wish – to fall in love, to find someone she could fall in love with.

But she was torn. She was afraid and worried sick. She didn't want to leave someone behind to suffer when she was gone. She didn't want anyone to experience the loss and pain her father was going through until now.

For years, she'd been thinking about it and she thought she had already accepted her fate but now that her due date was getting closer, the desire in her heart only kept on getting stronger. So she decided to be brave and try her best to make her wish come true with the little time she had left.

The only way she could think of to fulfill her wish was – to find a man whom she could fall in love with but would never fall in love with her. She had heard and read stories about one sided love. She heard and read that that kind of love was excruciatingly painful but… she still wanted it. If this was the only way for her to experience falling in love, she would be willing to throw herself in it, even if it meant being hurt. She thought that she could handle the pain of loving someone who didn't love her back more, than dying without knowing what love felt like at all. Perhaps, she was thinking about the quote she once read when she was eighteen that said, 'It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all'.

Abigail once anonymously shared her situation online and asked about what to do. Her thread garnered lots of attention and different contradicting reactions occurred.

"Since you don't want someone to fall in love with you, then why don't you go and pick a random bad guy? I mean, there are a lot of jerks and heartless idiots out there who only know how to break hearts." Was one of the advice she wanted to try. But what if that supposedly heartless someone would fall for her in the end?

Abigail still had a year left.

She was doing fine for now. The people around her, except her family didn't even know that she was sick. But her mother was like this back then, too. Abigail somehow knew that her health would start to worsen in the fifth year – this year. She could even foresee that she might have to start going back and forth from the hospital in the next month or two. She was aware that she didn't have much time left.