Secrets I've Held in My Heart

Chapter 4 : Christian

I wouldn't think twice before ruining the person who EVEN THINKS about hurting her, but when it's about confessing my love, I don't know why I couldn't do that. This fear of ruining our perfect friendship is the second reason, whereas fear of forcing her to be in a relationship is still ranked as number one.

I know every beat of Ava Rinehart, if I had confessed my love then she would have accepted it out of formality, due to fear of losing her best friend and because she don't know how to reject me.

We don't say NO to each other. It wasn't a rule, but we have done it so much that it's now imprinted in our hearts as the prime rule. We have literally forgotten to say NO to each other. It's like someone has deleted that feature from our system.

If Ava would ever love me romantically, then I want it to happen out of love, not out of fear or anything. It was my only condition, but f**k! I'm a dipshit. I should have f****d that condition before it was too late. I wish I had revealed the secrets that I've held in my heart since my childhood. I wish I could get another chance, one last chance.

Chance to break all rules and conditions.

Chance to flutter her heart.

Chance to tell her that she is my dream and she is my reality.

Chance to do all the cliché things with her.

Chance to be the reason for her blush.

Chance to see her dressed up as mine.

Chance to tell her that she looks like God's grace to me.

Chance to tell her that I worship her.

Chance to tell her that she is my heaven.

Chance to confess my love to her.

Chance to go on wedding cake tasting with her.

Chance to wait for her on the wedding stage as her groom.

Chance to make her my bride.

Chance to introduce her as my officially wedded wife.

Just one last chance to be hers and make her mine.

I know I f****d up. I know I'll never get these above chances. But I still wanna be absurdly optimistic. I wanna build a time machine and go back in time.

It hurts a lot. It hurts a lot to see her with someone else.

When I sacrificed my love for her happiness, I thought I could handle this pain. I can even burn for her, so I thought this pain would be nothing in comparison to that, but I was wrong.

This pain! It's worse than burning. Every second, every moment, it just hurts, hurts, and hurts.

Psychology says the more you cry, the more you let go. So, I tried that technique, and now there is no trace of tears in my tear glands. All my tears have dried. However, the shadows of her memory didn't even fade a shade lighter.

"Come on, Christian. Curl up your lips, give them a smile. I want a perfect pre-wedding album." Two days ago, Ava was requesting me to smile for her pre-wedding photo collection. But little did she know I've forgotten to smile since the day I broke our engagement. That day, she didn't just ask me to support her love, but also asked me to sacrifice mine. My happiness, my sleep, my smile, my life, my hell, my heaven, my love for her was my everything. And I sacrificed all of them in a beat. But, now, just a little thing, SMILE, I don't know why I can't do it.

"Christian, come on, don't scold the contractor. It's my wedding day. Just smile and live on." That's what she said two hours ago when I was lashing out at the contractor because he put my name instead of Jonas on the wedding board.

Can someone please tell me how can I not lash out at him? He was technically teasing me. The whole world was teasing me, and I wanna burn it.

Didn't expect love to be nothing but a shadow of pain and hurricanes of sorrows. If I knew, I guess I would have never—f**k! I would've still fallen in love with her, and this thought creeps me out more.

She is marrying someone who is not me, but still, I don't regret falling for her. If things keep going like this, then maybe I'll just get lost in this one-sided pain of love, and my heart wouldn't even try to find its way to happiness. I know my stupid heart well. It will always choose pain with her rather than happiness without her.

"It's time. Go get her, Christian." Bob, Ava's dad tapped my shoulder.

"I? Why do you want me to get her?" I guess I'll die if I see her in that wedding dress. I can't do it. No! I can't.

Please, Bob, don't make me do this.

"She might be feeling nervous, may also have mixed thoughts. You're her best friend. She'll need you." Bob gulped a lump of sadness and added, "She always needs you."

He is right. She will need me. But he was also wrong. She won't "always" need me. Now she will have Jonas, who will be with her like her own shadows. He will be the hand that blocks sunlight when it irritates her. He will be the teddy bear whom she will hug when she feels low. He will be everything she needs. I can see it in his eyes. His love is genuine. Not genuine as mine, but genuine enough to keep her happy for the rest of her life. I should be comparing my love with him, criticising his love for her, but duh! What kinda lover will I be if I'll disrespect someone else's love just to increase my love's worth. Also, my love for her is incomparable to human love. I love her beyond love, beyond marriage, beyond infinity, beyond eternity and beyond deity. I'll do anything for her happiness, including killing myself billions of times if it's needed.

I'll go, see her in that wedding dress. Even if it's gonna s***h my heart billions of times, I'll do it.

IN AVA'S ROOM…

"Ava! Ava!" I called her name when my eyes couldn't find her. "Av—" I was about to call her name again, this time louder, but I stopped when I finally saw her.

She was sitting at the corner of the room, her knees pulled at her chest, and her arms wrapped around them. The air conditioner of the room was off, but she was shaking, and the helpless sight of her felt like someone had slashed my heart with a Katana.

"Ava, moonlight." I approached her without wasting any time and sat in front of her. "What happened?" A sob tore from her throat and moisture spilled past her eyes. "Why are you crying like this, love?" Her tears were like fuel to my already burning heart, but I still managed to ignore my pain because nothing is more important than Ava. "Is it because you have to be apart from your dad and shift to Thailand with Jonas?" I made the most probable assumptions because if there's someone who Ava loves the most before Jonas, then it's her dad. "If it is, then I don't worry, love. I'll transfer him here to Vanstrong." Yes, I'll do it. Even though it will kill me to see her daily with Jonas, as his wife, I'll still do it for her. "Ava, darlin—"

"He… said…" Trembling within her words, she managed to say the most painful sentence of her life. "He can't do it."

"What?" I retorted, blood in my veins replacing itself with furiousness.

I'm gonna kill that bastard. The way I was crying and praying before, I should be happy about this. But how can I be happy when she is crying in front of me?

To not let tears fall from her eyes was the ultimate goal of my life. From childhood to now, I had made sure that nobody would dare to make her cry.

Last time, a year ago, when a rude man yelled at her and she was abouts to cry, I didn't respond at the moment because I could read it in her eyes, she didn't want me to see or interfere. However, after that, I made sure that men would never be able to step at each and every grocery store, supermarket, and shopping malls of Vanstrong.

Grocery stores and shopping malls easily agreed to my request to ban him, whereas some supermarkets ignored my request because it wasn't their problem. So, I bought them all and made it their problem.

That man should consider himself lucky because tears only formed in her eyes, they didn't fall, if it would have fallen then…. I myself don't know what would I've done to him.

"Jonas said he can't marry me. He told me not to wait for him. He canc—" She hiccupped. "He.. canceled our wedding."

"What?" Bob stepped in. He was so shocked that he couldn't even hold the jewelry that he was carrying. The box slipped from his hand and fell down along with the pearl necklace in it. "How can he do—" With wrath in his voice, Bob was about to approach us but he didn't even make it halfway before he clutched the left side of his chest and almost fell down if my dad hadn't arrived at the appropriate moment and caught him.

To be continued…