30 #2
"Something pissed her off. I suppose we were both PMSing that day because we had gotten into an argument.
One that was just more verbally berating than the others.
The girl with us was taking Moria's side, which made me act out more, and I was saying the cruelest, most cutting words to even it out between Moria and me.
We both took it too far. I mentioned something about her brother, something dark and private, which led her to throw my book bag with my most prized book into the river.
"We got into a blowout then. We were ripping each other's hair out. To that one girl's credit, she did her damndest to break us up. Unfortunately, we both fell off the bridge into the river in the middle of the flood season after our heaviest rainfall.
"Neither of us could fight the currents. I got lucky; a man was scouting the area for a fishing spot when he saw us. He managed to grab me and haul me out.
“Moria wasn't lucky. He couldn't keep his grip on her. She slipped away.
"It was two days later when she was found. She had drowned and suffered severe bodily injuries. Her parents chose a closed casket funeral." The weight began to lift off Leo's shoulders. In return, the bubbles of sobs escaped her.
"Mom and Dad said they had to beg and plead to keep them from pressing charges. Like an idiot, I thought they were trying to keep me from being locked in jail. No, they were trying to save their reputation.
"A half-year later is when I met Ruin—well, before he was Ruin. I was 16 then when he was my star. I was 19 when he changed; when I changed.
"I kept waking up to bruises and cuts on my wrists.
Mom and Dad just—sent me to a mental hospital.
I was there for five years. I fought to get out for the first two years.
Mom and Dad kept saying they would let me return home when I was better.
For the next three years, day after day of making progress, then regressing, then progressing, and regressing again, waking up some days with cuts on my body, until something happened—something out of my control—where I was finally able to leave.
"And guess what? I couldn't come back. Mom and Dad spent that time wiping away any evidence I lived with them. Not even a scrap of tape from my posters stayed. My books were scrapped. My old clothes were gone. I had nothing. I came back to nothing. Mom and Dad wouldn't even let me move back in.
I was something less than a stranger to them."
"For a year and a half, I was homeless. I found a way to get into college. I promised myself to work on leaving the past behind, even if it meant leaving Earth altogether.
"Even if I had to be alone the whole journey, I wanted to be among the stars. I wanted to be in a home far away from here. NASA was my best bet, and every day I've worked to get into their program, on that last sliver of ambition and hope that I can reach the stars..."
Pulse continued to stroke her hair as she laid her emotions bare. They listened so intently and sympathetically, they gifted their ears and a few tears.
How long has she been wallowing now?
“Shh,” Pulse kissed away the tears from her eyes. “From here on out, that will never happen again. No one will ever hurt you.”
'Can I believe you? Should I?'
"I'm sorry for everything you've been through." Pulse followed Quark as he motioned down a jarring path. "Everything you had to go through alone. I wish so much Quark and I had met you sooner."
A switch happened. Like the admittance of Leo's tacenda filled the halls with effervescence. The stars quickened from an anxious creeping to a sprint.
"It's all going to change; right now. As long as we are here, nothing, and I mean nothing, will hurt you again."
Pulse's voice thundered, and even though it worried Leo about warning the demons of the ward of their location, it was still the most beautiful sound.
"From here on out, on our lives and energy and everything, you will never be alone again."
There was a sudden darkness, contrarily as though it were a flash of light, it forced Leo's eyes shut.
This was the end. She knew it. She was right.
That morbid thought that it would all repeat.
Disappointed again. ‘How dare I believe that it could change.’
Wake up, that's the reality of your life.
It hasn't changed yet, and it won't now.
Then she smelled fresh air. Air wet with nature's dew and wind with the waking of spring's first bloom.
When she opened her eyes, there was light, not from the lavender sky above but from the brilliant stars before her.
They celebrated by giving her their full attention, smiles on their faces, and words of acclamation escaping them.
'I was wrong.'
Never has she been happier to be wrong. Being wrong has never been so wonderful.
When tears began to pour again, Quark reacted by promptly brushing them off. "What's wrong Leo, are you okay?"
She mushed a kiss to his lips. “You dork, I'm crying because I am okay. I'm so okay. I—I've never been so happy.”
Her stars shone in her eyes. The most beautiful stars in the sky belonged to her.
They all hugged and kissed, celebrating like they won the war.
'Maybe we did,' Leo thought. Looking back, she fought to make it out of the trenches, and it wasn't until now that she realized she was still in no man's land.
She fought on her own, through the battlefield and past every mine and bullet.
It wasn't until she looked at the stars that she found her way across that bridge.
Pulse and Quark turned their attention to each other. “We need to figure out where to go from here, though.” Quark hushed. “We need somewhere we can stay–”
“Come to my place,” Leo interrupted. “My home.”
A moment passed before Quark put it into context. “Your domain?”
"Yeah. I mean, I know you stars get rather scrupulous, but if you're needing a place–"
“Of course!” Pulse exclaimed. “Just—how do we get there?”
At this point, Leo had to laugh. She felt as though she clawed her way out of a six-foot grave, and her stars were worse for wear as well—after all, they'd been taking a beating for the past two nights that she knew of.
Seeing that exuberant energy in them still was something unique and refreshing.
"As long as you carry me, I'll point you in the right direction."
No questions or concerns. No compromises or bargaining. This time, like every time before, they followed. Her word was their law and she was their evren, for being nothing more than bher. The only persona that mattered to them was her unaltered, unfiltered, authentic self.
For this moment, the memories were, at last, too far away to hurt.