“I’m ok ma, but Trina’s in hospital. That fuckwit Christopher beat the living shit out of her,” I tell her through gritted teeth, trying my best to keep a handle on my emotions.
“Oh my god. Is this her blood?”
I nod, swallowing a few times to try and keep my feelings under control. But it's my mum. I've never been able to hide my emotions from her. Never.
“Mum!” I cry, my face crumpling as I grab a hold of her. She hugs me tightly, running her hand up and down my back soothingly, while she shushes me and tells me that it will all be ok. Once I calm down, we sit on the couch together, and I relay the events of the night, including how strong my feelings toward Katrina have become.
She sighs. “Oh David. I know you love her. You’ve loved her for a long time. But is now really the time to be telling her?”
“Yeah mum, I think it is,” I tell her.
***
I was so exhausted, that when I finally fell asleep, I managed to sleep straight through my alarm and miss the first set of visiting hours at the hospital. There is a good hour or two of time I need to kill before I can go and see Trina, so I take myself to the local shopping centre instead.
I’m really not sure how I’m going to tell her that I love her. But I feel that I at least need to get her something, to show her. I don’t trust myself to just say how I feel. Words won’t be enough.
Flowers seem like the obvious choice. Especially for someone who’s in hospital, but I really want to get her something more as well. Walking past the windows of the jewellery stores, I notice in one of them a necklace that seems perfect.
Entering the store, I ask the sales assistant if I can see it. It’s a spinning disk with the letters I,O,E,O on one side and then L,V,Y,U on the other. When you spin it with your finger, the letters come together and form the words ‘I love you’.
“Perfect,” I say, handing it back to the girl to wrap up, so I can purchase it.
I pocket the box and head to the florist to get Trina some flowers, then drive over to the hospital. I swear I’m sweating pools from nerves as I head towards her room, but as I make my way closer, I can hear the slight commotion of raised voices.
Suddenly, Tom exits her room in a hurry and almost collides with me in the hallway.
His eyes drop to the flowers in my hands. “Don’t give her those man, she’s likely to throw them in your face. I think she’s pissed because we missed visiting her this morning. Dad had to work, and mum had to go and buy her some things to wear. All her stuff’s at the apartment, you know. But now she’s in a foul mood,” he informs me in a low voice, his eyes darting toward the door. “Those poor other women in there. She started yelling, and they got out of there as fast as they could with their IV poles dragging behind them.”
“What the hell happened this morning then?”
“I don’t know. We called her and told her why we were coming. When we got here, mum was talking to her about moving on with her life and pressing charges against Christopher, and she just went off the deep end saying that she doesn’t want to move on, and she doesn’t want to press charges.” He runs his fingers through his hair and shakes his head, despondently. “I don’t understand it man. I mean, look at her. Look at what he did to her. How can she not press charges?”
I look over his shoulder as Mrs Mahoney exits the room and shuts the door behind her. “David,” she says as soon as she sees me. “Please see if you can talk some sense into that girl. I don’t know what’s gotten into her.”
“I don’t know what good I’ll do, but I’ll try.”
I hand the flowers to Katrina’s mum and enter her room. Walking quietly, I move her privacy curtain to the side, the sound of the curtain sliding along the rod alerting her to my presence.
She doesn’t say anything, she just looks at me. Her face appears even worse than it did yesterday as all the bruising has now set in.
“Having a bad day?” I venture, moving to sit on the chair next to her bed.
“You could say that,” she states, looking down at her hands.
“You want to tell me what’s going on?”
She sighs and shakes her head, tears coming to her eyes. “It’s just… I don’t know. I just want this to be over. I don’t want to press charges. I just want to get my stuff from the apartment and be done with it. Is that so hard to understand?”
I shake my head in response. I truly wish she would press charges against that bastard, but if she wants it over and doesn’t want to deal with him again, then yeah – I can understand.
“Then mum started talking about how I’ll heal, and then I'll find someone so much nicer than he was and I just lost it. How can she be talking about me finding someone after what just happened? I don’t fucking want anyone else!” she cries, tears starting to fall down her cheeks. “I’m going to come out of this covered in scars David. I’m not going to be pretty anymore-”
“Of course you’ll be pretty Trina. You're gorgeous,” I interrupt.
“Don’t. Just don’t David. Don’t even act like everything will be fine because it isn’t. Just…just be my friend ok. Treat me normally. I’m not weak because of this. But I am realistic. I’m going to have a massive scar on my face, and I don’t need to be lied to and be told that everything will be ok. Because it won’t. And I don’t need to be told that I’ll find someone else, because I don’t want someone else. I don’t want anyone. All I need right now, is for my family and my best friend to be supportive of me. To give me space and let me deal with this in my own way. Do you understand?”
“Of course I do Trina,” I tell her, taking her hand. The necklace in my pocket, suddenly feels hot, like it’s burning a hole into my leg. It seems like it’s taunting me, telling me how stupid I was to think I could walk in here and tell her that I love her and that everything would be perfect. “Whatever you need, ok?”
“I need sleep actually. I’m exhausted.”
“Ok baby girl,” I say rising up from my chair and kissing her on the forehead. “Rest well.” I make my way to the curtain and pull it aside, pausing for a moment. “Trina?”
“Mmm?” she hums.
“It will be you know. In the end, it will be anyway.”
“Be what?”
“Ok, everything will be ok, and you’ll always be beautiful.”
With that I leave her to sleep. I say goodbye to her family in the hall and let them know she isn’t going to change her mind about pressing charges and then head home.
The necklace taunts me the entire way to my place as I think about what a colossal error I almost made. In my room, I place the box in my desk drawer, vowing that I will wait until she’s ready to move on. Then I’ll tell her I love her. I’ll tell her that I’ve always loved her…
Read the next chapter in David and Katrina’s story in A Beautiful Struggle.
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Books by Lilliana Anderson
The Confidante Trilogy
Confidante: The Brothel
Confidante: The Escort
A Beautiful Series
Too Close: The Beauty in Between
A Beautiful Struggle
A Beautiful Forever
Entwined Series
Alter
Coming Soon
A Beautiful Series
Phoenix (The Beauty in Between) September 30
A Beautiful Melody
The Confidante Trilogy
Confidante: The Madame
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Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Epilogue
The Beauty in Between: Too Close (A Beautiful Series Novella) Page 11
