IRREVOCABLY IN LOVE WITH YOU

Revenge ruins none but one!

Jenifer’s POV.

Solitary silence percolated in my body as I ambled into my house with a satisfied smile. Today was the day I completed my revenge on my arch enemy, the man who destroyed my sister's life. The monster who took away her peace and left her to die…I hate to even bring his name on the tip of my tongue, let alone pronounce it in clarity on a breezy evening as this one where the world is glittering in lights to welcome the New Year…Singapore is no less than a heavenly abode for me yet I am trapped in this exhaustive mayhem of thoughts. An urge to drown myself in tequila and some countryside music and dance with a stranger in the middle of the streets, forgetting about my family problems or even my violent actions.

An erratic breath escaped my lips, and I walked up to my sister Natasha Lawrence's room. To my disbelief, she was sitting on the bed with crossed-legged, eyeing our family portrait hung in the wall facing her bed. An unsaid sadness sweeps around her eyes, dark circles couldn’t have gotten bigger than the ones I saw on her face then. It dawned on me like a radical fire, that she’s up…she’s awake. My sister is awake from the bubble, we thought she’d never leave.

I took slow and steady steps towards her, hearing which Natasha looked up and I ran up to her. We embraced each other all the while, my tears falling freely on my cheeks. Finally, the pain I have been holding up for a year resurfaced like it never subsided in the deep systems of my body.

“I’m glad you’re out of the comatose state. Why didn’t Mom and Dad call me? Are you okay? Are you in any sort of pain? Should I call a Doctor?” I fired my questions at Natasha, and she shook her head with a smile lingering on her plump lips. I missed this.

"First of all, I woke up today. Mom-Dad tried to call you, but you were not picking up the phone, so they left for the church," Natasha replied making me gulp a sob back in my thirsty throat.

"What happened, why do you look so scared?" She asked.

I hugged her and burst sobbing, "I thought I lost you forever because of Alex but, now he is in no position to hurt anyone. I gave him a lifelong punishment.”

"What are you talking about? And Alex, you mean Alex Jenner, right?"

"Yes, the monster who assaulted you that night and snatched away your life."

“What are you saying, Jenifer? Alex didn’t do anything. It was Alexis, my boyfriend who raped me, in fact, it was Alex, who even came to my rescue, but Alexis hit him with an iron rod, and he got unconscious and he....,” Natasha wept like a child.

“How’s that possible? The doctors informed that in your unconscious state you were taking Alex’s name," I asked, afraid to hear her response.

''So, you assumed that he did it to me without any proves? It might be because I saw him getting hurt and blood oozing out of his head, so I might have taken his name, but it doesn't make him a rapist.” Natasha rebuked, her face red with anger. She always hated my rebellious nature, because I cast aside all logical thoughts and do things that I regret later.

“What did you do Jenifer?” She demanded with urgency in her voice, and I started sobbing as everything now got clear.

"What a sin, I had done just a few hours back?" I thought.

"I.... stabbed him with a knife," I admitted.

Natasha looked at me with shock and I just sat there looking down as guilt overpowered me.

"What the hell are you saying? Tell me everything," she demanded.

“When our parents found you unconscious in the hotel room. At the hospital, we were informed about your rape, but the bigger setback that we faced was when due to the internal bleeding and injuries, you slipped into a coma. The doctors had declared it as permanent sleep. Our parents were devastated and insisted for me to return back from Hong Kong immediately to Singapore,” I began to recite the portion she’s unaware about. Our grandparents lived in England but when they passed away, our father felt lonely and depressed in his ancestral home. Thus, he preferred to shift to a city where barely anyone knew him with the inheritance, he earned from his father to restart his life from afresh. He met mother in Singapore and then had us until I went to Hong Kong to pursue my graduation.

I continued after a suspenseful pause, “The blow I received after seeing you in that state was something I still can’t describe. My breaths were snatched away and the only thing I had in my mind was revenge. An act of brutal revenge. Our parents found an unconscious Alexis in that room, but he was discharged before I reached the hospital but then he returned to check up on you and the luck was on my side because he was leaving town forever because his guilt was eating him up. Alexis felt guilty for allowing Alex near you which cost him your life. But one of the reasons he thought going away was better was because he doubted Alex might kill him in his rage. He revealed Alex to be an obsessed guy who could do anything as he did by coming in between you both. He did that night in his drunk state. He raped you while Alexis was defeated infront of his power because Alex hit him on his head.”

“Go on, proceed giving me the glory details of the stupidity you’ve done so far in life,” Natasha implored.

I breathed an erratic breath and rambled the remaining part of the truth, she should know, “In the chats, you said that you both love each other. There was no point in doubting him for he was already broken from losing you. For your sake, I never interrogated him about his whereabouts and instead promised him that I’ll do everything in my power to settle scores with Alex Jenner. I didn’t reveal anything to our parents because I was afraid, they might not believe me worse Alex might harm them. Our parents feared the incident would be out in the public so without informing anyone they shifted with you on the outskirts of the city while I lived alone in a small apartment. As per the plan, after six months I joined Alex’s company as his secretary. He’s clueless to my presence because you never mentioned about me to him. Taking the cue, I pretended to be a naïve girl to make him fall in love with me and when he proposed to me like a love-struck puppy, I ended the game by stabbing him with a knife right at his chest because after what he did, I felt he didn’t deserve to live. He needed to die for being a treacherous friend.”

Death. The only solution I’d thought. As I finished telling her the small details of the past months, I broke down not knowing what to do but I ended up fumbling, "I punished an innocent, I stabbed him and still he was whispering his love to me.”

"Please Nat’s say something, talk to me," I begged her with tears flowing through my eyes.

Slap!!

“Jenifer Lawrence, you disgust me today! How could You punish someone without even knowing the truth, without even trying to find out what happened that day? Are you mad? You stabbed Alex. Jenifer, I hate to call you my sister today, you…,”

“Just go away and pray nothing should happen to Alex otherwise, even God won't forgive you and just, so you know he was always my best friend, he always tried to warn me about that leech Alexis, but I was the one who never listened to him even on that party night he warned me but, leave it how does it matter to you what a good guy he was always?”

"You know what, Dad was always right to keep you away from our lives because when it comes to knowing the whole truth, you never do that, but just reach to conclusions and want to punish people, but you yourself are a horrible person. Have you ever thought how Dad will face Uncle once he gets to know the truth?" she yelled at me while I bawled my eyes out unable to control the war perplexing my internal systems.

"Don't say like this, I know I committed a sin, but I thought I was punishing your culprit.”

"You just let my culprit flee from town Jenifer. You didn't buy any justice, but you simply ruined someone’s life and made us all ashamed."

"Please don't say this, forgive me please," I begged her.

She wiped her tears and said: "Go ask, forgiveness from Alex not from me, you destroyed him not me. I can only pray that he gets saved, and he has it in him to forgive you.”

I stood up lifelessly and walked out of the house. My tears continuously flowed, thinking about the crime I had done. In my thirst for revenge, I had ignored, what my heart has been telling me. I walked, trudged, treaded aimlessly on the deserted streets as the rain poured above my head, when there was no energy left in me, I dropped on my knees on the wet ground and cried my heart out not believing that I have made such a grave mistake. The pain I felt was nothing to what Alex might have gone through when I betrayed him. I couldn't forget the pained expression on his face and finally, when I was not able to take it, I shouted the one name I never thought I would even take after today but now that one name has become my need…my guilt…my survival mechanism…and my hope…against hope to redeem myself in my own eyes.

‘Alex!’