On The Outside

Emily pulled the cap lower down her face as they passed her by – hand-in-hand they looked perfect together, like two perfect pieces of the same fucking beautiful puzzle.

Dana threw her head back and laughed heartily at something Stefan said, something that his baritone made too deep for Emily to hear. Dana’s tinkling laughter sent slivers and shards of jagged glass through her heart; the lilting sound pierced the tenderest part of Emily and twisted around till her breathing came out in short, desperate gasps.

Five years ago, if someone had told Emily that her world would be engulfed by a dark cloud of pain, she would have laughed in their faces. Five years ago, if someone had told her that she would pine away into oblivion because the pain of unrequited love was too large a burden for her slender shoulders, she would have had to suppress a smirk and bitten her tongue to prevent a caustic comment from flitting out of her rosebud lips.

The same rosebud lips quivered from the force of the all-engulfing vortex of searing loss – she lost Dana to him? Of all the people in the entire world, she had to hook up with her partner? Even as the thought flitted across her mind, auto correct kicked in – if it were just a ‘hook up’, Dana would be back by her side before the next fortnight. But the twinkle in her eye and that spring in his step meant that this was the real deal. She was putty for him. She’d known them long enough to know when things changed. She should have told her when she had the chance.

The realization brought another wave of emotion crashing through her, and this time she couldn’t prevent her hands from seeking out the .22 Magnum from her purse. The butt tastes rusty, she thought – the last thought to pass through the brilliant cop’s love-addled mind.

Dana couldn’t bear to see her best friend’s brain splattered on the walls of the very same ristorante where the love of her life had proposed.