Sydney
"Did you really have to do that?" Sydney asked.
"Yes I did." She answered. "Abortion is the choice of the mother based upon resources available to her. She was perfectly capable of finding enough support to raise her kids."
"Eden, what happened to the girl I loved? She's been gone ever since this academy started."
"You'll have to find a replacement. The Omega Eden would have gotten kicked out. I had to either decline or change myself. I did the latter." She merely shrugged, as if it wasn't a huge deal.
"Why? You didn't need to. You were perfectly fine with who you were."
"No. I wasn't. I was suppressing all that anger. I just didn't show it. It's kind of the reason why I punched Darwin. Letting a window into my life really ticks me off, especially when I hardly know the person. When I established that I wasn't to be messed with, my body decided to go along with that."
"By puking?" He said in a questioning voice.
She laughed. "That was a trumpet girl that vomited, not me. She took one look and ran like a rocket when she saw me shovel a spoonful in my mouth. Other than choking on the rock, I was choking myself by laughing to freaking hard at the face she made before she hurled. I found the rock as soon as she upchucked so everybody thinks it was me."
"So you had to be a bitch to Triple to change that?"
"No. But it was pretty nice to get her kicked out since she swore up and down that I was the one who puked."
"What really happened? This isn't you. You were fine until my mom saw us together. Are you scared of her? Is she threatening you?"
"No, Mom." She sarcastically assured him. "I'm fine. But anymore questions like that and you and your mom can go to a parenting seminar together."
"You see? This is the real you. Why did you have to change in front of everyone else?"
"It doesn't matter, Sydney! It doesn't! You put on faces to make people happy and that's what I did!"
"Who are you trying to make happy? Obviously not yourself." He rationalized.
"What if I am trying to make myself happy? What if I think that this might make me happy?" She asked, daring him to see it from her point of view.
"But you aren't. You aren't happy. I can tell." He sensed negativity from her and it was the same kind that he had felt during the fight that she broke up with him in.
"No you can't. What if this is just another face? I've been doing them for so long that I can't tell the difference anymore! Who am I? Tell me, Sydney. Who am I, really? Underneath all of the lies, faces, words and books, who am I?" She shouted. When he didn't answer immediately, she yelled. "Answer me! What do you think that I am?"
"You are Eden Quintessence Kothari. My paradise, my star and the love of my life."
"Obviously not." She snorted.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You know what it means." She said with a deadly look on her face.
"Honestly, I don't. Enthrall me on what I am supposed to know."
"You know how self conscious I can be. And yet you join this school with a hundred of the best girls in the world? All of them are definitely better than me. All of them that you could have relationships with while your mother actually knows who they are. All of them you could date and I would never know. And you don't protest at all? You acted like a momma's boy. Following her every word, whim and demand. That's what made me decide to come here. If you were forced to be with one hundred and one bitches, I would be too. But this face is the hardest. I have to pretend that I honestly don't care about how you feel or how anyone else feels. Do you know how hard it is for me not to be with you every second?" She questioned. Her voice was odd and Sydney could hear mixed emotions behind it.
"Then why do you have to act?"
"It doesn't matter."
"Yes, it does. Tell me." He ordered.
"No." She said defiantly.
"Why?"
"Personal." She stated.
"More personal than me?"
"Yes."
"Who?" Sydney asked.
"I can't tell you." She said in a low voice.
"Why?"
"You would be mad." She reasoned.
"No, I wouldn't."
"You don't understand. It's not only me who's been forced to change."
"Eden, what does that mean?" He said, confused.
"It means look back at the source."
"My mother? Now Eden, I know you two don't like each other but that's…"
"Outrageous, far fetched, over the top, or just maybe a little judging?" She finished.
"Yes." He sighed. She always knew what other people were going to say and she took the words right off his tongue.
"You don't believe me?" She questioned.
"You know what, I don't. I can't believe you. I honestly can't. Not with the way you've been acting."
"Fine. Don't believe me. Ignore me. It's not like it would make a difference." Her voice was getting louder and shriller as she spoke.
"Eden…" He started.
"No." Eden cut him off. "If you don't trust me, then fine." She shrugged. "I won't say anything else about it." She walked backwards and closer to the forest of exotic trees.
"Eden!" He called.
But it was too late. She was already gone and running fast in the tree tops. With that, he would never catch her. "Damn." He cursed. "Why does she do that?" One day, he would learn to catch her before she ran. That day would have to come soon.
A/N: No comment towards abortion. Your views are based on your beliefs and Eden's view is that abortion is based on situation, as some people think about it. Not all but some.
