Chapter 9

A/N: OMFG! It's been a whole year since I have updated this story! Ugh...You know I love you all right? Well I am really sorry for it taking me so long to update. I hope you enjoy this next chapter and now that I have internet at home again I am hoping to update a lot more than I have in the past year. I am going to reopen my twitter for my stories. I will also have it open for those of you who are interested in my other stories...ones that I can't post on . Well have fun with this next chapter!

Chapter Nine: In The Past

I was sitting on the couch with Ezmeralda. She was pale and her eyes were framed with dark circles. I had been quiet for the past five minutes but I couldn't stand the silence any longer.

"What is going on Ezmeralda?" I asked turning to her. She looked over to me and then away, clearly upset about what we had both dreamed. She sighed heavily and I could tell that she was struggling with herself.

"I'm not sure how to explain it myself...Not to a Christian." She said. I frowned. That had hurt. I may be Christian, but damn it I am open minded about a lot of things. I stood up from the couch and I walked over to the fireplace mantel.

"Explain what Ezmeralda? Explain that somehow we had the same dream, how every time I had those dreams I was being killed? How when I call you, you come out with 'Why didn't you save me?' What is so hard to explain that will make this any weirder? I'm already in a spiral here!" I turned to her then and looked at her. She was crying.

"Don't you think this is hard for me too?" I scoffed at that. Hard for her? She was into this mumbo jumbo stuff how was this hard for her? 'Why didn't you save me?' At the door way to the kitchen I stopped.

"You felt all of that didn't you?" I asked still not facing her.

"Everything." The silence in the room was deafening.

"What was it?" I asked sliding down onto the floor and leaning my head against the door frame. I didn't want to look at her much less sit with her right now. It took her a while to answer me. I could hear her sniffles from the other side of the room.

"Past lives. Our past lives and how we have died." I didn't say anything so she continued. "It is said that people who are destined to be with each other and go through many lives together are called soul mates. They follow each other through life and death and sometimes they find each other again sometimes it takes a couple life times." She took a deep breath and I heard her shift on the couch. "You and I are just that, soul mates, destined to be with one another, forever." I shook my head.

"This isn't making sense." I said closing my eyes and seeing nothing but Erica Elli and Ezmeralda.

"Is it not making sense or is it that you don't want it to make sense?" She asked softly. None of this was right. All I wanted was a normal life. Soul mates, past lives, this shit happened in faery tales and fantasy books.

"Ezmeralda none of this makes sense. Just, just get out. Soul mates, past lives, dreaming together, this stuff doesn't happen in real life. It just doesn't. We are born, we live, we die, the end. No soul mates, no second chances, no crazy reoccurring murders. Just get out!" I looked over to her as I finished the sentence and groaned inwardly. Ezmeralda's face was a mask of sadness. Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears, her brows knit together. Her lips were pursed trying to hold back the sob that I knew was coming. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. Her chest rose and fell with the effort and she looked back up at me. Tears escaped her eyes and she said in a calm voice.

"Fine Mr. Moore. I'm sorry I freaked you out. I'm sorry I lied to you. I'm sorry I made your night a bad one. I'll leave now…Goodbye." As she got up and walked to the door her goodbye seemed so final. It felt like the end of everything and with the closing of the door it felt like the period at the end of a sentence. I looked around the room at my crazy decorations. I sighed and sat. I heard the car door open and close, and the car engine turn over. As the lights of her car flowed over my front windows and away from the house I hit my head against the wall. Taking a deep breath I yelled. I yelled so loud my dogs ran away, I yelled for myself, I yelled for my life, I yelled for the sake of yelling.

"What the fuck am I doing?" I yelled "I just reassured myself that I am open minded and here I am shutting her down! I know what she believes in and I know that she is strong to her beliefs. WHY DID I SHUT HER DOWN?" I yelled. My anger was always in the way. It has always been in the way! It was in the way when I was younger, it was in the way when I got married to Crystal, it as in the way when I tried to date after Crystal, WHY CAN'T I REIGN IN MY ANGER?

I stood. I had to get to Ezmeralda. Who knew what would happen if I just let her leave. Grabbing my keys I ran out to my car I ran out to it, jumped in, and started it up. I didn't want to lose her.

No!

I wouldn't lose her.

The engine roared beneath me and I pulled out of my drive way quickly. Turning the wheel I headed straight down the street. I pushed the pedal down to the floor and sped up. I knew she was going to be my everything, I could already feel it. My heart was pounding in my throat at the thought of losing her. This wasn't about just me anymore, this was about us, and I had ruined it with one sentence. I punched the steering wheel and heard the horn go off. I turned the truck. Tires squealing, dust, and the truck tipping to the side only to land back on all four wheels. She was angry, just as angry as I was. I should have caught up to her already. I turned another corner and almost ran right into her own car. I breaked as hard as I could hearing the screeching tires as they halted and the truck slid over the pavement. Throwing my door open I jumped out.

"Ezmeralda!" I screamed into the early morning predawn light. I ran to her car and opened the driver's side door. She wasn't there. I looked around me and looked to the woods just beyond the car. I knew she would be in there. Grabbing the keys out of the engine I ran off into the woods. "Ezmeralda!" I yelled again into the woods animals darting off in fear. I ran following a barely visible trail before I skidded to a stop in front of a crick. I listened hard trying to figure out if she had followed the bank or if she had continued straight on through the woods. I looked down at the soft dirt and saw foot prints following the shore. I jumped into the eroded earth and ran in the direction the foot prints went. I heard her before I saw her. The crick had turning into a large stream at this point and I had, had to step up out of the eroded shore and onto the grassy bank.

She was sitting in the middle of the stream with her feet in the water. I saw her shoes sitting on the shore and I could see her shirt and pants on the shore as well. Her hair was wet and her bra and panties were dark with the water saying she had swum there. I stood on the bank and watched her sob for maybe two minutes. I began to take off my shoes and sitting them next to hers. I shed my shirt and pants and jumped into the freezing water. Fighting the quickening current I reached the cluster of rocks she sat on and clung to a rock before pulling myself up. Ezmeralda looked at me and I pushed my hair out of my face. Reaching out to her I pulled her over to me and sighed.

"Ezmeralda, I'm sorry." She continued to sob and her tears were amazingly warm to my half frozen skin. She sat in my arms sobbing and half heartedly fighting me. Her fists beat at my legs, my chest, my arms, until she had no fight left in her.

"You're a bastard." She stated simply. I looked down at her and sighed. Yea, I knew, of course I knew. I had been told that hundreds of times by woman who knew me and didn't know me.

"I know. I'm sorry that I am. I'm so angry all the time. My life, even though some may envy me, isn't fair at all." I felt Ezmeralda go still, her breathing being the only movement. I went on. "I lost my father when I was young, I didn't have that time with him that everyone else did. I struggled with my mom to help support myself and my brother. I got taken to court because I missed too many school days in my senior year because I was working to help support my mother, I had girlfriends and a wife who I in the end got divorced from and then my father dies the same year only months apart. Yea, I know, my life isn't that bad, it's not as bad as others. I realize that, but to me it's a lot. I never express myself other than through wrestling, my tattoos, and my makeup. Other than that I don't know how to control my anger. No not only my anger, all of my feelings. I'm weirded out I don't know what to do, what to think." I sighed lowering my head in shame. I should know how to do these things. I should be able to control myself. Any man should be able to do it, so why can't I? I felt Ezmeralda continue breathing normally and felt her relax into me.

"I'm sorry too Shannon." She said playing with the tattoos on my arms. I looked down at her cold wet body and sighed I guess this was it then. I messed everything up for myself.

"So this is it then?" I asked and closed my eyes. I didn't want to look at her when she said it.

"If I was going to say that why would I be sitting here still? It's too nice here in your arms." She laughed weakly and I opened my eyes.

"Really?" I asked barely hearing my own voice. I heard her laugh a little stronger this time.

"Consider this our first fight." She said and looked past us into the horizon that was light with brilliant purples, blues, and pinks. I looked at it and sighed. A new day. Perhaps this means a new me? I chuckled at that. No there could never be a new me, but I could look at life in a better way.

"What?" Ezmeralda asked me her bright eyes looking up at me. I shook my head and kissed the top of hers.

"Nothing, just thinking how weird it would be to have a me that was excited and chipper all the time." I put my hands together in prayer form in front of me. "Oh golly wiz! What a beautiful day it sure will be Ezmeralda dear! I can't wait to share it this wonderful part of life with you!" I laughed and she giggled with me. I smiled and she shook her head.

"You're silly." She said and sighed contentedly before leaning back into me. I moved to get up, but she pressed down on my lap with her body. "No, enjoy the silence." She said and I smiled. "You don't need to be "Oh Golly Wiz!" About it, but you should at least relax and enjoy this silence while you have it." I sighed and sat back. Soon my relaxed face turned into a frown. Now I remembered why I never let myself sit and relax. Sometimes there are things in the past that you will never forget, forgive, or want to remember.

A/N: ALRIGHT! I'm sorry that it took so long for me to get that up…there really is no excuse…well other than I didn't have internet…but I still could have been writing while I was waiting to get internet. Well I hope you liked this update. I'll be working on the others soon. Love you all! REVIEW PLEASUMS!

~*Morna*~