AN: Several Harmony residents are haunted by their choices. Trigger warning for dark content.

Haunted

Circa 2005.

Hero. Killer. Cop. Murderer.

Thoughts that Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald had wrestled with for months.

6 months exactly.

6 months since he'd killed Beth Wallace and saved Sheridan's life.

Beth.

He'd known her all his life, he'd loved her.

He'd used her.

Used her to forget Sheridan, to drown out his grief.

Was that what pushed her over the edge?

How could he have been so blind, so wrapped up in his love for Sheridan that he couldn't see what was happening to Beth.

Sheridan.

He'd saved her life more times than he could count.

Loved her more than life itself.

But this time was different.

This time he couldn't ignore the chaos their love created.

Yes, their son was safe and back in his mother's arms.

But what about the next time their love was threatened, the next time he had to save Sheridan?

He'd already lost his brother and now his friend.

Both driven to the brink of insanity by his love for Sheridan.

Happy though he was with his newly reunited family. Whenever he looked at them the shadows of Beth and Antonio always lingered nearby.

A constant reminder of the cost of his happiness.

Would he live like this forever?

Would he always be haunted?

...

Circa 2003

Right.

Gwen has been right about everything.

The rage, the desperation, the grief in her eyes would haunt him forever.

She was right when she screamed that he had married her because she was pregnant, because he wanted to give their daughter the family he'd never had.

And now instead she was gone, gone forever and Gwen was irrecoverably changed.

How could he have been so stupid, so selfish as to kiss Theresa on that beach?

Why hadn't he told Gwen that Theresa was in town the moment he realized it?

He knew she was still in love with him, tempting him every chance she got.

But the truth was that he wanted to be tempted, he wanted an excuse to fall into her arms again.
He wanted an excuse to keep loving her, because he'd never stopped.

Finding out Gwen was pregnant hadn't stopped it, marrying her hadn't stopped it.

But Sarah's death had.

True to her word, Gwen divorced him and moved back to New York.

Theresa waited, waited for him to move past his grief so they could try again.

But he never would, Ethan would never stop blaming himself for the loss of his daughter and subconsciously he would never stop blaming her either.

A love so destructive could never flourish.

After 6 months in Harmony he packed his bags and left, saying only that he would know where he was going to when he got there.

Maybe it would be a place where he didn't quite feel so haunted.

…
Circa 2006.

Everything.

After so many decades of unhappiness, Ivy finally had everything she wanted.

And then she lost it all.

The truth about her role in Grace Bennett death has finally been revealed.

Even worse than her deception was the fact that Grace Bennett was killed returning to her family.

And all of Harmony laid the blame squarely at her feet.

Sam wanted her arrested. Ethan disowned her.

Living without Sam once had been torture but back then she'd had money, power, and Ethan to get her through.

This time she had nothing, no one.

Not even Julian would have her so happy he was with Saint Eve, who was just as responsible as Ivy for Grace's death.

But no one blamed Eve, because she had finally told the truth or at least her version of it.

Ivy hadn't wanted Grace to die. She simply wanted her gone, gone so that she could finally have the life she'd always dreamed of with Sam.

And they'd been happy.

So happy until the day Eve Russell blew her life apart.

But maybe happiness wasn't in the cards for Ivy Winthrop.

Maybe all the carnage and chaos she'd caused in the lives of others, rendered her unworthy of happiness.

Maybe her passions, her ambitions were so great that she couldn't stop herself from hurting those she loved despite her best intentions.

Even then Ivy couldn't help comparing herself to Grace at every turn, blaming the woman from taking her true love away.

Wanting the life and family Grace had, the life Ivy had given up to be Mrs. Julian Crane, so desperately that she'd destroyed it and in turn destroyed her own chances of happiness with Sam.

But Ivy Crane had already decided that she wasn't going to live the rest of her life haunted by her choices.

The blonde looked around the garage as she sat in her car, watching it fill with smoke. She wasn't sure what she felt in this moment, one of her last.

But she knew that she would no longer be haunted by her choices, but maybe those she left behind would be haunted by theirs.