A/N: We do not know Ava's background, how she was before in South Africa, and we were denied from ever knowing any, so I created my own.
Story title is Dido's song, White Flag, chapter title is from the Corrs' song, Live Before I Die (Jupiter Calling, 2017).
Connor doesn't believe her. The person she loves the most, who she trusts the most, her only best friend in the whole of the city, doesn't believe her. He believes that she lied to him all this time.
When Ava Bekker got home that evening, she just slumped by the door and cried. Her heart felt like it had been sliced in half, in fourths even. From a simple thing she said, Connor Rhodes had believed everything his detestable father had told him about her and turned his back on her. He sided with him and not her even if she laid out what that abhorrent man did when he was younger.
"The ends justify the means."
He quoted her on that and jumped into conclusions.
She told him that when a transplant patient denied her own sister from giving the much needed organ just because of what had happened between them in the past. Ava did everything she could to save their patient, even 'anonymously' having the patient's sister donate the organ. It was the quickest way and it gave their patient a second chance in life. She presumed that Connor went to his father that same day. Whatever went in his mind to do it, Ava didn't understand. She saved their patient's life and that was the most important thing to her.
Ava is sitting on the edge of her bathtub, thinking about what happened and how to make Connor listen to her. But all her mind can think about is that night when she asked Cornelius Rhodes to donate for the Emergency Department's Hybrid OR, Connor's sudden pet project. She closes her eyes and tries to think of happy and positive thoughts but nothing is happening. She can still feel everything, remember what had happened as if it is the only thing that her brain can process right now. And somehow, when the scene changed, it flashes to years ago, to South Africa, to home. She opens her eyes and she sees that she is in her apartment, in Chicago. Far away from home, the place she escaped from.
She gets up and turns the water on. She picks up her bath gel, glances at it, opens the bottle and dumps the contents in the toilet. The whole room smells of lilacs which makes her whole body shake and tremble. She throws the empty plastic bottle at the door and buries her face in her hands. She wants to scream. She is breathing fast again, feels a panic attack starting, but she manages to take control. She picks up the bottle and throws it in the trash. She's never ever going to buy that scent again. She's never ever going to spray on perfume again.
She takes off the day's clothes and leaves it on the floor. She looks at herself on the mirror; she looks terrible and in her eyes are fear but it reflects what exactly she is feeling at the moment. She opens the vanity drawer and takes out a small piece of metal: a razor blade. She hasn't picked up one in a long time, just keeps it inside the drawer in case it is needed. She gets in the bath and the warm water soothes her body. She closes her eyes and tries to forget the events of the day but, still, the flashes of everything that terrifies her haunt her mind. She nearly drowns when she goes in the water, razor blade still in her hand. So she does what she had done before: she draws a short, thin line lightly on her thigh, somewhere no one can see when she is dressed. She smiles and breathes out of her mouth, the sting satisfying her. There is little blood drawn. She repeats the motion, this time a little deeper that red liquid drips out of it and into the water. There is pain but it satisfies her to no end. She does it again and again until her nerves calm down. She sets the razor blade down, pulls the plug in the bathtub, and continues to take a shower, scrubbing herself raw as if the horrible thoughts can go away, too.
She finishes and towels herself dry. She gives her fish their food and looks at them dolefully. Tomorrow is another day and tomorrow she will face Connor. She is determined to talk to him, to explain what happened - if she can actually put it into words, and she hopes he will listen. For tonight, she knows that she will be chasing the demons once again in her dreams. The demons that flew away when she was in Connor's arms.