The tears wouldn't stop rolling down her face. She couldn't control her sobs, not when the others around her were shooting her pitiful looks, and not when Flora and her mother wrapped her into their arms.
Because who would be able to stop crying at the funeral of their father? He was the absolute best man in Stella's life. He was the bestest man.
And now, he was gone.
Stella shook off Flora's and her mother's hands off of her and stood up. She wiped her tears with the back of her hands and left the room. She didn't want to be there any longer.
Nobody stopped her as she walked through the chapel and out of the doors. Stella continued walking as she passed a row of graves. She tipped her head down and swallowed tightly, knowing that her father would be buried in the ground in only a few more hours. When she reached the green of the area, she stepped under a large willow tree and sat down. She pulled her knees to her chest as her tears soaked through the material of her dress but she didn't care.
It was the only time she wouldn't ever care.
Soft sobs broke from her mouth as she hugged her knees even tighter together. The realisation of her father's death was too real now. He'd fought his cancer for almost two years until it painfully ripped Radius away from Stella.
She had no family now.
Upon opening her wet eyes, she realised that a shadow crept closer towards her. Stella tipped her head up to look at the person.
Brandon.
Stella hadn't seen much of him after he'd confronted her about her crush on him. It has been too awkward to ignore the tension so she'd spent less and less time at their home. And as Brandon was now in his second year of university, she'd seen less and less of him. A whimper left her throat when she realised he'd come home for the funeral.
Her father's funeral.
"He's gone."
She whispered out, closing her eyes as she tipped her head backwards against the tree.
How could he have gone and left her?
"He's really gone, Brandon."
She whispered out as she bit down on her lip to stop herself from sobbing any more. She was sick of how much she'd be crying for the past few weeks now. She was sick of it all.
Brandon knelt to the ground as he moved forward to sit beside her. He reached out, taking her hand in his, and turned to look at her. His eyebrows were furrowed as he stared down at Stella.
She had lost so much weight. Too much weight. There was no light left in her sunny eyes and he'd never seen her this broken.
Not when he'd rejected her two years ago, or the little while after that where it had become incredibly tense between the two.
She was broken for now, but it didn't mean that she couldn't be fixed. His family; his parents, his sister and himself, would do their very best to help her.
She deserved it. Stella always had.
"I have no-one!"
She suddenly exclaimed as he squeezed her hand, running his thumb over her fingers.
"I have no-one in this fucked up world, Brandon! Not even a single person! What the fuck do I do now?!"
Stella sobbed as she fell sideways into his arms. Brandon wrapped his arms around her shoulder and kept her close to his chest.
"You have us, okay, Stella? You have us. Mum, Dad, Flora and I. We're here for you. We're your family."
His voice was scratchy and hoarse and he couldn't deny the fact that he'd been crying after hearing the news. Radius was a good man, Brandon had seen it first hand, and if he was feeling like this after hearing news about the death, he had no idea how Stella could have possibly been holding up.
The death of one parent was enough to kill someone. The death of two? Well, he didn't want to think about that.
Brandon turned as his large hand cupped her cheek. He pulled her closer. Their foreheads touched as they stayed like that for a few minutes. When Stella tried to pull away, she felt a slight resistance from Brandon before he let her go. But he pulled her back once more to him as he placed a single kiss on the crown of her head.
That small action shouldn't have made her feel warm inside. It shouldn't have made her want to cry, made her want to thank him for clearing the awkwardness that had been present for the past two years. Stella appreciated the fact that Brandon could push what had happened aside and instead, comfort her.
Not a lot of people knew how to do that.
His phone buzzed and she darted her eyes downwards, able to make out the name on his phone. Mitzi. Like she was relieving that day she had at aged fifteen, she pushed away from Brandon and wiped her tears with the backs of her hand.
How could she have forgotten? He didn't like her, not really. He was only there to comfort her because she was his baby sister's best-friend. She was nothing more than that.
At once, Stella completely pulled away from him. Brandon watched her with tense eyes as she brushed her palms over her dress and walked away from him. He wanted to reach out, wanted to tell her to wait so that they could talk things out, but quite frankly, he wasn't sure if that was what he wanted.
If anything, he wanted more with her. He wanted to take back those words he'd told her two years ago, and wanted to apologise for what he'd said. He didn't mean it. He didn't mean it at all. Every word that left his mouth that night was a word of a lie, and he was forced to say it to her. Because every moment Stella was looking at him, his girlfriend would catch it. And when Brandon slowly began reciprocating those looks, she would catch it.
It was all too wrong.
He didn't mean to feel that way about her. She was too young, and his baby sister's best-friend. Would it matter though? If they both felt the same way, and maybe he waited for it, would it be right?
But she was only seventeen, just a minor, and he'd feel like a predator if he'd wait for her to become legal to finally make a move. Because that would be wrong, wouldn't it?
But they'd practically grown up together so it would only make sense if they'd both began to develop feelings for each other. It was inevitable.
Brandon sighed as his phone buzzed again.
With a clenched jaw and dark eyes, he unlocked his phone and blocked and deleted his ex-girlfriend's number. Mitzi wouldn't be dictating the way he lived his life any longer.
—
Family.
She wanted to roll her eyes at that. The one thing she ever wanted was to be loved by him, to feel his lips on hers, and hear the sweet things he'd whisper into her ears. But instead, she was faced with being his family.
She was grateful for them, she always would be, but she wished she could have had more. Lifting her eyes, she watched Flora's father take his daughter into his arms as he hugged her and pressed his lips to her head. Tears rose in her eyes as she watched their interaction.
Stella missed her father. She missed him dearly. Their home wasn't home anymore, and Stella had never felt this lonely before. She couldn't bear to watch another father and daughter interact without her heart breaking some more.
She stood up, muttered a goodbye as she walked past them, and stepped out and walked over to her own home. When she entered, she dropped the keys and locked her front door. She walked up the stairs and went straight to her bedroom. There was no reason for her to walk anywhere else, she had no need to. Not when her father was no longer here.
When she entered her room, she picked up a bottle from the full crate near her bed. It was her father's collection, and maybe if Stella had drank enough, she'd feel better.
She unlocked her phone to look at the most recent message Brandon had sent her.
BRANDON: We're here for you, okay? You can come to any of us for anything, sunshine, and we won't refuse you. We're family.
Stella brought the bottle to her lips and took a swig. Her eyes skimmed over the message once more as she took another.
Family.
Fuck that.
Where was her family when she needed them?
Nowhere to be fucking found.
