Dear Ava

by Ilsa Madden-Mills

No matter the road you take, it doesn’t matter if it’s beautiful or ugly, hard or smooth, paved or pitted with ruts—it’s your road to take. What matters is how it ends.

“Steel yourself,” I whisper. “Beyond these doors lie hellhounds and vampires.” I smirk. If only they really were. I’d pull out a stake and end them like Buffy. Sadly, they are only human, and I cannot stab them.

“All I had that was mine—my body—was taken without my consent, by you or one of your precious teammates. There’s nothing else you can do to me, Cold and Evil. Go tell your little brat pack that today. Something’s going to trigger my memory and when it does, I’m going to kill him with my bare hands.” “I’ll kill him with my bare hands.” His eyes flash. My heart drops and I rear back, confusion making me suck in a breath.

“Seriously? You’d pick ‘Nobody puts Baby in a corner’ over flaming swords and Jedi, and hello, aren’t all guys into starships and killing? Are you male? Use the Force, Knox. It must be Star Wars.”

Sometimes the loneliest place on earth is in the midst of a crowd.

and I had posters of Taylor Swift and Katy Perry on the walls. I fancied myself a future pop star.”

YES THE TAYYLOR SWIIFT POSTERS!!!!

But you can’t take a beautiful, soft flower and crush it under your cleats, not when she’s halfway to broken already.

I climb him like a monkey, wrapping my arms around his shoulders and my legs around his waist.

Hold on tight spider monkey

Just, someday in the future, find me. Just find me and come up to me and tell me you still love me and want me and can’t live without me in your arms—”