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.

Come on, little Ava. Come closer to me, fierce girl. One more step. Let me touch you. On the arm. Your hand. Anything. Please.

Emotion, something unnamed, rare and beautiful, brushes down my spine. I tense. Rein it in.

“I kind of like Cold and Evil. Fits me. Truthfully, I’d prefer Hot as Fuck, but you do you.”

“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. What?

Sometimes the loneliest place on earth is in the midst of a crowd. But that’s okay. I’m here and that means something.

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

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—”

“Lee Knox Grayson, I love you till the end of time. I never stopped. I never gave up. You’re my destiny. I’m yours. The universe fucking owes me, you feel me?”

Our lines got a little blurry along the way, through broken hearts and time lost, but in the end, we made a full, complete, beautiful circle.