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Slap after slap, she couldn't dodge any of the blows as they reddened her skin, the pain almost too much.
Yet Noelle didn't give her mother the satisfaction of seeing her cry.
A few whimpers were wrenched from her when the pain was too much, but other than that, Noelle kept a stoic expression on her face.
She didn't know how long the entire thing lasted. At the end, both Noelle and Elena were breathing hard.
"You're grounded," Elena eventually said as she took a step back. "You're not allowed to get out of the house until everything dies down, you hear me?" The unspoken implication was clear—if ever.
Noelle didn't reply to her, merely sitting on the floor and looking away from Elena.
Her mother continued to curse her out for what she perceived as the loss of her social status. It didn't matter that Noelle's full name had not been released to the press. Everyone had intuited it had been her, and the rumors had swept through Elena's social circles, turningherinto an outsider too.
Only when her mother left did Noelle finally find the strength to pick herself up, her mother's words swirling in her head.
Until everything died down? And how long was that? A year? Two? Until Elena could find someone to take Noelle off her hands?
Suddenly, tears pricked at her eyes, but it wasn't because of the pain. No, this was all for the future she'd never have. All the plans she'd made had disintegrated in the blink of an eye.
All the freedom she'd dreamed of… Her career, her life…
It was over. Really over.
For the first time in a week, Noelle couldn't keep herself in check anymore. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she let herself be one with her grief.
She was always bound to be the bad guy.Always.
For once, just for once, she wished she could be thegoodguy in someone's life.
That night, she cried until no more tears came out. She cried for all the hopes she'd built, for all the work she'd put in. She cried for the chances she'd never had and the futility of the moment.
Somehow, she knew that this time there was no way out.
She wasdoomed.
With her movements restricted and with the way Elena was watching her like a hawk, Noelle didn't have much to do at home. Everyone was involved in damage control, one way or another, while she was becoming a prisoner in her own home.
Even playing the piano proved useless.
Every time she sat down, placing her fingers on the keys, she couldseeAnn Marie in front of her. The oozing blood, the gaping wound, and the brain melting as it spilled from her skull.
Day and night, she could see all of that.
It wasn't just the piano that triggered the visions. The moment she closed her eyes to sleep was the moment she came face to face with blood. So much blood.
Rot, decay and the stench of death. It accompanied hereverywhere.
And so, at the end of one week of her exile, Noelle determined she couldn't go on like that.
She was tired, unhappy, and quite possibly on the brink.
Yet she hadn't fought so hard for her life just to squander it like that. No, sheprizedher life and she knew that she may feel hopeless at the moment, but that would soon pass too. There would come a time where she could break free—that she vowed to herself.
Until then, though, she needed to learn to cope.
One day, as she was browsing the internet, her fingers itching to do another search of the incident and see what people were saying about her, she decided she needed to step away from that added stress. In turn, she clicked on the ad for an online game, thinking that might be just the thing to help her pass the time.
She'd played online games before, and she'd always enjoyed the competitive side of them. Though she'd always wanted to dedicate more time and effort to them, she'd always been busy with her piano. Back then, she'd reasoned that to be the best she needed to gain a tunnel focus where the piano was concerned, so she'd only allowed herself very few distractions—only enough to help her get more inspiration when she felt burned out.
