Chapter 5: Chaos unfolds

"What the fuck did you just say about me?" 

Ethan's voice reached her ears this time, anger evident in his shaky voice. 

Before she could even react, he already came marching towards her and she felt a hand come crashing down on her cheek so hard that it echoed throughout the house. She had almost lost her balance and fallen over as the sharp pain shot through her body. 

She was pretty certain that it left a huge red mark on her face.

Her eyes were widened in shock but it quickly faded, soon replaced by the anger running through every inch of her veins. She marched towards him, ready to strike back when she felt herself being pulled back into something hard. 

That was when it hit her, she was being held back by someone, her own father. She let out a blood-curdling scream as she kicked her legs and tried her best to pry the hands of her father off of her. 

"Let me go! Let me go!" She screamed at the top of her lungs, her high-pitched voice ringing loudly in their ears as they thought that their eardrums might explode anytime. 

All of them only stared at her with wide eyes as if they thought she was crazy. The tears she tried so hard not to shed were now streaming down her face. She felt that she really was going crazy as she continued to shout and yell until her throat was sore. 

"Alexandra, you need to calm down," her dad demanded, still holding her back as she continued to scream and kick, ignoring her father's words.

"Could you be any louder?" Her mum commented sarcastically, rolling her eyes dramatically. 

"The neighbours might hear us. We don't want them gossiping," her mum pointed out this time as she only continued to stand aside, watching her own daughter struggle in vain for what felt like an eternity. 

All this while, Hannah and Ethan had their eyes on Alexandra's tear-stricken face and messed up hair, watching her fight to escape from her father's grasp with a smug expression on their faces. 

"Crazy bitch," she could hear her husband comment loudly from the side with a triumphant look on his face, with the sole purpose of fuelling the rage that was already burning within her.

Maybe it was the anger or the adrenaline, but she finally broke free from her father's grip and dashed towards Ethan with zero hesitation, kicking him hard, right where the sun doesn't shine, wiping the smirk off his face. 

The way his face turned red and how his hands flew to his crotch as he bent over, kneeling down in pain was an entertaining sight to behold, at least for Alexandra. A loud yelp escaped his lips before he fell over onto the ground, curled up in a fetal position.

Almost immediately, everyone rushed over to his side, concerned and in shock as Alexandra stood there and laughed maniacally at the sight of this. 

A smirk morphed itself onto her face this time. 

"I guess I am a crazy bitch." 

She watched in amusement as Ethan continued to grimace in pain as his yells rang loudly beside her ears. "Don't you fucking dare to walk away! I will make you regret what you did!" 

"Okay?" She shrugged as she took one last look at the scene unfolding right in front of her eyes before finally walking out of the house. 

Everything else was a blur. 

Alexandra now found herself sitting somewhere in the park nearby, only less than a 10 minutes walk away. Sat on a random bench, under a shade, hiding somewhere deep inside as she was deep in thought. Her mind was like a hurricane, the thoughts, the words, and the scenes all circling in her head. The strong facade was slowly being chipped away little by little as the seconds ticked by. 

Her eyes were starting to water as she thought about the betrayal she felt when her dad had held her back and how nobody came to her side. It made the pain she felt when she discovered her husband cheating on her with her sister, almost insignificant. 

Soon, she was a mess. The tears that were once in the brim of her eyes were now beads of tears flowing down her flushed cheeks. It brought her back to the time when she broke down crying in the arms of her best friend.

Except this time she was alone, but not for long.

"I think you might need this," a familiar voice spoke. 

She looked up with her eyes red, tears still in her eyes to see a familiar face through her blurry vision. "Caleb?" 

Funny how fate works isn't it? 

If it wasn't for his mum randomly calling him on a Friday morning just to nag at him for barely leaving the house and never being able to keep a relationship for more than a couple months, he wouldn't have ended up where he was right now, the park. 

It was his favourite place to go whenever he needed to clear his mind or take his mind off of something.

Little did she know that he was already there before her. He had seen her earlier, sitting on that very bench with a slight frown etched onto her face. Of course, he didn't know what was going on in that head of hers but it made him curious. Just as he stood up and was about to walk over, he watched as she buried her face in her arms that were resting on the top of her knees as she sobbed silently. 

And now there he was, holding out a packet of tissue he just so happened to have for her, a slight smile on his face as he urged her to take it. 

She mustered a smile, muttering a thank you before quickly grabbing the tissues from his hand. "This is embarrassing," she mumbled under her breath as she dabbed away under her eyes, quickly wiping away any signs of tears. 

He chuckled. "Well, I'm not going to ask you if you are okay because you are clearly not okay. And you don't have to tell me what happened, but let me cheer you up."

She sniffled. "Oh no… It's fine, I'm okay," she quickly replied, her natural response almost every single time someone caught her crying or even remotely upset. It wasn't something Caleb was unfamiliar with. 

"What makes you think you have a choice, love?" He asked with a raised eyebrow and a smirk plastered across his handsome face.

"Love? Don't call me love," she said as she scrunched her nose up together almost as if she was disgusted. Alexandra didn't know but it used to be his favourite thing that she did. 

"I can call you anything I want," he said before he made a dramatic pause, and knowing him, she knew exactly what was coming. 

"Love," he winked this time. 

He had reached out his hand to grab her and she felt her heart skip a beat as his fingers wrapped around her wrist without a warning. 

"Hey! What are you-"

"Don't worry, I'm not kidnapping you."

She raised an eyebrow at him this time, a playful grin etched onto her face. 

"That's exactly what a kidnapper would say."