Chapter 3. Another Day, Another Lie

The gale tore around the streets like an angered spirit. It had howled with the violence and raw power of an angry God. Like the roar of a proud lion. Anything not nailed down had been blown along in it's wake. Litter and newspaper swirled in the air as they gave up any futile resistance. The wind had blustered and whined under an unknown enemy. The air grew heavy and the humidity pressed down, suffocating. The scent of rain was dark and headyas trees with their trunks like twigs, swayed with the promise of harm.

The buildings were dressed in mourning black; a parting gift from the fiery beast that had vanquished but everything she held dear.

Black clouds hung over the rooftops like malevolent angels. Looming in the foreboding sky, every shade of monochrome from sliver to storm grey leaving gaps only for the howls of ancient battles. They sprawled across the sky, billowing in from the west. Their brassy glare drained colour from houses and trees and burnished cars in driveways, leaving neighbourhoods tinted bronze in the faltering light.

After a few experimental drops the clouds unleashed a torrent of water, driven by vengance.

The droplets raced towards the grond as if it was a possession. Very soon a winner emerged as a rain droplet fell, slow to start, splattering the sidewalks haphazardly. Then the rest fell as if from buckets, cascading like a waterfall from the heavens. It pounded on rooftops as if demanding entrance.

A stillness had fallen over the street, and in that silence emerged a low crackle of thunder, rolling across rooftops to the pattering of tiny raindrops. For a moment, everything stopped. Even the wind held its breath.

Lightening flashed, like a serpent of brilliant light sent to bite the earth.

Ominous and Threatening.

It was a weather of nightmares that dominated every thought and action

Yet the tiredness that begun a while ago remained like a veil over Adriana's skin, grey and cold, had not receded. Only a creeping sorrow where there should be joy sat like November rain on her skin, enough to chill what was once warm inside.

Cold water seeped into her shoes, stealing the heat from her soles just as fast as the wind stole from her. Adriana's face was soaked, the drops came together to run into her eyes and dripped from her chin. Her heat had long since deserted her to run to her core,  seeking shelter where there was none. For this long road, in this wintry storm, the frigid downpour and the icy puddles are were her nemesis.

Finally Adriana had arrived.

The one place where she felt eyes piercing into her non-existent soul. They had felt judgemental, ridiculing and threatening.

A place that compared to her own personal Hell...

School.

She had no friends but one, Celeste. Her face was young without one blemish to mar it's perfectly pale complexion.

She was not tall nor short, but somewhere in between. Her shoulders were feminine and she held her head high with the air of confidence. Her hair was thick with satin jet-black curls that was tamed into a bun on top of Her fair head. Her brow was soft. Her jaw was set in one of those playful smirks Adriana always saw her with, her mouth bow shaped, straight, and the colour of a deep scarlet rose. And then her eyes- they were an ocean blue, they looked through you without fear as if they already knew what they were to find and that you should be very ashamed of whatever it was that found her judging gaze. Her dress code was always fashionable with an hourglass figure and she was always the type that would go wild if given an inch.

She never looked Adriana in the eyes when talking to her. Always keeping a distance that grew as the days went by. Adriana new she was not a true friend. She resented Celeste for that. She resented the fact that she was allowing herself to be fooled.

Celeste was at the gates waiting impatiently for Adriana. She spotted her.

"What took you so long? I was about to leave you you know." Celeste had spat out through gritted teath.

" Why didn't you?" Adriana had asked with an edge in her voice.

"Excuse me."

"Your excused."

"How dare you? You no what?" Celste's voice carried a threatening tone hidden between noticeable layers.

Adriana never liked answering questions as she preferred to not talk at all, yet she answered as she was curious.

"What?"

"Your a loner. Yeah I said it, you're a loner who has no friends. Everyone hates you, heck even your parents hate you!" By now Celeste had started screaming, not caring about the crowd she was drawing. She would not be deterred.

"Your adopted! You were found in a dumpster! No one loves you, in fact, everyone wants you dead! Including me.

Never mind, you don't get it. Your an uptight person too wrapped up in the fact that you might have a chance, YOU DON'T! Go home and cry to your fake mommy like you always do."

"How long did you know?" They say it can't rain forever, that there will come a time when it must cease, that the last drop will have fallen. Thing is, Adriana didn't care. Maybe she should have stayed in the cold, dark filled prison that kept her comfortably numb.

"I knew the moment I saw you. I mean did you ever wonder why you looked nothing like your so called parents? No you didn't did you? My God, you are so stupid." Her voice had dropped to a whisper by then but Adriana still heard it. It was a magnified virus that would never leave it's host.

"The Truth hurts, doesn't it? better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie. No one will comfort you. No one wants you. They wanted to keep you in the dark. You their most loved daughter, they wanted to sell you off for a high price. You understand? No one wants you." Her voice was quite towards the ending. Once beautiful now twisted, her face stilled as horror struck, leaving a deep imprint embedded. She had realised what she had done. Regret. Too bad. There is no medicine in the world for regret.

Adriana new it was the truth. She was adopted. She always wondered why. But she knew now. They had lied to her.

The loneliness was a vice on her heart, it squeezed with just enough pressure to be a constant pain. It killed her everyday just a little bit more, taking what was once her inner light and replacing it with a darkness that overshadowed each moment. It is the fuel of nightmares, the reason she struggled to breathe when a new shock came. Where was the limit? Where wad the pain that accompanied her in life? Because she needed know; she really needed to know.

Adriana knew tha soon she would evolve into a human shaped shell too numb to feel the pain anymore.

She turned. Clearly no one wanted her anyway.

The mocking crowd had soaked everything up. They parted as she walked past, whispers flew like a wild wind. Continuous and eternal.

It was the she knew that everyone knew. They had kept it in the dark. Concealed.

"Adriana...I..." Celeste was mortified.

"I hate you." Three empty words uttered from her mouth.

She used to only feel the cruel bite of isolation in crowds, now it followed her home, an ever present reminder that she was a failure on every front.

Loneliness ate her alive, it swallowed every ounce of hope she had yet to spare. It fasted upon the hallow happiness Adriana had left, leaving behind empty carcass; full of despair and memories she couldn't seem to hold onto anymore. It took her heart into its claws, squeezed out every bit of life she had circulating throughout her opaque veins. It craved for her to suffer a life without any warm hands that would embrace, or any shoulders to go cry upon. No this beast wanted her to only feel those cold fingertips tracing her fading soul, getting close to her, yet leaving in the end; abandoning her, once more, for this beast is something you should be afraid off because you have no power over it.

They faded leaving her to mourn her

way through the city alone. Today. Another Day. Another Lie.

Adriana cursed those who have left her to a silence, so deafening that it frightened her, her hopes for a better tomorrow diminished into the darkened distance.