"Where the hell were you?" Sarah began. She was officially pissed at him. "What took you so much of time to find your sister? I myself saw a few ushers and asked for you. Two of them said that they hadn't seen any Nathan. One asked for your description, I said not at all phlegmatic."

"I didn't intend to have taken that long a time." Nathan said, surely not paying attention to Sarah words.

Ava was standing couple of blocks away from him. She was looking how Sarah and Nathan were talking. She did think of listening to what Peter had to say but she was too intrigued by the stranger who rescued her.

"You know, there's someone staring at us," Sarah said discreetly, leaning her neck towards the ground. "I don't know if that's your sister but you better check."

Nathan knew that it wasn't his sister and also that there was a possibility that it wouldn't be Ava and some lunatic stalker. As he commenced to move his head around, Ava and Nathan's eyes met and the former turned around with a jerk in neck. They had separated when they had reached the ballroom—Nathan had found Sarah while Ava went to Peter. And now she was eying at him with plenty curiosity while Peter raved and inquired her whereabouts. Ava didn't seem to care much about Peter's imbecilic rambles.

Nathan wanted to laugh at the addled nature of this day, for he was the only one who was familiar with the entire story and could therefore join all the dots.

"That someone is a lot more than a someone," Nathan said, not moving his sight off Ava. "Meet Ava."

Before he said that, Sarah was already looking at Ava. She thought of a quick comeback but let it go instantly for she was busy looking at Ava. Ava didn't look like a fully matured person, of course, she was just sixteen in this year but Sarah didn't have the knowledge of it yet. Her high cheekbones, the sharpness in her eyes mixed with the gentleness of adolescence. The red-wine eyes appeared to be crystals with superbly curved lashes. Her long partly wavy black hair was as black as coal and as beautiful as one of coal's product—diamond.

She moved her eyes from Ava to Nathan who wasn't done gazing at her, and said, "We'll have to lure her into one of the rooms upstairs and explain her everything—"

"No," Nathan forbade strictly. "That's going to change everything in the present." Tension and anxiety seemed to be radiating from him.

"If you have a better plan, I'm all ears," Sarah shrugged.

"That moment will come soon enough."

After some time, Sarah spoke. She said, "What if nothing gets altered?"

Nathan thoughtfully arched his eyebrows and asked, "You're saying that you can do that?"

"Nah," she explained. "But if, as you said, her soul is indeed roaming somewhere—as in wandering—all these actions won't reach her present-self."

"I'm not taking any step if I see any kind of menace or predicament standing at the door of that choice," he ruled out her point.

"Risks are what that have led us here. Risk of getting caught, risk of not finding her, risk of never be able to get to the present. Without taking chances, we wouldn't ever get to do a thing." She looked aside and then back at Nathan. "Yeah, I know she means a lot to you but if now you don't take the risk of executing that plan, you're going to forever think what if you had done it and gotten her and mended everything—"

"You don't get it!" His face muscles visibly contracted as he tried to lower his ungovernable temper. "What do you know about losing people anyway?" 

 He looked for Ava but she was gone from there. Everything was falling apart. He knew that he shouldn't have said that but he couldn't take those words back. Something he extremely hated. Once said something, you can't rephrase it or change the entire sentence before it reached the other one's ears and all the emotions and reality gets poured out. Whether or not you say that you had said that unknowingly, it wouldn't matter and the scar will always remain there on both of them because once we say something, it's no longer only ours; it becomes part of the conversion—something that worked mutually. And you can't cease to wonder as to why you had said or done it in the first place, maybe because remorse enters all the chambers of our heart without permission and gradually spreads to every tunnel and every hallow in the body like an unstoppable poison. Wasn't that unfair? It does hurt when we say something terrible to someone, something you shouldn't have, but it's more devastating when it is true. But here, he knew that it was untrue. He knew of the existence of a reason of Sarah being captive in Elliot's house, but not the reason per se.

"I don't have any family, not anymore," she spoke to herself. "My dad died and I don't know where my mother is. So yes, maybe I do know how it feels about losing people more deeply and intensely than you because no magic in the world can bring them back." "I'm literally a slave in Eliot's eyes. The only reason I'm helping you is because I can't stay under the roof of that house any longer. You know what's the thing with you? You just can't cease to become a pessimist even for a second and just ramble without having the knowledge of it. Yes, I may seem quite useless and unproductive for the moment but I give you my word that you will see her again and I don't admire persons who take their words back just because they can't fulfil those promises. But never say that I'm alien to the feeling of pain ever again."

She didn't say any of that, instead replaced them with a sentence, "I do know."

Nathan met a thought that compelled to reveal the past incidents. Maybe she deserved to know it; maybe by telling someone the burden of carrying would lighten. Maybe she didn't know why he was telling her that. Maybe this was simply a cryptic charity. Or maybe it would be better to not tell her and say to his half-conscious and working mind.

"I met her, Ava," even in his thoughts, his voice shook a little. "I didn't find any waiter-person, but I saw her and it felt good. For a moment, every wind stopped, every ocean wave paused, every light ray went motionless and every drop of darkness there appeared to be still, somehow floating in the air but dead. Earth seemed to have stopped rotating; even the both of us went stationary, only her heart beat rhythmically and my hairy heart remembered how it was to beat once again."

Reality kicked in and he apologised. "I'm sorry for what I said and I know I can't do anything to make up to that but—"

"No, you are going to," she cut him. "You will, I know that. Presently, we have to think of a way to get Ava." She flushed all the arguments down her throat and reminded him of the major task at hand.

"That's already decided." His face pulled an awkward smile, thinking to look a bit polite. "We're moving forward with that crazy mission of some strangers explaining her about travelling against time. I'd bet her coherence is going to go upside down. And by the way, we won't—" Sarah eyed him as to be a little optimistic. If she'd known the entire sentence, she wouldn't have. Nathan didn't have to follow her rules and be ridiculously sanguine but he decided to do it anyway, perhaps he owed her inasmuch as an obligation.

"—may not get the opportunity to have a dance together. I know you are desponded—" He had started to laugh. This was a genuine laugh.

"Here he comes to his original form. God, You were better like that," she said; half sighing, half laughing.

"If we're being candid now, I just realised that my sister had left this event quiet before. And I was still here because, of course, who comes with their sister as a ball partner?" He awkwardly eyed her.

"I'd said the same thing!" exclaimed Sarah.

"I recollected quite a few details along with that piece of information." His voice rushed and took a gloomy turn. "This is not going to sound great but we've got to do all this real quick 'cause this place is going to burn to the ground."

Sarah's eyes were in an incessant momentum but she allowed them to rest when they found Ava taking a turn towards the East Hall. 

***

Thank you so much for reading till here. It really means a lot to me.

Question: What do you think will happen next? Do you think Sarah and Nathan will confront Ava or will they buy some more time? I'm eager to learn your answers and if anyone accurately anticipates what happens next, in the comment section!

Date for next upload (for me today is 22/05/21): 25/05/21

Have a gorgeous day!

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Please DO NOT promote plagiarism AT ALL. It is a punishable offence. If you do, serious action may be taken against you.

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