#❝ 𝙖. 𝙡𝙖𝙣𝙙𝙧𝙮 ❞ ╱ task

[phantmheart]

THE CLIFFS were Athena’s favourite place to be, other than at home with her family and with her plants. Up here, with the wind in her hair, the smell of the salty sea getting up her nose, and with the incredible view of the water stretching for miles, it was hard not to love it. She felt untethered to society here, free as the gulls that soared above her, but it made her aware that the was world incredibly large.

Athena traversed the path along the Cliffs, knowing she could do this with her eyes closed and not be feared of taking a misstep, and observed the scatterings of clover, yellow wild indigo, and other wild flowers. She loved the variety of flora up here and remembered it being the spot she would come to when she wanted to make little bouquets for Lillian.

She knew these cliffs like the back of her hand, so when she saw a large box beside a moss-covered boulder she froze. This was weird, even for someone like Athena. Especially when she saw the initials A.V.L. monogrammed on the lid.

The box was like a treasure chest, made of dark wood with scuffed gold hinges and trim along the edges, and standing on wide gold feet that were slightly wedged into the earth. Ivy had creeped around the box like a chain protecting its contents and almost covered the chunky padlock that hung on the front.

Athena recognised it immediately. It was the box she kept in the shadows of her wardrobe, a container for the memories of a period of time she longed to return to. She approached and kneeled down, reaching for the padlock. It took some effort to shimmy it from the latch, but when the lid was opened a wave of nostalgia and nausea came over Athena when she saw what was inside.

All of the letters she had received from David had been neatly stacked and wrapped in a royal blue ribbon. On the top letter she could see her name written in his immaculate hand and traced it with the tip of her finger, imagining him smiling as he drew the pen across the envelope. But he couldn’t have been the happy if he stopped writing with no warning. Nothing would ever convince Athena to open the letters and reread what was there. It was all too romantic, too pure, and felt too much like one big lie.

There were also half-ripped tickets from several cinema and theatre showings, pressed buttercups and daisies weaved into a flower crown, a small collection of white and pale pink shells, pebbles of various shapes, and stuffed right at the bottom were several photographs printed on quality glossy card. Each of them with dates on the back accompanied by doodles of hearts, all in Athena’s meticulous handwriting.

The first photograph was of Athena by herself, donning her most beautiful summer dress- white, knee length, with tiny cherry blossoms dashed across the skirt- with the glittering ocean in the background. A wide smile was spread across her face, her golden hair windswept, and in her hand was a single red rose. She felt sick to her stomach when she saw it, painfully reminded that this photo was taken on what she considered to be the happiest day of her life.

The second photograph was taken on the same day when a kind elderly lady offered to snap a picture of Athena and David together. His arm was around her shoulder, hers around his waist, both smiling softly as they stood against the backdrop of the beach. Staring at the photo, she could imagine the warmth of his touch and how safe, how joyous, she was in that moment.

She felt her hands and lip tremble, a lump rise in her throat, and tears beginning to blur her vision. Athena had never been happier than when she was with David, but he had broke the heart that she had kept protected for so long out of fear that something would go wrong. Of course it would go wrong. Athena should have expected it. She was weird, quiet, stubborn, sensitive, and talked to her plants like it was no big deal. Why, or how, could anybody really love her?

The tidal wave of emotion eventually began to calm and after a moment Athena stared, puzzled, at the box. Everything in it, except the letters, had been burned. She had put the items on a fire in the Landry home’s back garden and watched them turn to ashes. She was sure of this. So how could those items be in tact? How?

Well, if fire couldn’t destroy them, then they could could be locked away again, tossed into the ocean below, and find a new home in the dark depths of the water with nothing but seaweed and jagged rocks for company. She wanted to forget everything that had been crammed inside the box; she never wanted to return to that life. It was too painful and she was a completely different person- a fragment of what she was now.

Athena Landry was not allowed to be happy. She was not allowed love. She was destined to be alone, alone as this godforsaken box would be when it found itself lost to the ocean and lost to time.

But she never remembered throwing it over the cliff. She never remembered retreating home and locking herself in her room. But those dredges of faded memories sure as hell felt real. That was a feeling Athena never would forget, whether in reality or in dreams. It was a scar too big and too stark on her soul.