Back to Love: A New Beginning
Chapter 231

Chapter 231:

Becky froze, but she wasn’t as upset as before.

“I’ll help you fulfill your dream,” Derek said.

Not a minute later, Becky finally reached out her hands towards Derek and he gingerly lowered her down from the rock. Once they landed on the ground, Becky hugged him tightly.

It was then that I remembered what she told me the other night. He claimed he would show me how much Derek loved his sister. And now I realized that Derek was still very much in love with Sybil. It was probably the reason he treated Becky so well.

Watching something like this unfold before my eyes made me feel suffocated. I looked away and lowered my head.

Then I looked through the clear glass beneath my feet and saw how dark the cliff below was. Suddenly, I felt dizzy and my knees went weak.

A pair of arms grabbed me from behind just in time to keep me from falling. “Are you okay?” said Aaron.

Derek turned his head to look at us. I couldn’t see his expression, but I knew he was still holding Becky and didn’t let go. I had to admit that I couldn’t keep my composure right now, and it wouldn’t be appropriate to argue with Becky right now. Therefore, I just wanted to escape.

“I’m scared of heights; I want to go down,” I muttered.

Aaron held my arms firmly. “Okay. Let me help you.”

After helping me down, we passed a guest room. He asked, “Do you want to come in and get some rest?” I shook my head in response.

“I’m relieved to see that Becky is okay. We should get going. I don’t think we’re needed here.” Aaron must have understood how I was feeling at that moment, so he just nodded.

“Okay, let’s go!”

After leaving the villa, I got into his car and he drove away after.

Soon after, the villa disappeared in the rearview mirror of the car. At that moment, my heart felt empty. A strong feeling of sadness began to overwhelm me.

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Had I met the right person at the wrong time? What if I had met Derek before he met Sybil? Would he have loved me as much as he loved her?

“Eveline, you shouldn’t worry too much. I think what Derek feels for Becky, it’s not love.” Aaron was driving steadily as he said those words.

I leaned against the car window and exhaled my sadness. “He loved Sybil so much that he ended up caring about Becky anyway.” Aaron let out a sigh, not knowing what to say.

Suddenly, one particular tree caught me, and I exclaimed, “Stop the car!”

Aaron stopped right away.

I got out of the car and approached the tree. It was a Ceiba. Even though all the leaves had fallen off, I still remembered it clearly. I lifted my head, looking at the branches with mixed feelings as tears rolled down the corners of my eyes,

No matter that the environment had changed, I still remembered this particular tree. I was ten years old that year. It happened on a late winter night. My parents had not yet arrived home. And since it was late, I had fallen asleep. But then, I heard a loud knock on the door that woke me up.

I thought it was mom and dad, so I ran to the door to open it despite the heaviness of my eyelids. At the door, I saw two tall, snow-covered policemen. I followed them cautiously, not knowing what had happened. But when they looked at me sympathetically, I began to feel uneasy.

The scene of the car accident was absolute chaos. Even though it was almost midnight, there were still many people watching the commotion.

The head of the truck had been badly deformed and the snowy ground ahead was littered with shards of glass.

There, a person lay silently on the blood-stained snow. From a distance, I could not see the man’s face clearly. But when I saw his dark blue uniform, I recognized it was my father.

With a heavy heart, I approached my father’s side and saw his severely mutilated face. At that moment, I didn’t want to believe he was dead. This twist of fate was so cruel that it seemed like a surreal nightmare.

With every fiber of my being, I wished it was just a dream. I wished that when I woke up the next morning, I would be curled up under the warmth of my blanket. Suddenly, I heard the sound of a key being inserted into the front doorknob. Hastily, I jumped out of bed and ran out of the bedroom. It was then that I saw my father enter the house.

Before he could shake off the snow that covered his body, he reached into his pocket and didn’t pull it out in suspense. He smiled at me and said, “Eve, guess what I bought you!”.

Having lived over twenty-six years, I had met different kinds of people. Each one of them had a different smile, but of them all, my father’s was the warmest.

That winter night I lost him forever and never saw his kind smile again. The police told me that my father had died on the spot, and that my mother had been taken away in an ambulance to the hospital.

As I stood there, frozen with fear, I didn’t know what else to do but cry. The only thing I remembered was that there was a Ceiba tree on the side of the road and that my father had left this world never to return.

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