Thorns in the Side

One of the reasons Mia fell for Wes was this perceptive empathy.

Time and again, he saw right through her. He realized what she was feeling even without her uttering a word, even with just the subtle shifts in her countenance. More than that, he responded to it with so much compassion it hurt.

“You can leave. It's fine,” he told her, though the heavy look of melancholy weighing on his face said otherwise. 

His brows drooped low, his gaze downcast. Then, his smile—it had lost its warmth and brilliance. He seemed withdrawn, no longer as self-assured as before. 

“Run away and don't turn back.”

A public rejection.

That was what it would appear like if she stepped out of the scene and left through the back door. That was also the very same thing that happened the last time he declared his love to another. He understood this well, but he still cared more about her comfort than his own. 

‘No, that's not… I don't…’

She did not want to humiliate him in front of all these people. She could not bear the thought of him getting left behind again. 

“Hey, you two! Who are you to do such a thing to Alice?!”

“Was that on purpose or what? You could just do this somewhere else.” 

But voices raised, and the tension returned. Gwen and Lucy started kicking up a fuss, demanding that they explain themselves and apologize to their friend.

Mia froze at the sound of them charging in their direction, but Wes was quick to act. Still smiling, he held her shoulder and spun her around. 

“Go.”

And Mia did. 

She ran around the corner and straight to the back door. Her heart ached so bad she struggled to breathe. Tears rolled down her cheeks, blurring her vision and slowing her down as she couldn't see where she was heading. 

In the end, her fear won.

She thought she had changed for the better, had gotten stronger. When she decided to help Wes, it was no leap of faith, but a decisive step towards that goal. However, today showed her all that progress may have been for naught, or perhaps, just far from enough. She still felt petrified, so much so that she chose to turn her back even though it meant leaving Wes alone.

She had made him go through that pain the second time. 

‘I’m sorry… I'm very sorry…’

So many emotions ravaged her from within—remorse from letting him down, guilt from ruining a perfect moment, disappointment in herself.

Wes would probably be better off without her. If he realized now how troublesome being with her was, she wouldn't fault him for it. 

He could change his mind and back out. At the very least, he won't be wasting his time being stuck in a relationship with her.

After what she did, he had every right to cut off ties with her.

‘No… No, I don't want that… Please, anything but that… Please…’ 

Her heart broke into pieces just imagining it, and more tears fell from her eyes, making an absolute mess out of her. There was no getting rid of these emotions. She knew she was being greedy, but she was so far deep at this point and had long been left longing. 

‘I… I can't…’ Mia figured right then and there that she liked Wes too much to let it end like this. “...I can’t give up.”

---

It was not the perfect plan.

Wes had been complacent, and this was what it had done to Mia. He'd watched the startled joy on her expression suddenly turn to trepidation and conflict. She'd then started acting the same way she did that one time, but worse.  

‘What’s going on? Have I gone overboard? Does she...not want this after all?’ 

It couldn't be, not when she had been too focused on him to bother with anything else and had even been bracing herself to speak. She was about to give her answer to his confession, he sensed. But that's until whatever she noticed behind him had caused her to lose sight of her surroundings, of his presence, of their moment. 

‘Hahhh… I knew it.' Wes suppressed the growl that tried to escape and moved his head a bit to the side to look. ‘I knew it was a bad idea to let those people-’

In that instant, it clicked in his head.

He could not possibly forget their faces. Only recently, they had reminded him how despicable people could be—how twisted, how sadistic. What they did was deeply engraved in his memory. 

Gwen Jackes. Lucy Aceron. 

The terror and despair reflected in Mia's eyes right now took him back to the CCTV footage he’d witnessed that night. For her to react this strongly as soon as she saw them, the damage they'd inflicted on her must have been severe; it agonized him to even think about it. What's worse was that he allowed this to happen by neglecting the possibility that they shared a connection with Alice. 

That explained a few things. She's friends with those girls from Mia's school, so she's often seen around this place. But something was still amiss.

‘Why didn't Xander know? And aren't there supposed to be findings from my personal investigation, too? How did they even meet Alice?’

That’s not important right now. Here's what was most important.

“Mia? Mia, please.” He looked at her again and continued his attempts to reach her, but it was no use. 

Seeing her this way made him feel as if he's being stabbed in the chest. It hurt more than he'd admit, and he didn't know how to stop it. Such a condition was something he'd only ever read and heard about.

Panic attack.

It was this sudden episode of intense fear and discomfort which could include palpitations, trembling, dizziness, or a crippling sense of foreboding. It could occur to anybody, but some major contributing factors were stressful life events and a history of adverse past experiences.

Wes felt his breath caught, and he gritted his teeth, brows forming a crease. ‘Forgive me for not realizing it sooner, Mia.’

Doubt rose in his mind, shaking his resolve. 

The plan was to publicize their relationship early on, to share the news of their unity, to show everyone she belonged to him and he to her—a glamorous, media-worthy romance. She deserved recognition and so many more things, and he was proud to have her by his side. But while it was his wish to present her before society, putting their love on display for all to see, he would not be able to take it if she ended up only suffering under the spotlight. 

So, maybe he was wrong. 

Maybe she was against it. Maybe she was not ready. 

Maybe he'd be forcing his choice on her if he went through with this. 

“Mia, listen,” he said in the gentlest voice he could muster. “There’s a back door around the corner. Go ahead and use that to get out of here.”

Mia was aghast upon hearing it, to say the least. 

It took a little bit more prompting before he could get her to leave. He hoped he was able to put on a reassuring expression until the end; it's getting harder to control his emotions. All he wished was to hide her in his arms and lessen her fear somehow in his embrace. 

However, doing that would not make the people around them disappear.

“Hey, I said! We're talking to you! Where does that coward think she's going?! We're not done with her, either! Go and bring her back here!” an irritating voice yelled on and on from behind him.

It had been doing it for some time now, actually, but he was preoccupied with ensuring Mia could get out of there without any more problem. Now that she's gone, he could finally do whatever he pleased with them, let them have a piece of his mind. Yet the moment he turned around to confront Alice's friends, all that smugness and bravado vanished in a snap. 

“W-W-Wes Ashthorne?!!!”

Eyes bulged wide. Jaws dropped. Faces flushed red.

He, on the other hand, all but wore a cold and dark smile. 

‘You dared.’ His eyes flashed for a second, then narrowed. ‘Very well. Do make this worthwhile for me.’