GOLDEN HEART 25

In a majestic office at the top of the tallest building in Johannesburg, stood a quite tall and well - built middle - aged man next to a huge window that was overlooking the breathtaking night view of the city.

The figure seemed to be struggling to win an internal battle with his own self, then he suddenly crashed the glass with his hand.

The door to the office was suddenly opened and another man covered in the darkness of the room took a seat on one of the expensive looking couches.

He spent a while looking at the slightly hunched back of the first man, and the hand that was covered in blood that was still buried inside the glass of the window.

‘I guess you heard.’ The man commented in a heavily accented English. ‘What is it that you wish to do now that you found out?’ He asked breathing in the silence that took over the room.

‘Don’t start with me, Rob!’ Warned the first man.

‘I mean I’m just saying the girl already did more than enough, it’s time we come clean before it’s too late.’ Rob, continued despite the warning from earlier.

The man took the flowerpot on the table next to him and sent it flying to the wall opposite from him. ‘Don’t. Fucking. Start!’ He gritted again.

Rob stood up from his position, and walked towards him. ‘The girl was traumatised! She lived and experienced things worst than you ever did! She is surrounded by traitors! She doesn’t deserve that, no one does!’ Rob gritted fiercer than the man. ‘Don’t you know her already, we will fucking lose her if she ever came to find out!’ He added in the same manner.

‘She isn’t surrounded by only traitors as you kindly described them.’ The man said sarcastically.

‘Oh! How could I have forgotten! She has two whole persons who are genuinely loyal to her!’ Rob replied in the same manner.

The man advanced towards him. ‘That’s the last time you’re going to speak to me in that tone, Rob. You may be my friend but I won’t hesitate to put a bullet in your head if you disrespect me.’ The man threatened.

‘No, she will put a bullet in your head once she finds out. You went beyond all boundaries on this, and despite how you deny it she is way stronger and smarter than you ever can be. And when the time comes you’re going to regret playing her the way you did.’ Rob warned his close friend.

‘All I ever did was to avoid repeating the same mistake twice! I trained her to be strong so that no one dares to look at her without flinching!’ He defended.

‘You turned her into a monster, you shoved her into the same life that her mother begged you so earnestly to keep her away from. You of all people shouldn’t have surrounded her with people that were never hers and never will be, the like of people that are the definition of traitors in her eyes.’ Rob said. ‘That alone my friend is a mistake that can only be redeemed by death in her law.’ He concluded.

‘It’s too late to stop now, she may be strong but not strong enough, She needs to be stronger for her to.’

The man was interrupted by a loud sound resonating in the room. ‘SHE…’ Rob crashed his hands on the table so strongly that few cracks appeared.

He closed his eyes and sighed out loud as if to calm himself down before he continued in a much calmer tone compared to the last.

‘She is sick! Fucking sick! The tumour in her brain is eating her alive, she is slowly fading! And all you care about is preparing her for a business she doesn’t have the least of ideas about, she might even die before she gets to know about it!’

The man was taken aback by his friend’s reaction. Rob never ever lost his composure, he was always so calm and collected, no one could guess what’s going on in his mind, and most importantly he never spoke unless it was absolutely necessary.

To see this kind of man raging on something can only mean one thing, he cherished the little he watched growing like no other that when he got to know of her illness he acted out of character.

‘She’s not going to die. I won’t allow it.’ The man said trying to convince himself more than Rob.

‘She may not die, but she’ll end up forgetting everything before she even gets to know the whole truth. DON’T you think it’s unfair for her to spend all her life fighting with all her might to avenge those dead and protect those alive, she always gave without waiting for anything in return only to get two sincerely loyal persons by her side.’ Rob said.

‘There’s nothing we could do now, don’t you know her already.’

‘Oh, I do know her. I know her just enough to know that we will be the ones biting our fingers at the end of the day. She’s never the one to forgive, she may spare our lives but there will never be Justine or A.L in our lives again. That’s the A.L we became to know, a creature that loathes traitors, hates being played, and that’s great at holding grudges, and you know who’ll be the most affected the most. He’ll destroy whatever we built so far in his rage fit.’ Rob tried to change his friend’s mind, to change the inevitable but in vain.

There’s nothing we can do now, we’ve come way too far to change anything. The outcome will still be the same, so there’s nothing to do but to keep on going and hope this secret is never unveiled.’ The man said.

Rob sighed defeated and he turned to leave before suddenly stopping. ‘A.L is the best at unveiling secrets, you of all people should know that.’ He said just when he was about to exit the door of the office, then he left.

‘I do know.’ Murmured the man to himself.

He tuned his gaze to the desktop computer on his right where the videos that was sent to him from one of his multiple eyes that were planted by her side. A video where she killed the leader of the gang that was behind the attack in the cruellest of ways.

The screen was paused on her photo where she just took the knife out of his heart.

Her nose was slightly scrunched, eyebrows drawn back together in a frown and her lips pursed together.

She looked angelically lethal.

A look only she could manage to pull.

‘Of course I do.’ He said, confirming his earlier statement.

‘Some of us walk around with a necklace of Hope, an armour of Sanity, but at the end of the day, they always come off. We reveal our naked, vulnerable, real selves….’