A Serenity of Darkness

By Kimberly Cruz

"Love sucks." If you haven't said it yourself, I'm sure you've heard others say it. But this statement couldn't be more stupid. It is all too far from the truth. This book tells a lot of stories that have nothing in common except for what they will all prove: their message. Love doesn't suck. What sucks is the lack of it, the loss of it. By the end of this book, you'll be sure that if there's anything that doesn't suck, it's love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: May 13, 2024
• ISBN: 9798891572546

Book preview

cover.jpg

A Serenity of Darkness

Kimberly Cruz

Copyright © 2024 Kimberly Cruz

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2024

ISBN 979-8-89157-242-3 (pbk)

ISBN 979-8-89157-251-5 (hc)

ISBN 979-8-89157-254-6 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Special Thanks

Wake Me Up, Drag Me Down

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

The Princess That Couldn't Be Saved

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

The Chains That Lifted Me

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

My Heart Wants to Come Home

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Don't Cry, You'll Die

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

We Were Killed at the Lighthouse on Broadmoore

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

I Don't See Shadows

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Death Dates

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Brave Enough to Run

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Pretty Little Dead Girl

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Not My Déjà Vu

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Home of the Oddly

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

It's Always the Quiet Ones

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Love Isn't for Everybody

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

It Wasn't Me

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Somewhere between Hell and Earth

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

The Future Came Too Fast

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Even Good Things Can Fall Apart

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

About the Author

Special Thanks

Jazmine Lopez, you got the ball rolling.

Miranda Lujan, you kept the ball moving.

Chris Sanchez, you believed in me, and I don't even know why.

Wake Me Up, Drag Me Down

Chapter 1

Why are you crying?

Because…I'm nothing in this life. I have nothing to offer. I have no meaning.

But you do. You are my reason, my reason for so much, my happiness.

No! I'm not…I'm just nothing. I don't even know why you say you love me.

Because I do. Just know that you do have a reason. Do you believe I have a purpose?

Well, of course. You, everything about you, is so perfect. So pure.

Then you should believe in your reason for you are the reason I'm here. Without you, I can guarantee I wouldn't be here.

I looked at her beautiful face. Her long black hair just barely revealed her brown eyes, and her smile peeked out from behind her luscious mid-pink lips. I held her face and placed her hair behind her ears.

Don't!

I pulled back with shock. What do you mean?

You know I freakin' can't stand you revealing my face!

But, Lily…

No! You know I hate it! You know what? I can't stand you! Your face, your voice, everything about you repulses me!

As she backed away from me, fury filled the room, and suddenly a darkness overcame. However, it wasn't black darkness; no, it was more like a red velvet darkness, the kind of darkness that fills you with ironic emptiness, that leaves you lost in a place so familiar, the kind that unleashes adrenaline and at the same time creates an overwhelming need to be motionless. Her face, I stared at it again, and it wasn't her. It wasn't her eyes, her hair, or her smile, but it was somehow her body. Then I noticed it, a chain, the chain that left her neck scarred. Blood started dripping from the ceiling, but somehow, it all avoided everything but my hands.

It's all on you. You let it be. You could've saved me, but you let me, let me be lost to the dark world with nobody. I didn't know where I was nor why I was there. It is! It is all on you! My blood is on your hands!

I woke up in a cold sweat, unable to breathe but relieved to be surrounded by pure black darkness.

Chapter 2

I didn't know why, but I had been having that dream repeatedly. I couldn't figure out what it meant. Lily had been dead for four years now. Actually, now that I think about it, as of tomorrow, it would be five, but why now? All the years prior to this had just been another day for memory. Of course, I was filled with an unimaginable amount of dread when this time of year came around, but I seemed to be the only one. Lily's parents had abandoned her when she was just ten years old. And until we met when I was nineteen and she was sixteen, she had been homeless, fending for life at every corner.

I sat up in my bed and glanced at my clock: 2:54 a.m., I had to fall asleep now. Lily always told me that I could never be awake at 3:00 a.m. because that's when they could attack me and make it real. They would be far more than just a figment of my imagination. She never specified who they were, but I would guess it'd be my demons, the guilt that haunted my heart and soul. As I closed my eyes, I remembered the day. It was June 21. That was the day Lily and I met. She was outside the hospital. She looked so pale, so faint. She should have been inside the hospital, but she told me that she couldn't. They denied her care because she couldn't afford a room. I took her in and told her I would pay for her room. The hospital cared for her for about five days. She had a terrible flu that they announced could have been fatal. After she was released, she felt lost yet again.

Where are you staying? I asked her.

Nowhere and everywhere.

I contemplated what she might have meant by that, but I held back acting on my wonder. Well, as luxurious as that sounds… I said playfully, would you like to come stay with me?

She smiled such a beautiful smile of relief as if the weight of a thousand burdens had been lifted from her grown-weak shoulders.

I would absolutely love that.

Chapter 3

She held out her hand hesitantly. I'm Lily.

Eli.

I took her hand, forming a fist leaving only her pinky out, then grasped it with my own. I promise. She gazed at me with a pleasantly surprised face.

What do you mean?

I promise I'll take care of you—always.

As she smiled, she put her head down, and I led her to my house. I know it's not much, but when you find something special about it, it quickly becomes a great home.

Well then, I'm pretty sure I'm home.

Already? What did you find that's so special?

Well, first of all, it more so found me.

And secondly?

Secondly, it's you. Quicker than ever before, my heart became bare. It couldn't remain closed because she was its key. With every moment I spent with her, my heart grew fonder and fonder.

But here's the thing about the heart growing fond. There are three types—first, the beautiful type when through it all, love perseveres. The second type is the definition of deception; it seems so undeniably perfect but only because it becomes an unhealthy addiction, nothing but a drug that kills you from within while providing satisfaction to you and your unaware mind. And the third is the type that is a combination of both. In the beginning, it is all love, and then becomes parasitism. Then you reach the stage where you fall in love but at the same time find unjustified and fake hatred to mask that love.

Sadly, Lily and I didn't know that we were entering the third type.

Chapter 4

For the first two years Lily lived with me, everything was perfect. We were so infatuated with each other, every feature that lay in each other's character. Come year three, we couldn't stand the sight of each other. She became my parasite, living off me while she did nothing but wreck me from the inside out or the outside in; that year was too much of an exhaustion for me to tell. Then came year four, and we rediscovered our love. However, we did find ourselves arguing quite often, but we knew it; we just knew that what we had was worth holding on to.

June 22 was the day she died; we had gotten into a fight like no other.

My eyes shot open. That was it. I discovered the reason.

Chapter 5

That night, it was pouring down rain. I can remember it as if it were merely minutes ago, but for some reason, my subconscious wouldn't allow me to recall the reason we were fighting. Really, the main part I remember was her telling me she didn't need me and my telling her that she couldn't even last a second without me. But our strongest words…

Your life wouldn't be in your worthless hands if it wasn't for me! I yelled. She looked at me with disgrace and disbelief.

Your pathetic ass only helped me to sustain life because you needed to feel as if you had meaning in yours!

In that moment, she ran off, and as if it were my demand, I hollered for her to leave. I felt hurt but at the same time apologetic. I didn't mean the words I spoke before her. I knew that she didn't mean her words either. She said them in spite of the pain that hit her when she felt that my words were true.

That night, I heard piercing screams, but I couldn't tell if they were Lily or the voices of guilt in my head, creating a take on the worst-case scenario. And the next morning, I found the necklace I gave her drenched in blood on my front step.

Chapter 6

At 3:00 a.m., these same piercing screams rang in my ears. I felt something take hold of me, and it seemingly was from the throat, from within my body. I couldn't breathe and was paralyzed. Whatever these feelings were, they threw me to the hallway. This must have been what Lily meant when she said they could get me.

They got me to the front door, and as I looked up, my door flew open. There in front of me stood a part of my past that I really had hoped would never be my present again, Mia.

Chapter 7

The darkness in her eyes left me stricken. She took a step closer toward me and after that another and another. At last she reached my person. Above me she stood. The girl standing before me was everything I recalled her being, but now, I wasn't blinded. She was one of the most beautiful faces any soul could ever hope to lay eyes on. At the same time, so regrettably, it was the darkest heart one could ever have the misfortune to feel. With a single paralyzing touch, I fell unconscious.

Chapter 8

A drip fell on my face as I woke. I shook my head to help wake my mind. I looked around the room, and I recognized it. That was when I discovered that familiar doesn't necessarily mean comforting.

Just how you left it, yes?

I looked at her, so unsettled. It was the same, just as I remembered it being. You will fall again, and when you wake, satisfaction will come to me. Unconsciousness overcame my body once more for what must have been hours.

The sound of weeping brought me back to my senses, cries for help unlike any other because they could only belong to one: Lily.

Chapter 9

I savored her presence. Every feature I studied, I examined. It was Lily. Unlike Mia, Lily was, truly was, sheer beauty. But there was no comparison. Lily was perfect. Mia was deceptive.

Just then, I heard Mia's step, worst of all, not toward me, toward Lily.

You murdered me when you broke my heart. Now I will do the same to you.

She held in her hand the necklace I gave Lily. Then with such eagerness, she wrapped the chain around Lily's neck and strangled her lifeless. The pain that possessed me took away my soul. My vision faded, but I could still hear the violence happening before me. Everything I had just regained was now ripped away from me. She wasn't kidding; Mia was looking to kill me from a broken heart.

Once the screams stopped, I felt my body being dragged. My vision regained, and I saw before me Lily's lifeless body bare in a tub.

I had to do this in front of you, Mia said. And she slit Lily's throat. She bled rapidly like Seattle rain. Mia then palmed my head and drowned me in Lily's blood. And in that moment, I woke up.

It was a nightmare, not real. But I felt Mia's presence. She held me over a bathtub and grazed her blade across my chin. Tonight, you're back to being mine, Mia whispered in my ear and rubbed her lips against my neck. I stared at the countless scars that ran down her entire body—her wrists, her entire arms, her belly, even scars I could tell were less deep were noticeable on her neck. I swallowed, scarcely capable to breathe. She then drowned me, this time for real, but now, it was in a pool of her own below-freezing blood.

The Princess That Couldn't Be Saved

Chapter 1

Fairy tales are nothing but stories that lack logic. However, I suppose it's all for the best reasons. For example, there's always said to be happy endings, but it never really ends at all; at least it's not supposed to. The fact is that endings are not happy at all. When the need to perform a task is no longer existent, you enter a lost place, a place that always leaves you wondering What now? and you feel meaningless. When a song ends, you must press Repeat; otherwise, you can no longer enjoy its melodies. And when life ends, everyone is left to live so full of dread. So happy endings are very illogical if you take time to take them into consideration.

Fairy tales are meant to be told as happy continuations, not happy endings. Of course, the continuation is supposedly implied.

I will leave you now, my fair reader, with a story I can assure you has a true ending.

Have you ever wondered how the princess got locked in the tower? That is likely a fact that has never held clear. Perhaps it is because it never really proves to be significant to the tale. I cannot tell you the past and backstories of all the princesses, but I can tell you of this one for you will find this one very relevant.

I will spare you the pain that lies within the excess details, but I warn you it won't seem as if I spare you much.

This, as all fairy tales do, begins with an undeniable attraction. Sarah, our princess, met Anthony when she was just eight years old. She had run away from home and had nowhere to go but the farthest place she could think of, a pier, Pier of Ashes. It was there that Anthony found her crying.

Are you alright? Sarah looked up with such fear in her eyes. I guess not, because you're crying. Why is it that you're crying? Anthony sat by Sarah, trying to offer comfort.

I'm lost, Sarah said, weeping. I have nowhere to go.

I could take you to the place where I went when I had nowhere to go. That is if you trust me.

I do.

Anthony took Sarah beyond town limits. She had never been outside the town before. As they walked, they passed a beautiful castle in the distance. Do you see that? Anthony pointed out the castle.

It's beautiful.

They say that a princess once lived there, Anthony told her.

Really? I have always dreamed of being a princess. Don't laugh.

I won't laugh. It's nice to dream. Maybe one day, I can make you one. Sarah smiled shyly. No one had ever talked to her in that way, a way that made her feel comforted.

This is it. Anthony led Sarah to a dark alley, the kind of alley that seemed so lifeless it seemed to rob people of hope or make them incapable of reaching a place higher than that. But it wasn't. Like fairy tales, this alley was very backward. Commonly people came from a damaged place and could then hope to come out better. This alley took in the people that knew they could be better; they then entered the unknown, living a life that was entirely unpredictable.

It's not much… Sarah said. Anthony looked at Sarah with disappointment. But it's so much more than I could have ever hoped for. Sarah hugged Anthony, thanking him for the beginning he had given her.

Time passed, and the day came that Anthony would fulfill his promise to Sarah. He took her to the castle, the castle that they had crossed the night they met. It's even more beautiful on the inside, Sarah said while standing in astonishment.

C'mon, I wanna show you something. Anthony took Sarah to the lower level of the castle. It was a room filled with diamonds.

How did you find this? As Anthony began to answer, a massive roar echoed throughout the room.

Fear overwhelmed Anthony and Sarah. Anthony grabbed Sarah, and they took off. Some had said the dragons there had died off. The ones who discovered otherwise had never survived to oppose. Anthony and Sarah headed toward the stairs, but just as they were within reach, the dragons took hold of Anthony.

No! Sarah screamed with devastation.

The dragon tore Anthony up limb from limb with no mercy, no hesitation. The dragon was determined to end Anthony's life in the most brutal way, and Sarah was left to witness it all. Tears filled Sarah's eyes. She felt as if she couldn't breathe with the lump she felt engulfing her throat. Somehow, Sarah's fear drove her enough so she could run up to the castle's tower.

Once reaching the tower, Sarah had the time to weep profusely. She stayed on the tower floor for many days and nights. As sad as this may be, the truly sad part was when she restrained from crying. Something changed. Sarah's heart was shattered; it was no more. That day, Sarah's soul became as dark as dust.

Chapter 2

Sarah spent majority of her time in the tower. She spent the rest of her time getting to know the rest of the castle, what she had decided would be her new home. When Anthony died, so did she, so why wouldn't she have chosen to live in the place that robbed her of life?

Sarah would also visit the castle's workshop quite often. It was there that she decided that the dragons would indeed be a thing of the past. She took with her a sword and a small piercing knife, nothing more. She headed down to the chamber. Once more, the dragons released their roars. Except this time, fear didn't fill her; infuriated pain did.

The moment Sarah spotted the beast, she ran at it, each and every time giving it a wound that fell deeper and deeper. The beast was well dead by the third stab, but Sarah wasn't done. She continued stabbing the dragon at least forty-two times.

Sarah then took the piercing knife and disassembled the dragon limb by limb and then piece by piece. She took the eyes, the heart, and the brain. If the dragon had seen what she and Anthony had, if it had a heart and if it could have given a second thought to its actions, it wouldn't have undergone such a brutal experience. Sarah did this to each and every dragon that occupied that chamber. And the blood that fell on her did nothing but give her the taste of adrenaline.

She fed on their flesh and quenched her thirst with their blood. With every day that passed, the emptiness that consumed her made her less and less humane.

The people of the town heard Sarah's cries for Anthony almost every night. They all believed her cries were of distress, that she cried for help. She merely cried for blood. There were men in the town who wished to save her even if it meant their death. Only this time, it wouldn't be the dragons that were killed.

Chapter 3

Man by man, prince by prince went to go rescue Sarah. And one by one, they died. As the days fell, Sarah's cries grew louder. She couldn't continue her reality of life on the remnants of the dragons she slayed. But Sarah knew she could never be a cannibal, and although her victims helped fulfill her endless thirst for blood and hunger to kill, it was rare. Her real hunger and thirst were anything other than dragon remnants—blood and flesh. Only some actually brought water and other nourishment. But all of them constantly reminded her of what could never be hers again.

Sarah wanted to die, more so every day. She witnessed it in the most brutal manner. Death, torture, and suffering were the only things Sarah ever experienced in the tower. And as long as she had the time, she thought she would make each one unique.

Sarah carved throats, skinned alive. She departed fingers from hands and thrust wounds into pounds