Black Rainbow (Rainbows 1)

Looking up at the clock, I realized that four hours had somehow slipped by. It had taken me some time after… after it had happened to call her. But she was the only person who I knew Thea needed most.

“Have they said anything? Do we know anything? We couldn’t get an immediate flight out and they kept saying that she was in critical condition. And—”

“Breathe,” a teenage boy, about seventeen or eighteen, said. He had dark brown skin and black eyes. He placed his hand on her back and rubbed it soothingly. I hadn’t noticed him until now.

“I’m sure she’s fine—”

“She was shot! She is not fine! I don’t understand!” I cried.

Never in my whole life had I felt as useless as I did today. I was failing everyone and everything.

“I haven’t heard anything yet,” I said to her, which only made her cry more.

In the four hours that had passed, I had heard nothing.

“Selene?”

She broke away, wiping her eyes and turned to face a worried, older woman who was making her way towards us with the aid of a cane. She was short, with white hair and dark wrinkled skin. Though she was two generations above, there was no mistaking the resemblance. This was Grandma Cunning.

“No word yet,” Selene said and the woman looked to me. “Grams this is Levi Black. He’s not just dad’s lawyer—”

“Selene, it’s fine. It’s nice to finally meet you, ma’am.”

I extended my hand towards her but she just stared at it and then back to me.

“So you’re the one who’s dating my granddaughter?”

“N—” I began, but Selene elbowed me.

“Yes. Yes I am.”

I couldn’t deny how good it sounded to say it out loud.

She nodded, finally shaking my hand and taking a seat.

“Can I get you anything?”

“Don’t go outta your way for me son, just sit,” she said as she took a deep breath. “You saw it didn’t you? You were there.”

I didn’t want to talk about it. I was trying to block it out. I made no reply.

“You took this case for her?”

“Yes,” I told her. There was no point in lying now. “But she made me believe.”

She smiled, “Yes. She’s a passionate one.”

“I know.”

“You take a case on for her? So she takes a bullet for you?”

I sat up, blinking as I thought about it. Her on the ground, staring up at me, trying to speak, but before she could her eyes had slipped shut. I thought she had died. Right in front of me, with my hand on her stomach, trying to stop the bleeding. I thought she had died, and I wanted to die alongside of her.

No.

Sniffling, I wiped the corner of my eye and sat back in my chair.

“I don’t mean to chastise you, Thea does what she wants. It wasn’t your fault. But when she wakes up, you’d better knock some sense into her.” She paused and placed her hand over her mouth, and I took her other hand into my own. “You better tell her she can’t be jumpin’ in front of no bullets just because she’s in love with someone. I would yell at her myself, but I know I will end up crying right in the middle of it.”