Cassandra 2

The choices we make and the consequences of those choices are the linchpin of life. Not many people know this. Sometimes, Cassandra forgot too. She knew there would be a price to pay, somehow, some day, for the terrible things she had done, even if they were done out of love.

It was a sunny day. It was always a sunny day on momentous occasions such as these, as if Gods felt pity for her after all and wanted to send small comfort, knowing, unlike her, what the future held.

Her friend stood tense next to her, starring straight ahead. She knew what he wanted and she waited with dread for him to voice his request. How old were they then? Cassandra of tomorrow reached towards Cassandra of yesterday and heard only echoes. Time. It didn't flow the same way for her.

Sun bounced off the flag pole on the building opposite and she squinted. She knew what he was going to ask and she really didn't want to say yes but she knew she would. She waited.

It felt like a million of tiny iron beads coalescing throughout her very soul. This is what love did. When you loved someone who wanted you do something you knew deep down in your very core was wrong and yet you also knew you would do it, it felt like dying. Because you loved them. Because they were a friend.

Cassandra often wondered why it was that she loved her friends against all reason. Perhaps Gods had a hand in that too. Perhaps it was another curse disguised as a gift.

The boy shifted his weight from one foot to the other and then turned to face her. He had reached his decision.

"You Do realise what this means," Cassandra said, her eyes alight. "We can never be friends like this again. We can never speak of this. Ever. You will forget everything we ever did or said to eachother and so will I. "

The boy nodded, gravely. "I know. And I am sorry. I know what I am asking."

Later, much later, Cassandra thought about what he had said that day. He had made a choice. She had made a choice. It changed the course of many lives. Such a small thing.

Cassandra knew what he would say before he had said it and still it came as a shock. But she had made her choice already. After days of agonising. After weeks of the boy pleading with her. After weighing up all the options and making sure that what she was going to do out of love for this boy wasn't going to cost someone else she loved their life. It would only cost them their happiness.
Cassandra had chosen the boy's happiness over her own. Over someone else's.

"Fine." She looked at him, her green eyes speaking louder than any words. "It is done."

"Thank you," the boy whispered, a trace of apprehension in his voice. "I really love her, you know," he said, as if it was an apology.

Cassandra shrugged. It was done. He was no longer her friend. They no longer had anything to say to eachother.


Years passed and Cassandra saw her gift to her former friend come to pass. She watched impassively. She hoped for the best. She had favoured one friend over another and she knew there would be a price to pay, so she waited. And then it came.


Honey had lost her baby. She was devastated. Alone in a foreign country with no friends or family to help or offer support and husband that was away at work most of the time.
Cassandra had listened to her friend's agony over her lost baby and she cried silent tears. She had comforted her friend, whispering soothing words down the telephone line.

Months later, Honey called again, whispering urgently on the phone, "Cassandra, I need to tell you something, but I am so worried and you are the only person I dare tell."

"What is it?" Cassandra asked with alarm, but she new what Honey would say.

"I am pregnant." Honey had taken a sharp breath with the last word and the silence hung cold and challenging in the dead air between them.

Cassandra knew what was coming. She knew that Honey wouldn't even have to ask.

"Don't worry, Honey, it will be fine this time, I promise."

Honey sighed with relief. "From your lips to Gods ears." It was a command, more than a request. As if she knew she was only asking for retribution, not a favour.

"I promise," Cassandra shivered with guilt. "Don't worry, it will all be fine."


That night Cassandra tore a piece of herself and wrapped it around the growing life inside her friend.
When Honey told her she was expecting twins, she was excited. Honey had kept quiet about the babies until very late when she was sure they would be all right. The only person she had told had been Cassandra and her mother.

The babies were born and they were beautiful. It surprised Cassandra when she had first seen them to recognise them as her own, to be able to tell them apart even as babies.

She looked at their father, her old childhood friend who had changed everything by asking her to make Honey love him. He felt like a stranger. She saw the guilt marking his soul but his eyes and his mind were filled only with worry and love.
Cassandra wrapped the twins in her gift and left. She felt odd. She was leaving two children behind that belonged to her as much as they belonged to their parents. She wondered if she had wronged them too, with her gift of life, her penance to their mother. Oddly, she couldn't tell. The babies were happy and so different and so the same as eachother. She marveled at their perfection. It hurt to leave them but she had made the choice. One day, they will come to her and ask.

Cassandra didn't know what she would tell them, but she knew what she would ask them. She would ask them if they were happy. And if they weren't, she would ask them how she could die to make them so.