Chapter 99-Whatever it takes to survive

Chapter 99: 99-Whatever it takes to survive

Dylan lowered the phone slowly, staring at the dark screen as though Aymara might suddenly change her mind and call him back. She hadn’t.

Not only had she rejected him but she had done so with a coldness he had never imagined hearing from her.

The woman who once called him several times a day just to hear his voice had ended their conversation without the slightest hesitation. She had even threatened to block him and the worst part was that she had sounded completely serious.

"Aymara..." He whispered her name and rubbed his face with one hand, a bitter laugh escaping his lips as he couldn’t understand it.

Aymara had loved him for six years. Six whole years! She had been willing to give him almost anything he wanted, and even when he treated her poorly, she always found a reason to forgive him. He had grown so accustomed to her affection that he had never seriously considered the possibility of losing it.

He had thought she would eventually calm down as she always did. But the woman he had just spoken to was nothing like the Aymara he remembered.

She sounded confident, ruthless, and entirely uninterested in his excuses. Even the mention of their six years together hadn’t softened her resolve one bit. Instead, she had told him that she no longer loved him.

Dylan tightened his grip on the phone. "She’s just angry," he muttered to himself. "She’s trying to teach me a lesson."

He repeated the words, hoping that if he said them often enough, they would become true because he couldn’t bring himself to believe that in two weeks, Aymara can get free from the leash he’d always tied around her neck.

And even if she got free, it wasn’t possible for her to escape and leave it all behind that easily. She had gotten used to his captivity for six years. It didn’t make sense.

Then another thought intruded. What if she wasn’t angry anymore? What if she genuinely didn’t care about him?

His stomach twisted. ’No. That couldn’t be right,’ he denied in his heart.

Aymara had always loved him. He had built so many of his decisions around that certainty that the thought of losing her now felt like discovering the ground beneath his feet had disappeared.

He was still standing there, trying to convince himself that the situation wasn’t as bad as it seemed, when a sharp voice came from behind him.

"Are you satisfied now?"

Dylan stiffened. He knew that voice and it belonged to the only other person on the ship.

Slowly, he turned around. Sarah stood a few steps away, her arms folded tightly across her chest. Her expression was dark and her eyes were fixed on her phone in his hand.

Judging by the look on her face, she had heard enough of the conversation to understand exactly what he had been doing.

Dylan slipped the phone into his pocket like it belonged to him. "How long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough," she answered and laughed without humor. "Long enough to hear you begging Aymara to take you back... to hear you call her sweetheart... to hear you tell her that you still love her."

She took a step toward him. "So, tell me, Dylan. What exactly am I, your girlfriend, supposed to make of that?"

Dylan frowned at the confrontation. "Don’t start, Sarah."

"Don’t start?" Sarah repeated incredulously. "You were just telling another woman that you love her, and you expect me not to say anything?"

"I wasn’t doing anything wrong," he let out, unremorseful.

The moment the words left his mouth, Sarah’s expression changed and for several seconds, she simply stared at him blankly. After a long moment, she let out a disbelieving laugh.

"Nothing wrong? You were trying to get your ex-girlfriend back!" She said, her voice raising higher than she intended because of her emotional state. "Is that not wrong. Especially since you claim to love me!"

"Keep your voice down."

"Why? Are you afraid someone will discover that you’re still in love with Aymara or that you’re not done pretending to be in love with her?"

"I’m not in love with her!" He denied which proved her latter guess was correct. He wasn’t done pretending to be in love with Aymara to get her to be useful to him.

Sarah noticed. Her lips parted slightly, and something sharp flickered in her eyes. "Then why did you call her?"

Dylan opened his mouth but he found no answer for her. Sarah took another step toward him.

"Go on. Tell me. Why did you call her when we have barely enough food to last us? Why did you spend our precious communication time trying to persuade a woman who clearly doesn’t want you anymore to take you back?"

"Because she has resources and actual skills!" Dylan snapped, the words came out louder than he intended.

A heavy silence fell. Sarah’s face went still and for a moment, Dylan seemed to realize what he had just admitted. He looked away, his jaw tightening as he tried to recover but it was too late.

Sarah had heard him. "Actual skills?" she repeated quietly.

Dylan said nothing more.

"That’s why you called her?"

"Sarah, you don’t understand our situation," he tried to smoothen things.

"Oh, I understand perfectly." Her voice rose. "You want her ship...you want her food... you want her comfortable life and if she agrees to take you back, you’ll get everything you want without having to struggle for it!"

"What’s wrong with wanting to survive?" He argued desperately.

"Nothing! But don’t stand there pretending it’s love!"

Dylan’s expression hardened. "You think surviving out here is easy? Have you forgotten what we’ve been eating?"

Sarah flinched. Of course she hadn’t forgotten, the last days had been miserable. Their supplies were running dangerously low. The food they had managed to salvage was nearly gone, and most of what remained was either spoiled or barely edible.

They had been forced to eat raw fish on more than one occasion because their damaged cooking equipment could no longer be trusted. Even when they managed to prepare something, the taste was often so unpleasant that Sarah had to force herself to swallow.

The smell of saltwater and rotting seaweed clung to their clothes. Their sleeping area was cramped, damp, and cold. Every time the ship rocked violently, she feared the remaining supplies would be thrown overboard or that another section of the vessel would break apart.

This was not the life she had imagined when she chose Dylan. She had believed that being with him would secure her future. She had imagined that once Aymara was out of the picture, she and Dylan would finally have everything they wanted.

Instead, she was hungry, exhausted, and frightened and now Dylan was looking at her as though she were the unreasonable one.

"You think I enjoy this?" he demanded. "You think I want to keep eating raw fish and sleeping in a place that smells like a garbage dump? Every day, we risk being attacked by monsters or pirates. We don’t know when our ship will finally give out, and we have no idea how long we can survive with what little we have."

His voice grew more bitter with every sentence. "I’m tired, Sarah. I’m tired of being hungry. I’m tired of worrying about every little thing. I’m tired of living like this!"

Sarah stared at him. "So, your solution is to crawl back to Aymara?"

"My solution is to do whatever it takes to survive!"

"And what about me?" Sarah asked to know his plans for her.

Dylan looked at her. Sarah’s eyes had grown bright with anger but beneath it lay a vulnerability.

"What about everything we’ve been through? What about the things you promised me? You told me you wanted to be with me. You said you were tired of Aymara controlling your life. You said that once we got away from her, we could start over together."

"I meant it at the time."

"At the time?" Sarah’s voice cracked. "Are you telling me that you don’t mean it anymore?"