Cassandra was driving on the highway all by herself. She had learned to drive a car as soon as she turned 20 a few months ago in April. Louis had been her driving instructor as he bought her a birthday present as well.
A Land Rover that she always fancied.
In the same Land Rover, she was feeling a presence behind her when nothing was actually there. She was afraid it was another horrid dream about the God of death again. She wasn’t ready to see him.
But she was wrong about his arrival.
For he often arrived with a message to be etched on her palm.
“Cassie?” Cassandra presses the breaks with full force when she hears a voice in her head.
“It’s me, Cassie. Louis.” Her heart began to race as she stepped out of the car. There was no one using this road to the outskirts, especially when it was beginning to drizzle. Cassandra chose to drive around on the Sunday just because she was bored out of her mind and she’d saved Louis from dying, as instructed and wanted by the God of Death.
When she hears the voice of her brother from the future, Cassandra felt sick to the stomach.
As she closed her eyes, she could enter the astral plane wherein her brother was waiting for her.
The whole place was blue.
And he was glowing in the dark like a soul about to leave.
Cassandra cries loudly as she was trying to approach him. The young man smiles.
“Thank you for letting me be your brother, Cassandra. I was never meant to be born I guess.”
“D-Don’t say that! Come back, Louis! Please, please don’t leave me! You’re my brother!” Louis smiles softly. He was taking a few steps closer towards her. Cassandra wasn’t able to move, she was stuck in the position where she was crawling on the road of the human realm.
“Argh!” She tried to move, but she couldn’t.
“Shush…” Cassandra gasps as she stops trying to defy God. She feels the gentle touch of her brother on her cheeks. He crouched down to embrace her for the last time.
“Thank you, for letting me live. I love you, my little sister.”
“No… no…” Cassandra shakes her head, refusing his departure.
“LOUIS!!” She screams as his touch was losing it’s warmth. She twists her human body of the human realm by force to witness the walking away of his soul.
“I love you, Cassandra.”
“I love you, my little sister.”
‘My little sister…’
She screams.
She was thrown back into the human realm as her senses began to clear up.
It was as if her screams were reaching God. He pours down all the rain that he collected for her, to calm her down and to apologise for the decision he took for her. He apologises for taking away her brother from her. For everything that she was forced to do in someone else’s body.
“AH!!” She lets a blood cuddling scream out of her chest. She was glad there was no one around to spectate, serve as an audience for her grief.
Crying for a few more minutes, she climbs back into the car weakly. Her hands were shivering as she dials a number.
“Zayn…” her shaky voice says.
“Cass? Cassie! Oh my God, where are you? It’s about to-”
“I saw him, Zayn. I saw my brother…” Zayn freezes in his spot. He was in his room, trying to remember who was next to perish from this world.
“Cassandra…” he utters her name gently, as if asking if she was alright.
“Please come here, Zayn. I’m scared. M-my hands aren’t working. I feel stone cold a-and my hands…” the girl was panicking. He knew what to do right away.
“Stay on the call, Cassie. Do not cut the call, you hear me? I’m coming to you. Stay strong, baby. I’m coming.” Quickly taking a few towels with him, he rushes to the main door as he ignores everyone behind.
He takes the car that Louis parked outside on the day before as he rushes to see her.
It was pitch dark outside, it was only around 19:33…
In a few minutes, Zayn races down the streets and reaches the highway quickly. He sees the black car with it’s door open as he parks the car behind hers.
“Cassandra! Cassandra!” He runs towards her with panic, ready to embrace her with the towel.
“Shush…” he tries to calm her down as she cries violently on his chest.
“You didn’t lose him, Cassie. You didn’t lose him forever.” Says Zayn.
“Louis Johnson still lives, because of you. Because of you, my uncle lives, Cassandra. He is alive… he is alive…” he begins to sob along with her as well. Both were drenching in the rain, they didn’t care. As long as they had each other in embrace.
Soon, they drive back as Louis and Dan notice their swollen eyes and faces.
“We caught cold, eheh.” Zayn lies.
Ms. Zee prepares a herbal tea and a steamer to soak their damp faces with warmth.
Thanking the lady who leaves with her boyfriend in the car later, Zayn goes back into his room.
He could hear Cassandra’s gentle, muffled cries towards his room. He walks towards the wall that divides their bedroom as he knocks on it.
“My brother…” she groans in agony.
“I’m sorry…” Without knowing, Zayn and Cassandra sat against each other with the wooden wall between them. When the rest of the Johnsons enjoyed the rain, the two were mourning the loss of a special person from the future.
Cassandra had to learn to accept his absence from today. For he would continue to live inside Louis Johnson, the original reincarnation of her brother.
And so, Cassandra and Zayn stick to each other like glue from then onwards.
They’ve learned a lot of things about this entity that comes to warn them, give them clues and signs to save the Johnsons from death.
Cassandra eventually loves with the loss of her brother. She was even more attached to the man who has the soul of her brother here, now in 2023.
She was willing to forgive God.