QOTD

Chapter |32|

They say that being happy means letting go of what weighs you down.

I guess I was a bit too late to realise that all I had to do was stand up for myself and keep sturdy. Sometimes we are a bit late to become aware of how it is in our control to get influenced by the people around us.

I stared at the clear blue water from the deck, careful enough to stay a safe distance away from the edge. The water reflected the light of the stars and the moon that appeared to shine brighter than ever.

I sat there alone, thinking about all the incidents that took place a couple of hours ago. Some might say that I was a bit harsh on them but those who say that, don't know the depths of ruins I carried until I learnt that the only way I was going to be able to fix it was building it myself.

I let out a deep breath, which was weightless of all the burden I used to carry. For once, I didn't feel forced to breathe.

The serenity that engulfed me as I sat under the blanket of the stars, made my insides settle down peacefully.

As I sat there admiring the beauty around me, I heard light footsteps echo from behind me. They came to a stop right beside me and I felt a weight settle down on my right. I didn't turn nor did I move. I just sat there, lost in the calmness around me.

"I thought you'd never come near water again," Daniel said as he stared ahead, mimicking my posture.

"And I never thought that I'd be free of Linda and Alicia. But I guess life is mysterious that way," I answered, staring at the soothing movement of the water with the wind.

We sat there in silence for a while before Daniel fidgeted a bit. He seemed a bit hesitant about something but I didn't ask. There were a lot of things I wanted to ask him but I kept my mouth shut.

"Skylar?" he called out softly, making me turn to him a little.

"Hmm?"

"Hold out your hand," he said and I fully turned my head towards him, confusion lacing my eyes.

"What?"

"Just do as I say," he said in a soft voice.

I looked at him for a few seconds. Moonlight illuminated half of his face, defining his features beautifully. His stormy grey eyes stared into mine urging me to comply to his request.

I nodded after a bit and held out my hand in front of him.

He quickly dropped something into my palm and turned away, not meeting my eyes. My eyes widened as I examined the object in my hands.

My hands shook a little as I brought it closer to me. My lips parted in surprise and gratitude filled me as I saw the familiar book locket in my palm. The same one that Alicia had taken away. The one that contained a beautiful memory of the only person I loved more than my life.

Tears welled up in my eyes as I looked back up at Daniel who was avoiding my gaze. My heart started beating faster, opposing the serenity outside.

Without thinking much, I threw my arms around him. His body tensed up a little before relaxing in my embrace. "Thank you," I said, meaning every letter of the word.

His arms wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer to him. I tightened my hold on him as well. I could feel myself getting engulfed in his scent but I didn't mind. My heartbeat was pacing as if I'd run a marathon.

I was well aware of my tiny crush on Daniel. I wasn't going to deny the fact that I did feel something for him. Whether it was just a small crush or something big, I didn't know but whatever it was, it sure as hell wasn't going anywhere any time soon.

Daniel held me close and I realised how much I needed a hug. I'd been through way too much in the past few days and I had no one to hug me like this and tell me that everything was going to be okay. And the way Daniel held me, it felt like he understood that, despite of being lack of words to convey it.

"You don't need to thank me at all. It's the least I could do since how I treated you was equally bad," he replied and I relaxed a bit.

We stayed that way for some time, enjoying the peace that nature offered. After a while, I slowly let go of him. I took the locket and wore it around my neck. As the cool surface of the locket collided with my chest, a sense of relief and happiness flooded through me.

We sat in silence again for a few seconds before Daniel spoke.

"Wanna continue the twenty questions?" he asked and I looked at him in surprise.

"We still have questions left?" I asked, the corner of my lips turning slightly upwards.

"Let's just pretend we do," he replied.

"Sure," I replied before sitting comfortably, keeping my eyes on the water.

"You go first. I feel you have more questions to ask," he replied.

I didn't object because I did have a lot of questions to ask him. I thought about which one I could ask him first. Not wanting to sound too nosy and pushy, I resorted to a bit vague question.

"How has everything been going between you and Sali- I mean Lacey?" I asked, wanting to know about their weird behaviour today.

He paused for a moment before sighing. A humourless chuckle escaped his mouth before he answered. "I dumped her. I had been turning a blind eye towards all her antics for quite a while now. I guess I'm done being oblivious. I can't believe she made me miss Carrie's funeral and I still had it in me to trust her," he spat bitterly and I looked at him, startled.

"But how did she manage to do that?" I asked, surprised by his revelation.

His face turned bitter as he spoke,"The day Carrie got into an accident, Andrew and I had a huge fight. It was the biggest fight we've ever had as best friends. At that time I had been infatuated with Lacey and we were in the "sort of" relationship at that time. After the fight, I had gone to her place and at one point, I had gone out of the room, leaving my phone with her. When I came back, she told me that Andrew had called, saying that he didn't want to see my face at all and had asked her to convey it to me that I was not invited to the funeral.

And like the moron I am, I didn't even bother trying to call him to check if he was okay or that that was the reason he had called me."

My eyes widened and my mouth hung down in shock. I had no words to say. It was hard for me to imagine what both of them would've felt like in the situation, each thinking that the other didn't want to see them.

Both of us lapsed into silence for a while before I broke it.

"Your turn."

"Why are you afraid of water?" he asked and my eyes snapped up in a jerk.

How did he notice that? I'd told everyone else that I didn't know how to swim which is why I didn't go near water but I don't know how he managed to take note of that. He wasn't even there when I was dunked into the lake.

My lips parted in utter shock when I heard his question.

"I-I," I stuttered, unable to think of words to form a sentence.

"It's okay if you don't want to tell me," he replied, making me shut my mouth.

As much as I wanted to keep my mouth shut, I knew that I needed to let go of my past, a little bit. I'd kept this caged inside me for too long and I had to let it go before it got locked in permanently.

Taking a deep breath, I turned my head back towards the glisten water and I started.

"My mom was diagnosed with lung cancer when I was thirteen. It was stage one so there was a possibility of controlling the tumour before it spread. Two years of chemo and operations later, doctors declared that she had 70% chance of living through it," I started, my eyes going damp as the flashbacks started playing in my head like a movie.

Daniel stared at me a bit wide eyed but kept his mouth shut, not interrupting me.

Taking a deep breath, I spoke," It was two weeks after my fifteenth birthday when I forced mom to take me to a lake party on the other side of the town since all my friends were going there.

She was still weak even though she was recovering but I still forced her and she complied to my request. She complied because she loved me more than anything," I spoke, my voice breaking towards the end.

Daniel opened his mouth to interrupt but before he could ask me to stop, I didn't give him a chance to even utter a word.

No doubt I was feeling a bit emotional as I recounted that day's events but I had to do this or else I was afraid I wouldn't be able to let go.

"So since I was hormonal teenager, my then crush convinced me to jump into the deeper side of the lake. I tried to refuse but he said that he wouldn't let me drown. And like the stupid fantasy-stricken girl I was, I agreed.

But I didn't jump. Though I had agreed to it, I decided that it was too much of a risk. So when I turned down their offer, one of his cronies pushed me. Though she didn't know that her push would make me slip and fall into the water," I continued, even though it became harder and harder with every word.

I paused for a few seconds to take in deep and calming breaths before speaking again. All this time Daniel sat still, tensing as I spoke.

His hand enveloped mine, making me look up. It offered me comfort that I needed as I recounted the most dreadful day of my life.

"So I fell. Water caged me into its presence and I thrashed around but I don't know why no one came to help. I tried to scream but water didn't allow. After almost giving up, a hand pulled me to the shore.

I was almost unconscious when I came out so I didn't know who had saved me. A day later, when I recovered, I found out that it was my mother who had dove into the water, abandoning her oxygen tank. She was taken to the hospital where I found out that her lungs had collapsed, ending her life," I blinked to stop the tears from falling.

My breathing was heavy, as I tried to calm myself down. Daniel squeezed my hand in comfort and I slowly calmed down. He carefully pulled me close to him, wrapping an arm around me.

He didn't say anything, for which I was grateful.

After a few moments, when I had calmed down, he diverted my attention.

"So, you don't have any more questions for me?" He asked in a light and a playful tone, lifting a certain heaviness from the atmosphere.

I almost sighed in relief. I took another deep breath before letting it out. I nodded. I thought of what I could ask him.

"Did Lacey ask you to be nice to me?" I asked, a bit hesitantly.

Daniel looked at me, surprised before answering. "Yes."

"Oh," I replied, feeling a sharp pinch inside me. I looked away and stared at my shoes, trying to focus on the dirt rather than the negative thoughts that we're starting to form.

"You asked the wrong question, though," he said, making me look up at him in surprise.

"I don't understand," I said, confused by what he meant.

"You didn't ask whether I was nice to you because she asked me to," he replied.

"So, were you? I mean-"

"No," he cut me off. "She asked me to be nice to you a day before the treasure hunt. And if you remember, I had yelled quite a lot at you just the previous night," he said, as I got the day he was referring to.

The night he'd shouted hurtful things at me. And Lacey had asked him to be nice the day before but he was still mean to me until the treasure hunt day.

An unknown feeling made my stomach flip when I realised that he wasn't nice to me just because Lacey asked him to.

"Did you really love Lacey?" I blurted before realising what I just asked. My eyes widened and I tried to stutter out a response to take back my question.

He didn't seem too surprised though. He just let out a small sigh and answered.

"I thought I did. I lied to you about something when I had told you about Lacey and my relationship," he told me and I looked at him inquisitively.

"What do you mean?"

"The thing is, when my dad left us, I was shattered. He used to be my hero. Since mom worked two states away at that time and could visit only a few times, I'd grown up with dad. For a ten year old to be betrayed by his hero, was a lot.

That was the first time I lost a part of myself. Then I met Andrew. He was a crazy kid not that he's any less now," he chuckled, his eyes shining as he reminisced his friendship with Drew.

He told me some of their crazy stories and I could feel myself finding it hard to imagine the way Daniel said he was like. His face crinkled in happiness when he told me about how he used to be.

"You won't believe it but I was like a carbon copy of Andrew. The difference being that I was forced to change.

My dad came back on fourteenth birthday. He stayed around for some time, making promises of staying forever and spewing shit like that. I started trusting him again. I was mad at first but his false promises kept my hopes high. He raised them so high that when they came crashing down, they broke me completely," he spat.

My heart ached for him as I heard his story. No wonder he had trust issues when we met. Initially, he was so rude that it almost made him look a bit obnoxious but who knew that it was just a ploy to push people away?

I felt a strange familiarity with his situation. Both of us had been betrayed by our own blood in some way and it had left us with a hole that wasn't easy to fill.

I turned to him and clutched his hand the way he had mine. He needed it as much as I did.

"So when he left again, I became who I am now. I left everything that made me happy, afraid that that happiness would abandon me the way my dad did. I looked for comfort where I knew I wouldn't be left. That's when Lacey came into the picture.

I saw an assurance in her because I knew she wouldn't leave me because there were many girls who wanted to 'change' me and she had way to much ego to let me go.

I wasn't stupid. I knew what she was doing and I was well aware of how she did things with other guys but the assurance that she would come back made me mould myself according to her. My need of trust made me believe that I loved her," he said bitterly, his jaw tight.

"What made you leave her now?" I idiotically asked. I knew it wasn't my turn and neither did I have any right to question him but the curiosity inside me created an unstoppable urge to ask.

And Daniel didn't even seemed to mind.

"I guess I found some-"

Before he could say anything else, his phone rang. He took it out and groaned web he glanced at the caller ID.

I took a peak and almost laughed when I saw the name on the screen.

Queen of Shit 💩

"Lacey?" I asked and he simply nodded before switching it off.

"Come on. We should get going since it's getting late," he said before getting up.

He extended his hand for me to take. I took it and stood up, dusting my shorts. "Let's go."

We both started walking towards the house. Neither of us spoke as we trudged back.

We both walked in comfortable silence till I could spot the house from a distance.

"Skylar?" Daniel abruptly spoke, halting in his track.

"Yeah?" I stopped, facing him.

"Give Andrew a chance too. He really loves you as his sister. And don't think that you're an replacement because Carrie and you couldn't be any more opposite," he said, making me smile a bit.

My instant reaction was he knew? But then there was plenty of time for Andrew to tell him since I was away for a bit.

I let a smile grace my face as I nodded at him.

"Of course. That's the least I can do for him," I said before starting to walk again.

It was after a long time that I felt a bit happy on the inside with no reason to let my smile turn upside down.

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