(Victoria)

I honestly don't know what people thought about me after prom. Some people must've thought I was a complete coward who didn't deserve all the happiness that I had ever achieved in life. Some people thought that I did the right thing by sparing Sophia and Ray from the humiliation. Considering I could've gone a lot worse when it came to "secrets," a handful of people thought I had done the right thing.

Another handful of people were just plain out confused of what to think. The other remaining people just didn't care about the whole situation in general and they just acted like nothing had happened. I'm sure everyone had thought one of those four things.

Did I care about what they thought about the whole thing? If I'm being honest at all, then I couldn't care less. Why? Well, a lot of people learned something new on prom night. I was no exception. During the time when I was waiting for Ray and Sophia to dance, several thoughts hit me.

I realized that I shouldn't be dwelling on my dislike towards Ray and Sophia. Granted, I always liked Ray, but I always thought that I had disliked Sophia with every fiber in my body. Throughout my entire senior year, I had always wanted to get revenge on Sophia for taking Ray away from me and ruining my life. There was always the running disdain in my veins.

However, when I saw her on the dance floor, dancing with Ray, like there was no end to the world, a switch flipped for me. For the first time in so long, she seemed so genuinely happy. She was lost in Ray, as they held each other, and danced the night away. It was almost total euphoria, and euphoria is insanely hard to achieve.

Even though my happiness had been interrupted by so many people over the course of my life, a thought hit me. Why should I ruin one person's happiness over that? It wasn't worth it to torment Sophia like that.

On top of that, when I saw how Ray and Sophia looked at each other on prom night, I realized something else. If Lisa truly liked me, then she'd look at me like the way Ray looked at Sophia on prom night. Lisa never did that. All she did was blackmail me and trick me into ruining their happiness that they deserved. That's all she was capable of.

She didn't make me feel like how Sophia felt when she was with Ray. When I was plotting with her, I felt like the weak pawn supporting the tyrannical king. I was tired of being a little pawn in her games, so I backed out. Granted, I felt really good when she embarrassed herself on stage, and everyone booed her off. That was a moment that was very satisfying to me.

    Even though I had felt good about getting rid of Lisa from my life, a lingering feeling of guilt just wouldn't leave me. I just couldn't stop feeling guilty about the whole situation. I was wondering what could I have done to spare Sophia from almost losing her composure and lashing out at Lisa.

I shouldn't have helped her leave those fake loves notes. I shouldn't have helped her leave that note that almost destroyed their relationship. Man, that's the one thing that I completely regret throughout this whole process.

    On top of that, the fighting has started up again with my parents. I used to think that their fighting and their marital instability was mostly my fault. Even though they made several mistakes in the duration of their marriage, not everything was my fault. I made some mistakes throughout everything, and I shouldn't have.

But, it took me an eternity to stop blaming me for being the cause of their unstable marriage. I realized that not everything was my fault, as my mom always said. Not everything was the cause of the choices I made. And it's time that I shall stop listening to everything my mom says, and taking it to heart.

    "Okay, Victoria, I don't even know how to react to the whole situation. I don't know whether to be proud of you or to be mad at you. I've never been this conflicted in my life," David says, as I write notes in my notebook.

"What do you mean? I didn't do anything too bad today," I ask. He shrugs.

"Well, to be fair, I didn't completely embarrass Sophia in front of the whole school. I dropped out just in ti- oh man, now I get what you mean." David nods.

"Yeah, you get why I'm conflicted, Victoria. I'm glad you had the heart to not help Lisa embarrass Sophia and Ray, but at the same time, I'm disappointed that you helped her with this. Why?" I sigh.

"I don't know, David. I guess I was just upset, and I was vulnerable. I was stupid back then." David sighs.

"Victoria, the 'I was young and stupid,' excuse will not work on me. Doesn't matter what you did, but it won't have any effects on me for all that I care. Now tell me, why did you actually do that to them?" I sigh.

"Fine. I admit I was kind of jealous of them. I was jealous of Sophia's happiness with Ray, and I envied that. I wanted that kind of happiness, and I never got it. We never got it, David. We've always been surrounded by Mom and Dad who can never seem to agree on one thing. Can you tell me the last time you saw them smiling and laughing, like they were truly happy with each other?"

David's mouth falls open to argue with me, but when he actually starts to go through his memories, he realizes that I do have a decently valid point when it comes to this. David sighs. "That's actually really sad, Victoria. I never realized that was how you felt when it came to our family. I thought the happy memories you and I had were more than enough to cover up for the unhappiness that Mom and Dad caused. I'm sorry for not being able to cover up for that." I shrug.

"It's not your fault, I guess. I mean, it could've been a lot worse. But it's something that I can't really get over."

"Victoria, David, we need to talk to you guys," my mom calls from the living room. I raise an eyebrow at David, who just shrugs.

We both get up, and we drag ourselves to the living room. I can tell this is an important announcement, because my mom's tone is insanely reluctant when it comes to these things. It's almost like she's dreading telling me the news.

When we make it to the living room, our parents are standing there. Serious looks are plastered on their faces, with my mom looking a little bit guilty. We stand in front of our parents, and my dad looks over at my mom.

"Kids, your mom and I have decided that we're going to get a divorce," my dad says, delivering the blow straight away. Surprisingly, I'm not even that shocked. When my dad says that, I don't even react. I just stand there, like a statue, because it's no surprise to me.

As a matter of fact, call me a horrible person, but I'm glad they decided to divorce. I feel like they were only hurting themselves by staying together for the sake of us. It wasn't helping us in any way, contrary to what they thought it was doing. My mom looks really confused at us.

"You can cry you know. You can let it out," she says. I shake my head.

"Mom, we're not sad. We're relieved," David says, and my dad's taken aback by it. Granted, he's not offended, but he's rather surprised by David's answer.

"Why do you say that, David?" my dad asks. David raises an eyebrow.

"We're glad that you guys have come to an agreement on this. Victoria and I both thought that the marriage wasn't doing you guys any good. So we thought that it was better for you guys to split, instead of staying together," David says. My mom looks rather relieved at us.

"Well, we're glad you guys are taking this well," she says, and she comes in for a group hug. We all join in, and just enjoy the newfound peace that's brought upon to us.

    "Victoria, have you decided what you want to do?" David asks as we walk back into my room.

"Oh yeah. Wake Forest University accepted me, and I'm doing it in marketing," I say. David smiles.

"That's amazing, Victoria. North Carolina, right?" I nod. "You probably won't see Ray and Sophia for a while then," he says. I nod.

"Yeah, but I think it's better that way. They've found their happiness, and it's time to find mine." David smiles.

"Well, I guess you should. Because that's hard to get," he says, and he walks out of my room.

    In all honesty, my imagination carried me to worlds in which I didn't appreciate. They were worlds in which I felt like I was stuck in an eternal prison and I was serving a life sentence. But, looking back at it, I realize that if I hadn't been carried to those worlds, then I don't even know what I would be like at this point in my life.

Would I be suspended from school? Would I even be going to Wake Forest University? Would I even be as happy as I am right now? Those are subjective questions, but in a way, my imagination taught me some really useful lessons.

They're lessons that I can use in the long run, when I run into problems that make me feel degraded inside. But, even though the worlds I were carried to weren't the ones that I had hoped for, in the end, I'm in this current position, and I'm really happy.

I don't remember the last time I was this happy. Now all I can hope for is for my imagination to keep me in this particular world for as long as time can allow.

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And behold the last chapter in Victoria's POV! Wow, what a journey she's gone through. Do you think she had the right reaction to her parents' divorce? Let me know in the comments.

Hey everyone! How are you all? Man, I can't believe next week will be the last chapter of I Never Imagined. The Q&A chapter will be coming out later this week, just a heads up. I'm pretty excited.

Also, I released the teaser+author's note+cast aesthetics for my new book, Phoenix! I'm really excited. Chapters will be released starting in July. Check it out if you want!

That's pretty much it. Hope you all liked this chapter!

Please vote/comment/share/follow/message if you like my work! See you all this week with the Q&A chapter and next Sunday with the LAST chapter of I Never Imagined! Have a great week!

Love you guys,

Shree