CHAPTER SEVEN
[7]

DAISY WALKED INTO LUNCH LATE. Carrying her tray to the outdoor sitting area, she sat down beside Jen and Josette who were already half way done with their meals.

"Where have you been?" Jen asks. Daisy shakes her head, a signal to just not sorry about it. Jen raises her eyebrows knowingly at Josette. "Have you guys taken the College Algebra test yet? I had it first hour and would not be surprised if I missed every question."

Daisy subconsciously tuned Jen out as she continued the conversation with Josette. Instead, Daisy's eyes trailed off to the black coat that sat at his usual spot at the empty table in the corner. His head in a different book everyday, listening to something on his walkman.

While Daisy usually tried her best to pay no mind to Kai, all she wanted to do was strangle him at the moment. Hate and enmity welled up in her heart, fury itself burning her up.

Her attention was redirected to Tommy, who came up behind her and planted a quick kiss on the top of her head before sitting across from her besides Jen.

Tommy eyed Daisy for a second before speaking. "Are you feeling okay?" He asks.

Jen and Josette's conversation fades, and they turn to Daisy to hear her answer. "What? Yeah why?" Daisy asks confusedly.

"You went to the nurses office earlier so—" Tommy stops talking, then sniffles. "Is that weed?"

Daisy stiffens a bit. "I don't smell anything." She lies.

Tommy looks at Daisy concernedly. "Were you smoking?"

She clenches her jaw, arguing with herself on whether or not she should start lying to him so early on in the relationship. "Just a little bit." Daisy shrugs.

Tommy narrowed her eyebrows at Daisy, then turns to look at Jen and Josette to see if they were just as concerned as him. He focuses his gaze back on Daisy. "You shouldn't do that." He says cautiously. 

Josette starts awkwardly playing with her food. Daisy inhales. "I'm fine." She says, then tries to change the topic. "Jen you were saying about the College Algebra—"

"I know," Tommy begins, returning back to the previous conversation. "It's just, a little trashy." He shrugs.

He was right, weed and drugs were trashy. But they were fun— and everyone did them. Daisy was still a teenager, she didn't care for consequences, short term or long term. They were invisible to her at the moment. "Okay?" Daisy says, shaking her head. "Sorry." She says annoyedly.

Tommy takes a deep breath. "I've gotta go to the trainers to ice my knee before the game tonight. I'll see you." He nods, clearly uncomfortable, before getting back up from the table and leaving.

Jen and Josette exchange awkward glances, and Daisy slumps in her seat, feeling guilty. She didn't like feeling guilty— she'd trained her brain into completely shutting out that emotion when it came from someone like her mother. Leading her to do something Susan would dislike out of pure spite. But hearing it from Tommy was different, like she was balancing on a thin line of— how many shitty things can she do before he breaks up with her?

—

That following Sunday, George had encouraged Daisy's family to come to his church that morning. Daisy was raised religious, but fell out of it as she got older. Thought she did sometimes find herself praying for things she wanted, like better grades, or a cooler family.

Daisy had somehow been forced into a delicate blush pink dress for the service. She had sat in between Allison and Michael. Michael and Daisy spent all of service playing tic-tac-toe on one of the prayer request papers stacked on the entrance to the church. Allison pretended to listen to impress her mother, but Daisy knew she was just as bored as her.

After standing for what felt like four hours of singing painfully wretched worship songs, everyone gathered outside of the church to catch up with each other. The purplegray spire of a church and the irregular forms of old building in the background of all the commotion.

Daisy looked around bored, trying to keep herself from falling asleep standing up as George introduced Susan and everyone to his church friends.

Michael stood beside Daisy, and Daisy smiled down at him as he wore the same annoyed expression as her. "Hey." Daisy says. The little boy looked up, squinting a bit at the bright sun that hung above Daisy's head. He didn't say anything, but Daisy continued on. "You wanna go play in that fountain over there?" Daisy gestured to the pretty stone fountain that stuck out above the rest of the common area.

Michael nodded happily, and Daisy grabbed his hand. As she turned to lead him there— she stopped in place as she was met with Kai's eyes.

For a second she didn't process it. No way was Kai Parker at church. But he was probably thinking the same thing about her. Daisy relaxed her shoulders.

"Daisy?" Josette says.

Daisy looks away from Kai and turns to Josette. "What are you doing here?" Daisy smiles at her. Josette's entire family was here, dressed in formal clothes. She didn't see them in the building, but then again she wasn't really paying attention.

"Oh you know." Josette says, stepping a bit closer to Daisy so she could say things in secret. "Being dragged along to random town activities by my family for no reason." Josette whispered.

Daisy smiled, nodding in agreement. She watched as the Parker family started to converse with her family, combining into what could be considered a tiny army. Josette, Daisy and Kai stood back a bit, not really caring for what the parents had to discuss.

Daisy looked beside her for a second, catching a glance at Kai. She'd never seen him dressed so refined. He had on nice dress pants, and a turtleneck with a dress coat over it. She knew it probably wasn't his first choice of wardrobe, as he looked miserably bored and uncomfortable.

He looked up, raising an eyebrow at her. Daisy didn't say anything, but she didn't look away. Kai lifted a hand and pulled out a necklace that he wore under the turtleneck, revealing a silver pentagram charm.

'Oh, wow.' Daisy mouthed sarcastically at him, before turning back around to watch the adults converse.

Susan looked at Daisy. "What do you guys think?" She asked.

"What?" Josette spoke up, in a sweet voice. Daisy could melt at how genuinely kind and innocent she was.

"They think that would be great." Joshua spoke, not letting Josette or Kai answer.

"Perfect." Susan clasped her hands together and smiled.

"What are you talking about?" Daisy asks.

"The Parker's are gonna come over for dinner tonight." Susan responds.

Daisy wanted to burst out laughing. But more of a hysterical laugh. This was going to be a shit show— most likely at the expense of her sanity.

—

Daisy sat on the floor of her bedroom, sorting through her records and reorganizing them like she did when her shelf started to pretty much cave inwards.

"Hey—" Allison says, ripping the headphones off Daisy's head. "I'm talking to you."

Daisy didn't even realize Allison came in her room. "Talk louder then." Daisy responds.

"The Parker's are here." Allison says, she begins to turn around, but then she examines Daisy. "Are you seriously wearing that? Mom said to dress nice."

"Mom said to dress nice." Daisy mocks Allison, standing up from her spot on the ground.

Allison scoffs. "Are you ten years old?"

"Are you ten years old?" Daisy mocks her again, following her out the bedroom.

Allison spins around and smacks Daisy across the head, only to lead to Daisy yanking the back of Allison's hair as she turned back around. "Ow!" Allison yells.

"Daisy!" Susan shouts from downstairs.

Daisy rolls her eyes, not even going to try and argue her way out of these fights. She follows Allison down the stairs, talking and conversation filling her ears as she enters the kitchen.

The Parker kids went off and did their own thing with Michael in the living room, while Diana, Joshua, Susan and George conversed in the kitchen as Susan finished up the last of dinner.

"Where's Josette?" Daisy asks, looking around for the black haired girl.

Diana frowned. "We think she caught a bad cold or something, so she decided to stay home."

Of course. Daisy's one saving grace in this dinner was home sick.

"I'm here, though." Kai says, striding into the kitchen past Daisy with a tray of food. He sets it down on the counter before giving Daisy a wide smile.

After a few minutes, the two families brought all the food to the dining table and sat down amongst each other— a few extra chairs were added to fit all the kids into the table. While the first bits of conversation were all about how good the food smelled, Joshua had to suggest the most stupid of dinner traditions. "Should we say grace?" He says.

"Of course." Susan nods. Daisy stifled a scoff, loving how her mother was so quick to agree when they haven't prayed before eating since her Dad was alive.

Then the quick realization that she'd have to hold hands with Kai hit her and she turned to look at him sat beside her, searching for any way out of this. Kai sent her a cheeky smile, knowing that she didn't want to do this.

She clenched her jaw, and he held both his hands out to either side of him. His little brother, Joey, reaches for Kai's hand, but Joshua gently swatted it away, giving Kai a stern look.

Daisy pretended to ignore the situation, but she knew it was strange. She knew this family was strange.

She inhaled deeply, grabbing Allison's hand with her right, and Kai's with her left. His hands were rough, and coarse, and significantly bigger than hers. She closed her eyes, trying to relax, as George began the prayer.

"Lord of All, we give you thanks for your abundance, and for all the great things you have given us." George began.

Daisy felt Kai readjust his grip on her hand.

"We ask your blessing upon this food, and upon our friends and family."

Then, as George continued on, Kai began to squeeze Daisy's hand. Her arm twitched at the sudden pressure, and she tugged away from his deepening grip— while also not trying to make a scene.

"We also pray that in your great mercy, you would look kindly upon all those in need this day."

He squeezed harder and Daisy almost let out a yelp at the pain.

"Amen." George finished.

"Amen." Kai repeated, immediately taking his hand off Daisy's, like he's done nothing.

Daisy rubbed her hand, looking up at him with an angry expression as he began to eat the meal. She knew he knew she was looking at him, but he ignored her. Never has she ever met such an asshole, he was even worse than her. There had to be something clinically wrong with him at this point.

"Kai your mother mentioned you're planning to become a doctor?"  Susan says.

Kai looks up and nods. "Mhm." He says. Daisy scoffs, which earns her a stern look from her mother. "I'm planning to get a degree in Medicine, then get my doctorate."

Daisy couldn't tell if he was lying through his teeth or actually being genuine. She didn't see him as the 'doctor' type at all.

"Malachai has exceptional grades, we're hoping he'll get a scholarship so he can attend University of Pennsylvania next fall." Diana nods.

"That's a great school." Susan says. "Kai, maybe you could tutor Daisy sometime." She smiles.

Daisy dropped her fork on her plate and leaned back in her seat. "I don't need tutoring." She says.

"I'd love to." Kai smiles.

"You have C's and D's in almost all of your classes right now, Daisy. You're lucky you can still graduate." Susan shakes her head as she continues to eat. Daisy glares at Kai, who barely glances at her before returning to his meal.

"Can I be excused?" Daisy says. She didn't know why she still asked at this point, she'd just get up anyways.

"You've barely eaten." Susan says, gesturing towards Daisy's plate.

"I don't feel good." Daisy responds, standing up from her chair.

"What's wrong, honey?" Diana asks, sweetly.

Daisy ignores her, she takes her dish to the kitchen, and disappears upstairs without another word. She knew she was acting like a brat, she knew she'd get lectured about this later, but at this point— if she would've sat at that table any longer she would've killed Kai. So if anything, she did her family a favor.

Daisy sat on her years old light pink bed, not ever noticing the faded patches. Her still scrawny legs dangled over edge just like they had when she was small, but now her toes tapped the dusty boards as she sat back and listened to her music. The intense screeching of heavy guitar and overpowering drums filled her ears, as James Hetfield screamed something indecipherable along with the music.

Pennsylvania. On the complete other side of the country. Daisy could only dream of getting that far away from her nuclear family. She tried not to think too much about it, though, she tried to keep her cold composure to hide the fact that she would be embarrassedly homesick.

The door to her bedroom opened and she sat up quickly, a little startled. Kai walked in, and looked around with a smirk on his face. "So cute." He says, welcoming himself inside and shutting the door behind him.

Daisy tore her headphones off. "Get out of my room." She says, standing up from her bed.

"My mom wanted me to come check on you." He shrugs, continuing to look around at the posters that lined Daisy's walls.

"Okay, you checked." Daisy walked towards him. "Out."

Kai made his way toward her dresser, opening up a jewelry box that played delicate music when he opened it, she reached up to grab it from his hands but he pulled it from her reach. He then grabbed a tiny bag of pills from the box and holding them out for her to see, an over dramatic gasp escaping his lips. Daisy completely forgot they were in there, she hadn't touched that jewelry box in months.

"Daisy Hendrix are you a druggie?" Kai says, his mouth gapped open in pretend shock. He examined the bag. "What is this? Fentanyl? Xanax?"

She grabbed the bag, and the box, from him quickly, putting it back onto her dresser. "You hurt me, earlier." She says, holding up her hand— that was still sore. "Why did you do that?" She shook her head, not sure why she was saying what she was saying. As if letting him know that he hurt her would make him feel bad.

Kai gently grabbed her wrist, and Daisy stiffened, not knowing that that was what he was going to do. He examines it, and she stayed frozen in place. "Looks okay to me." He says, letting his coarse fingers graze across her delicate skin.

Daisy pulls her hand away. "Do you want something from me?" She shakes her head. "Money? Drugs?"

Kai shakes his head, turning to lean his back on her dresser. "No."

"Then why don't you just leave me alone?" She asks, almost begging.

Kai thought for a second. "I don't know."