2nd week of school and I'm already feeling burnt out and stressed  🙃

I wonder how the rest of the school year will be😥

But Double Chapter!

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"What cha doing?"

I lifted my head towards the window and saw Rosemary sitting on the adjacent tree branch, swinging her boots aimlessly. 

"Um, nothing much." I replied, fumbling to put my journal away while staring at the floor, trying to avert her gaze.

She didn't respond back. 

"Ummmm," I racked my brain for something to keep her from thinking, "How about we play a game?" I drummed my fingers on the side of my leg. "That's a fun activity we both like!" I smiled, conradulating my quick thinking. 

"Nah," she hopped onto her feet and fluttered off the branch, towards me. "I'd rather play . . ." I watched as a dark wisp surrounded her beautiful Shadow wings. "My favorite sport! Floatball!" She out-of-characterly exclaimed accompanied by the familiar glint in her eyes. 

My eyes went wide while my heart started doing overtime to make sure I was uncomfortable and nervous as heck. 

"Ha, ha" A dry laughter forcefully came out my lips as I looked down at my laced boots, identical to Rosemary's and began to wonder if she was joking, or had just forgot. Hopefully is was the last option. 

My voice warbled with anxiety, "Umm, Rose?"

"Hm? Yea, what is it?" she asked, snapping out of her own world, lookin a bit sad that her moment was ruined. 

"You missed a little, um, detail about me playing Floatball." 

Her eyes rolled as she scoffed at me, "And what, would that be?.

I shifted my weight from one leg to another before taking a deep breath to slow my jagged breathing. All of my fingers touched each other as I pressed them together and took in a sharp, cold breath.

"I can't fly, Rose."

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She looked at me with a blank look on her face while repeated looking from my face, to my broken wing behind me. 

"Oh riiiiiggghhtt~" She looked guiltily at the ceiling while scratching her medium-curled black hair. 

"Um, I'm sorry Lex', I forgot." She looked towards the corner, averting my eyes this time. But I wasn't going to stand like this. 

I stepped in her eyes direction and tried to send her a warm, reassuring smile "It's okay, nobody is perfect" 

She looked at me with a small smile, "Thanks"

We stayed like this for a bit, before I game up with an idea that works for both of us. 

"Just because I can't fly doesn't mean we can't play Floatball, all you really need is Shadow Magic, or any magic that allows you to use floatation. So, we can just do it in my backyard" I stated matter-of-factly. 

Rose's head popped up and as her smile grew, "Yea! Let's do that!" She began to rapidly flap her wings as she floated up more and more, then she zoomed out the window. 

"Hey! Wait for me!" I ran towards the window and jumped onto the branch Rose was swinging on before. Carefully, I inched my way towards the tree trunk and used a bit of Shadow magic on my feet, to make myself have more agility when have less weight to move around. 

Once I reached the bottom, I saw Rose leaning against the tree, "What took you so long slow-poke?" she said with a smirk plastered on her face. 

"You know I can't go as fast as you, you cheated!" I stopped my foot on the ground while fake pouting. 

"Yeah, yeah" she changed the topic, "Anyways, I'll walk with you to the back, kay' ?"

"M'k." 

The back wasn't that far away, just a 10 minute walk or so from my room. On the way there, we recapped our exciting adventure from the day before. 

"You should have seen the look on the faces!" Rose laughed, while one hand was resting on my shoulder, "The light fairies were like 'You can't come to our side'" she imitated in a high, shrill voice, "And we were like 'Says who?' and they said 'Said us!' before chasing us back to our side!"

I grumbled, "I remember tripping over the loose tree branches, getting hurt, then getting a lecture from Dad when he asked about my bloody knee" 

She took her hand off my shoulder and stood in front of me, "Look, sweetheart, your dad, needs to loosen up, you need to have thrills and fun in your life, not trapped in a tree for the rest of your life" 

She pointed at herself, "That's why you got me! And as a friend, I want you to be happy, kay'?"

I wanted to nod, smile and believe her, but, I could understand why Dad was so uptight. Why he would always ask me if anyone bullied or hurt me today, then prepare to launch a full-scale brigade against them, and I would have to plead him not to, sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn't, but after the first one, they saw what could happen, so I got less and less threats. 

Sometimes on the way to bed, I see him mourning over her, Mom, gently crying over a lovely self-portrait she made of herself while she was pregnant with me. And somedays, he would be mad at my existence, locking me up in a room, or outside. 

But, that's why I have Rose, and why she has me. 

We both come from troubling families, and we bond over that.

I snapped back to reality, "Um, anyways, we're here!" 

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I wasn't expecting Part 3 to be so long, but oh well

Anyways, just saying, I feel like this will be more like a short story, then a one-shot, since we're at three-shots now :)