Best Friends Forever?

Chapter 10 - Jackal and Hyde:

Chapter 10 - Jackal and Hyde:

 Despite the incident at the waterpark and Ben more or less blocking me out when I asked him about the scar, come a short while later he was fine again. Better than fine; we were talking. There wasn’t that same uncomfortable silence between us, we would talk and laugh just like we used to, back before he left. My head told me not to get used to it, I had already seen how he could change at the push of a button, by my heart wanted to believe that I had my best friend back for good.

 That evening, in a shocking turn of events, Ben even sat down and played board games with us. Finally a challenger to come after my crown!

 “Everything okay honey?” Mrs Fletcher asked her son eventually allowing curiosity to get the better of her once that stupid smile hadn’t faded from his face nearly an hour later. I had to admit I was kind of enjoying seeing him physically gleaming like this, it was different, it was nice.

 “Great, thanks” came his enthusiastic reply, his voice full of happiness. First the happiness and now the good manners, this certainly was interesting, why was he being like this? Surely it can’t have been the waterpark? It has to be whoever he was on the phone with last night, that has to be it, I reason with myself, silently hoping I was wrong.

 “Maybe you should go to Aqua Dream more often, if that is how happy it makes you!” His mother remarked, “I don’t remember when I last seen you this happy.”

 “Mom” He cried, embarrassed by her statement, as we all chuckled at his expense. It was nice to finally all be able to get on and have a great time together, Ben finally looked like he wanted to be there.

 A question nagged at me about his mother’s statement though, why hadn’t Ben been happy in such a long time?

 “Samantha, did you enjoy the water park today?” My dad asked, looking up from the dice he had just rolled, “You survived I see, Ben must have taken good care of you.”

 For both Bens and my own sake, we decided not to tell them about the little bump on the head earlier that day, we didn’t want to worry them, or well get in trouble. Truth is I should never have even been near the slide let alone on it so it would not be a good idea to tell them I blacked out because of it. Plus the swelling and sore head had slowly eased so it seemed pointless to get into trouble over nothing anyway; especially with how my mother tended to overreact.

 “It was great, thanks you guys” I lied, pretending that nothing had happened. Lying to my parents felt like murder, it felt wrong on so many levels, but if I wanted to keep my ‘friendship’ with Ben and indeed my life then it was necessary for survival.

 “Good, it’s nice to see the two of you getting on so well again” My mother finally remarked at the end of the conversation. Her words seemed sincere but the slight twitch for just a split second in her eyes made me think otherwise, didn’t she want Ben and I to get alone?

 Following yet another all-out trashing of everyone by myself at the board games (hey what can I say, I have a calling in life), Ben took me by surprise when he suddenly spoke up, his voice full of warmth and excitement.

 “I’m going to head down to the beech for a walk before bed” he said before pushing up off his seat with those huge muscular arms, why is he so perfect? I mean… “Do want to come Sam…Samantha?” Wait, Ben Fletcher was inviting me to go with him to the beech for a walk? This was the same guy who had blocked me out for weeks and hadn’t spoken a word to me, now wanting to hang out with me? Maybe I really had drown in that pool and this was all some twisted afterlife.