One high school, five teenagers, an unlimited amount of chaos.
After a storm wipes out Wilkinson High, Rowena Salone and the entirety of her classmates are forced to relocate to the next closest school in their district. Being the new girl isn't so...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
So, our friends practically forced me and Declan to ride the Ferris wheel by ourselves.
I don't think either of us minded it though, especially at this hour of the day when the sun was setting. The effect illuminated the skies in pinks and oranges and purples. A few stars were peeking from the darkening shades of the night that teased at the very top of the air space.
I looked down and spotted Evelyn and Parker as our cart slowly rotated to the top. Julie was watching them from outside the gate of the little airplanes they were riding.
"Julie seems nice," I said in my lame attempt to bring up the conversation. Maybe Declan felt like talking about it, maybe he didn't. I just wanted to understand him more, I guess.
"Yeah she's nice," He said back, following my gaze to where the three of them were.
"You don't sound like you mean it that much."
"I do mean it," He said, fixing his tone to sound more genuine. "She's just not my mom, that's all."
"That's why you two aren't close then?"
He looked at me as if he were thinking it over in his head. I tried to read his gaze, but he was guarded now. The only way he would let me in at this point was with his words. He took a moment too long to answer and I was worried he wasn't going to elaborate on it at all.
"I don't mean to be as closed off with her as I am," he says finally. "I know it's not fair to her, but I can't help it. She's just my dad's wife and to recognize her as anything but just feels off to me... like I'm doing something wrong towards my mom."
"Do you feel like she's trying to replace her?" I asked carefully.
"No, no that's not it. That's how I know it's not fair. She's a good person, it's just something I'm struggling with, I guess. Sometimes I wish she was an evil stepmother like those princess stories and shit, just to make it easy to dislike her. But, she's not and I don't." He shook his head at himself.
"You think she knows you don't hate her?"
He gave a breath of a humorless laugh. "Probably not, I don't know."
He went quiet after that and I bit my lip in hesitation before I asked him another question. "What about your dad?"
"Do I hate my dad?"
"Well I mean, what is he to you? You mentioned before that he was never around but, what does that mean for you?" I began to feel a little worried at the question that flowed out of my mouth. I didn't want to push him too much or make him feel uncomfortable. But then I realized that Declan didn't let people make him feel uncomfortable, he was the type that would say something about it. If he didn't want to talk about it, he would tell me. I knew him enough at this point to know that much.
He turned to look at me again before he inhaled a breath and spoke. "He's not bad a person either. He's a hard worker and he keeps a roof over our head, and I respect him for that. All that time he spends away though, I feel like I barely know the man."
