Lost In The Ways Of The Ocean

Chapter 13:Dani's Decision Pt. 2

So now what?? After we ate, I headed back to the ocean with Elli. She looked in my eyes saying, 'I know you love Nashville but I'm scared! I don't know what I'd do without you. Please come live with me.' I don't know what to say honestly. I nearly died twice and Elli nearly died twice. I looked out to the yonder saying, 'Elli--' Before I could finish my sentence, I fell into the water again. I transformed into a mermaid again. Hmm, this keeps happening when I go into the water. But I paused this time saying, 'Well, now what?'

*an hour later, the family arrived by the ocean*

I said, 'Guys, go without me. Elli come in.' Mom (Lynne) said, 'Dani please don't do this.' Alex said, 'Dani no.' Mike Jr. added 'Please reconsider.' I said, 'Guys, Elli nearly died and is broken without me. But I love you all.' I broke down worse than ever and Elli rushed to me hugging me. She had turned into a mermaid again. I cried saying, 'Just....go.' The family was heartbroken by what I said and Amy took the worst of it along with Lauren and Christina. Amy sobbed 'I lost Dani to the ocean :( I hope the ocean takes good care of her.' A heartbroken Lauren ran as far away as possible and Christina followed. Katherine & Lisa yelled, 'WAIT! GET BACK HERE!' What did I just do? :( my brothers sobbed as did my parents. I just broke their hearts :'( I can't believe I did that.

The family headed home to Nashville without me. Meanwhile I stayed with Elli. She said, 'Thanks, please don't leave my side. Protect me.' I nodded yes.

This end's Dani's POV for now.

Lauren's POV:
I can't believe Dani did that! Why did she do what she did? So we were on our flight I couldn't help but think about what happened to my sister. She did nearly die along with Elli and Elli is worried about her a ton. So I get what she said. But I wish she realized how valuable she was to this family. Maybe that's why she wanted to be with Sirena. She felt like an outcast. We arrived in Nashville 3 hours later and got to our houses. I went into my room and checked to see if I could reach Dani. I did get a DM on Twitter from her asking me to watch a video she did with Elli. Amy messaged me saying that she sent it to the entire family. I watched and it said,

'Hey family, it's your girl Dani with Elli. We just wanna say that this was a very difficult decision for me to make. Yes I did want to be with Sirena who her daughters were terrorizing me because, I felt like I was unloved and became an outcast. I have not been enjoying myself lately and really was at a crossroads in my life--'

I was emotional and my mom texted me saying, 'I know it's hard saying goodbye to Dani but this is what she wanted. She was lost in the ways of the ocean.' I cried further and continued the video.

'Lauren if you're watching this specifically, I love you and can't wait to see you again for a visit. You will always be the Sugar to my Spice. Love you Laur.' ~Dani

Christina came into my room hugging me saying, 'I can't believe Dani is no longer around. This is gonna hurt for a long time, but we have to move onward.' I said, 'That means the band is no more?' Saddened, she said, 'Yes. This is our farewell as a band. Without any one of us in the band, we are no more.' I got another message from Dani saying that she's doing a livestream on Periscope restricted to only a few people. I went there quickly, and opened the app. We were watching Dani on Periscope. This is gonna be emotional. I said in the stream, 'Dani, good timing. We're about to make a huge announcement.' She said, 'Announcement? Wait where? I was not informed of this.' Christina spoke saying, 'Hey Dani it's Christina, just wanna say we miss you so much and we hope you're having fun in Cali.' She said, 'Thanks. It's amazing here. I'm gonna miss being with you guys regularly. It won't feel the same.' We understood.

Christina's POV:
I gathered the family, or at least the rest of the band and we were in Lauren's room. We decided to do a livestream too and link it to where Dani could watch us. I said, 'Did it work?' Dani said, 'Yes. Go ahead and make your announcement.' Amy noticed something odd, 'Guys,' I said, 'Amy shut up. LOL.' Dani then added, 'Chris! Let Amy talk. Geez haha. Go ahead.' Amy said, 'Well, here goes.'

Amy's POV:
I looked at the background from where Dani was streaming and it looked pretty beautiful, but this didn't feel California-like.' I then whispered to Christina, 'That might be her bedroom.' Christina's eyes darted. Dani looked confused. She said, 'What's going on? Do I have to straighten you guys out like I always have to? LOL Rats!' That's the Danielle I know well. Haha. So we got to our announcement. We introduced ourselves like always.

'Cim intro'

Christina started with, 'Well it has been a great ride and I'm looking forward to what our future is for us.' As Christina was talking, Dani ended her livestream and left her room. I was perplexed. Christina continued, 'We just came back from an emotional journey in Cali where our vacation plans were ended abruptly because of....uh....' Lauren blurted out, 'We can't lie. Our vacation plans were ended because of bad weather and the ship was broken down, but we fixed the ship up, but we ended our vaca after 2-3 days.' Christina said, 'Thx Lauren. LOL. So with all that we felt this was a good time to do a song that means a lot to us. So we're naturally going to sing a song we did a couple  years ago but we're doing it again.' I said, 'We're singing Fight Song by Rachel Platten' So we were about to start. We did a music video for this but we decided to do an acoustic cover for this. I got my guitar ready and Lisa went to get her cajon. Would this really be our last song we would ever do? I don't think so but, we can't go on without Dani right? Dani's living in Cali now. So we started. Lauren sang her verse she did originally and then Katherine, then Christina did her solo in the chorus. I got to my solo and I started to tear up. We paused the video and I said, 'I messed up. Let's start from the beginning shall we?' So we started over. We got to my solo again and I did a better job this time. Lisa did the next solo and the second chorus. As we got to the bridge, Lauren did it.  We finished the song and then we evaluated how we did. 'We weren't as good as we normally were.'

We miss Dani

TO BE CONTINUED