June walked past where her and Cleo had been sitting, not entirely sure what it was she could do to comprehend what Pope had told her. She had a flurry of emotions running through her. She wanted to rip her hair out and scream because he had almost kissed another girl. She wanted to jump into the water and swim back home because that girl was Kiara. She wanted to fall to the ground and cry because of what she had trusted him not to do. She wanted to sit down and just go about her business, because there was nothing she could do about it. She wanted to do a lot of things. But more than anything she just wanted to ask him about it.
She started towards the stairs that led to the top deck where the two of them were, the sun finally setting and cooling the air around her. The wind whipped and whistles all around her and her wind was a jumbled mess of fog and doubt. She took a few more steps, her hand grabbing the railing as she approached the staircase.
A strange thought transpired in her head the moment she put her foot on the stair, her mouth falling open and a breath leaving her conflicted lips. She looked at the stairs as she took a moment to really delve into the thought, wondering the authenticity of it. And the thought was:
Did she have the right to be angry?
While thinking rationally was not June Marchs particular strongsuit, this thought had hit her all of a sudden. And when it had it made perfect sense. She stopped on the stairs, her eyebrows furrowed and her eyes stuck to the stair as she really decided to think this one through. This one decision could change a lot of things. If she went up there and started arguing and accusing and yelling and fighting, things would be difficult, they would be tense. But did she have the right to do that?
Her mind traveled back to before the island, when Rafe had visited her in her room. He had aired all of her dirty laundry, brought things up that he had promised to never speak of again, and he had kissed her. And although she had pushed him away, the guilt associated with that interaction still clung to her. The guilt of still feeling for him back then. Along with the selfishness of all of her previous lies.
Her fingers detached from the railing, her foot moving back from the stair and her eyes blinking a few times to gather the decision she was making. The decision: indifference. Maybe it was something Pope saw wrong, maybe it wasn't real, maybe if she let Pope take care of it, things would be better. Maybe she didn't have to ruin the last remaining source of happiness in her shitty life. Maybe she could just let it go. Maybe she could just let it go.
Still her heart didn't ache any less, she felt betrayed, but she refused to show it, she refused to make it clear. So she swallowed her pride, swallowed her hurt and her broken trust. Her breath shook as she pressed a hand to her stomach, the girl having to work manually to regain a regular breathing pattern. She walked away from the steps and towards the railing, her eyes glued to the water as she tried to find a way to feel less shitty. She wondered if it had been any other girl if she would have been more okay with it, not that she would be okay at all, but the fact that it was Kiara had just rubbed salt into the wound.
June hated herself for leading JJ astray. Maybe she had been so focused on going home on the island that he looked elsewhere for affection. Maybe she wasn't enough anymore. She couldn't blame him, she would leave herself too. A mess of a girl, who never truly knew what she wanted, who never seemed all that interested in anything. A girl who they had only really know for a few months, while JJ had known Kiara for years. June couldn't even blame them, perhaps she had just been an obstacle in the way. Maybe Kiara was never the problem but June was, infiltrating their group, standing in the way of true love. Maybe she had read it all wrong.
