Falling

chapter nine

DISCLAIMER- all of these ideas are the wonderful JAMES DASHNERs. I am not capable of coming up with such a great book idea. I only own willow:) hope you enjoy

After dinner, there wasn't anything that I had to do. Just lay around till dark, play games, and talk. I didn't know if I should head off to the deadheads or my sleeping quarters.

I ended up going over to our sleeping bags with Chuck and Thomas to talk. After a few conversations that almost made me start crying out of laughter, I decided to excuse myself.

After using the bathroom I headed out to the deadheads to think, to think about what happened with Gally earlier today.

"Hey Willow" I hear a familiar voice behind me, but not the one I was hoping for "You mind if I walk with you?" It was Minho.

"Oh hey Minho, of course!" We walked in silence about halfway through the deadheads and Minho plopped down.

"You tired Minho?" I laughed at him. He looked up at me with a small smile. He patted the leaves next to him as if to sit down.

"I needed to ask you a question," Minho stated.

"Alright go ahead!" I replied

"Have you noticed anything different in Thomas? I haven't asked Chuck because I don't want to risk him telling Thomas. You and Chuck are the closest to him."

"Well, he was pretty excited that he was becoming a runner!" I proclaimed with almost as much excitement as Thomas had. Minho chuckled.

"I mean like the opposite. Has his personality been any different since he has been in the maze?"

"No, not that I could tell" I responded with a confused tone.

"Alright, that's all I needed," He said as we both stood.

"Ok, I'm going to walk a little farther," I told him.

"Alright see yah Willow," Minho said and walked back towards the glade out of the woods. After I watched him leave I turned around and I walked farther until I got to a nice patch of ivy that was hanging on the walls. It was so perfect so I sat down and looked up at the fading sky. Before I realized I was asleep.

••••••

I started awake. It was only slightly darker which was odd. I was probably only asleep for 10 minutes.

I turned to look to my left and I saw Gally standing behind a tree. I jumped not expecting to see him.

"Gally! What are you doing?" He laughed at me jumping from the sight of him.

"Sorry Willow," He said coming out from behind the tree. "I saw you talking to Minho, I didn't want to interrupt." I smiled up at him as I patted the ground next to me. He had a grin growing on his face as he squatted down to be sitting on the leaves with me. The sun was setting and it was casting shadows on Gally's soft expression. We made eye contact and then he started talking.

"Hey, I wanted to talk about this morning." I cringed at the words because I wasn't sure if he was going to lash out at me. I looked away from him to hide my sour expression. He put his hand gently on my knee which made my head snap around to look at him. He didn't remove his hand as I glared at him.

"You know I didn't mean to-" I cut him off

"Gally, I understand. I just caught you at a bad time to talk" I lied. I just wanted to see if you were ok.

"It's never a bad time to talk Willow," He said, his eyes looking sad. "Anyway, what I was going to say was that I am sorry for yelling at you earlier. You know I didn't mean it, right Willow?" I had looked away once more tears brimming my eyes.

"Willow?" His voice on edge and I knew exactly what his eyes looked like without having to see them. They were filled with sadness and concern. I looked back at Gally and I saw something flash in his eyes but it was gone just as fast as it came.

"Gally I'm so sorry" I let the tears slip out of my eyes and onto my cheeks "I have been holding it in since I got here" Gally removed his hand from my knee and pulled me closer.

"Hey, it's okay." He made me look at him "It's okay" I cried until I had run out of tears and just sat with gally until I thought I could talk again.

"Thank you," I said so quietly I could barely hear myself so I doubted he heard me.

"You're welcome Willow" He replied just as quietly. I looked over at him and he had a grin growing on his face.

"What?" I asked him. He looked back at me.

"I have to show you something" He got up and ran off out of the deadheads. I didn't know what just happened.