If I had a flower for every time I thought of you...I could walk through my garden forever.
~Alfred Tennyson
A/N
Has anyone else heard of a quokka? Because I always thought they were so cute but no one I know hasn't seemed to have heard of them.
Chapter 12.1
Beatrice's POV
I sighed, flopping into the car seat, my adventures with Tenshi had completely exhausted all of my energy. Ryder got into the driver seat, pausing a moment.
I slowly glanced over as I realized he hadn't started the car only to find him already staring back. "Hi," I greeted.
"Hi," he answered back quietly.
I smiled. "Hi." I knew the joke was originally in a point to mock me but we'd become so adjusted to greeting each other like this that it had become simply natural. An inside joke of sorts. It confused people endlessly but I guess that was half the fun. "What are you doing?" I asked.
He shook his head. "Nothing."
I did not believe him.
He gave me a guilty smile. "Trying to stall you from actually meeting my sister," he admitted.
I had been trying to calm my nerves all day but it finally sunk in that I was actually going to have to meet his sister. "Why didn't you tell me you had a twin?"
He shrugged. "It didn't come up."
I sat up straight. "You never talk about yourself, we always talk about me. I don't even know your favorite animal."
His eyebrows drew together. "Do you usually know people's favorite animals?"
"Of course." It was an essential question to know. "Klaus's is a penguin, Sonny's is a swan, Marley's is a dolphin, Tenshi's is a snake, Nila's is a polar bear, the girl's in my math class is a giraffe."
"What's yours?"
"A quokka." I answered almost immediately.
"A what?"
I stared at him in disbelief. "You don't know what a quokka is?" How could he not know? It's a quokka, the cute little fur balls who like selfies. "They're so cute and they have the most adorable little smiles and—"
Wait....
He did it again! I couldn't believe I fell for that so quickly. He did it again. He's good. "No! Don't change the subject. We're supposed to be talking about you." He always did this, he always avoids the questions and finds some way to turn it back around on me. That girl from the mall told me that if I wanted to get his attention I needed to stroke his ego, let him talk about himself, but that doesn't really work when he refuses to talk about himself.
"I'm not an interesting person." He backed out of the driveway. He may not have been excited for me to meet his sister but he was clearly less excited to talk about himself, or even tell me his favorite animal.
"I highly doubt that." Everyone has a backstory, some are just more hidden than others.
He changed the subject. "Have you ever been to the fish shack before?"
I shook my head.
"Goodluck, and hold your breath." He grinned as he pulled into the parking lot.
That's not a good sign.
I took a long glance at the rundown building shaped like a barrel with pipes sticking out of all sorts of directions. You would have thought it was one of those horror attractions where they scare you half to death while you try to eat the world's grossest food.
I stepped out of the car, following Ryder like a lost puppy since I had no clue where the front door was. My feet practically stuck to the pavement with every step, probably due to the same green goo that dripped out of the pipes and onto the building wall that was also coasting the ground. What is this place?
And I finally understood why Ryder told me to hold my breath.
I have never smelled anything more horrible, which is saying something because Sonny hid my dead hamster in my pillow—yes in, he sewed the little guy inside so I wouldn't find out he accidentally killed it. I'm still mad at him for it, granted he was seven but still—and we didn't find it for two months. You couldn't even go into my room because it smelled so bad.
But this, this was worse. Worst than a dead hamster, worse than spoiled eggs, worst than sticking your head into a dumpster. This was like pure death, like someone took all the gunk from the ocean floor bottom and let it rot in the sun for a year.
I didn't dare breathe, my eyes already starting to water. I was sure if I took in a deep breath I would puke.
This is where she wanted to eat? Can the food even be sanitary if it smells this bad?
Ryder pushed back the mesh lining that was apparently the door. Just a solid piece of metal with seaweed draped over it. Instead of a door bell signaling that a new customer had arrived, a loud pipe emitted gas, clouding your vision just long enough for you not to notice the guy standing the corner with a bucket of slop, blindsiding you so he could take the opportunity to throw said bucket of slop at you.
I squealed as the red glop hurdled towards me, instinctively grabbing onto Ryder's bicep as if he was going to protect me. I'm fairly certain he would probably throw me in front of him.
Something rolled towards me, landing directly before my feet. My eyes grew three times their size. "That's a fish head." I stuttered, staring at the decapitated fish. "That's a fish head!" I'm gonna be sick. I looked up at Ryder, still gripping onto him for dear life. "You hate me." I came to the grand conclusion. He surely must if he wanted to take me somewhere like here. "You clearly hate me. I might as well call it a quits now. I can't possibly win."
I stared at it again, inching closer to Ryder. I don't care if he hates me, he's better than the fish. "That's fake, right?"
He shrugged. "Probably. I really hope so."
"I hope you know that I am not letting go of you until we're seated and if anything else comes flying at us, you're taking the hit," I warned him.
He wrapped his arm around my shoulders. "You can hold on to me but I'm definitely letting you get hit by the mysterious glop."
"How romantic," I deadpanned, tucking under his arm to avoid the stuff dripping from the ceiling.
He directed his head towards one of the many, many, occupied tables. Do that many people really want to come eat here? "That's my sister."
I glanced around, trying to find where he was looking. My eyes locked with the familiar emerald ones. You have got to be kidding me.
I would have recognized her anywhere, she looked like a model straight out of a magazine.
And cue the instant panic.
Kill me now, please, I'm begging you. Kill me now. Put me out of my misery.
If I'm lucky maybe the smell will be enough to knock me out.
This cannot be happening right now. Fate had an odd sense of humor and I am not here for it. Please let this be some sort of sick joke.
As if this day couldn't get any worse, because having Ryder see me dressed like a wannabe prom queen wasn't enough, this had to be the cherry on top.
'Make friends' Klaus had said, 'it'll be fun' he said. This is not very fun! So far I have had my hair ruined, my dignity fried, my pride disintegrated and now I am going to die of embarrassment all in an attempt to make a friend. Who needs friends? I have fictional people to keep me company, I don't need friends.
She smiled at me, recognizing me in an instant. I am going to be sick.
"Adams, not Adam." The first words to come out of her mouth, letting me know that she most certainly knew who I was. "Adams as in the last name."
I didn't say a word, certain that whatever would come out of my mouth would be the equivalent of the decapitated fish head. I gripped onto my comfort book for dear life, begging that maybe if I held it tight enough this would all be a twisted dream.
She looked the two of us up and down, Ryder's arm still wrapped around me. "I see my 'three look wonder' worked, I told you that you could do it." She laughed. "If you had told me you were trying to snag my brother I could have given you way better tips." She pulled me into a hug like she'd known me for years, not at all discouraged by the fact that I hadn't moved a muscle, my entire body stiff as a board and my eyes as wide as humanly possible. I looked like I'd seen a ghost—actually, scratch that, a ghost would be far better.
"Do you two know each other?" Ryder questioned, examining our 'friendly' exchange.
"Of course we know each other." She stared at Ryder like he was a complete moron. "We're besties."
"Since when?"
"Since always, duh."
I had never seen someone with such animated facial expressions before but hers were something straight out of a cartoon as she mocked Ryder.
Ryder rubbed his forehead. "Can someone tell me what's going on?" He looked to me as if I was going to admit the truth.
"No, Ryder," she enunciated his name as if to poke fun at him. "That is a secret between us girls." She jumped on her toes, flicking him directly in the forehead. "Mind your own business."
Ryder glared at her, swatting her hand away.
She smiled the same sparkling smile I'd seen before, directing her attention back to me. "I'm serious though, I could have given you way better tips. Like he can cook really well but his favorite breakfast is Apple Jacks from a box. Weirdo. And he still sleeps with a stuffed penguin that our dad gave him when he was little, but he hides it whenever people come over."
Ryder turned bright red. "Alexia!"
And if this had been anyone else, and not the girl from the mall who had tried to teach me how to flirt, unknowing of the fact that I was learning in an attempt to catch her brother, I probably would have found this hilarious, a perfect opportunity to tease Ryder. But this was not anyone else and I was still having trouble functioning, no longer able to breathe, and not just because of the smell.
She giggled. "Oh come on! I'm just trying to help." Her eyes lit up "oh, and he loves holding hands."
"Alexia!"
She completely ignored him. "But he doesn't like when girls hold his hand like this." She picked up my hand, slipping our fingers together like it was no big deal. "He thinks he'll crush her fingers because he's always had unnecessarily large hands. So you've got to do it like this instead." She re-laced our fingers so that my pinky was on the outside. "And he loves when girls kiss his knuckles."
"Alexia!" He desperately tried to get her to stop talking.
I had never seen Ryder so embarrassed. He'd turned a whole new shade of red.
"What? It's true! Remember when Sally Jenkins did it? You couldn't speak properly for like an hour."
"We were in fifth grade!"
The idea of a little Ryder stuttering over a girl was oddly adorable and almost calmed my nerves, almost. But nothing would get me over the fact that his sister tried to teach me how to flirt. I wasn't sure which one of us was more embarrassed, me or Ryder.
"So," she fought back, "doesn't mean you don't still like it." She perked up turning towards me. "Ooo and he's never—"
Ryder slapped a hand over her mouth, about ready to drag her away. "She doesn't need to know that!"
She squirmed in his grip, practically throwing swings at him. She snorted before Ryder was ripping his hand away, gaping at her as he wiped his hand on his jeans. "Did you just spit in my hand?"
She didn't waste the seconds of freedom. "Ryder's never been kissed by girl other than for sex!"
Ryder practically lunged at Alexia, throwing her over his shoulder. "We're leaving! I told you this was a bad idea."
She was not discouraged by the fact that she was dangling like a rag doll. "And he's never had a girlfriend!" She shouted as he dragged her away.
"Alexia! I will throw you," Ryder threatened, trying to get her away from me as quickly as possible but she was yelling loud enough for the entire building to hear.
"And he hasn't held hands with a girl since elementary school!"
He pulled her away before she could tell me any more valuable information.
I relaxed ever so slightly at the new found knowledge. I figured Ryder wasn't one for a relationship but I assumed he must have had a girlfriend before, or at least been kissed romantically, and not just for a little fun.
I didn't even have time to process my thoughts before a blurb was rushing towards me, laughing like a maniac, with a clumsy Ryder tripping behind her behind her. "Run!" She shouted, grabbing my arm and not giving me a choice.
I sprinted beside her, following her lead. "Where are we going?" I shouted as we ran out of the restaurant and towards the cliffs.
"I don't know!" She grinned back, letting the wind guide her. "Away from Ryder."
Ryder was following behind us, and though a track runner he wasn't moving very fast. "What did you do to him?"
"I kicked him in the balls," she answered like it was no big deal, like she did this daily. "I hope you weren't planning on having kids because I did some real damage."
My jaw fell open. I love this girl.
Our track quickly approached an end as the pier came closer into view. "Um, Alexia, this is a dead end."
She examined the path in front of her. "Nothing is a dead end if you try hard enough. Can you swim?" She had to shout just so I could hear her over both of our panting.
What? "I mean yes but I don't think—" I didn't get a chance to answer as the end of the pier hit us like a bullet.
"Jump!" She yelled, although she let go of my hand so as to not take me with her when she jumped off without a second thought, as if to give me the choice to join her or not. As if to say it was up to me. That I didn't have to if I didn't want to.
It was up to me.
I glanced back at Ryder, and then to Alexia who was taking a sprint off the cliff side and into the water below.
You only live once.
And with that, I jumped off the ledge.
It was perhaps the most exhilarating thing I'd ever done. I could feel the adrenaline course through my veins as the wind fought to push me back up to the safety of land but the idea of the water was far more appealing. And as water engulfed me in a shock of icy liquid, I had never felt more alive.
I popped up from the surface, laughing just as much as Alexia. "That was insane!" I brushed back my sopping wet hair.
"We have about forty five seconds before Ryder catches up, so what do you want to know?" She was literally glowing, lighting up the water around us.
The opportunity to know most anything about Ryder was quite tempting, but the information was meaningless if it wasn't coming from him. I didn't want to know about him, like they were facts I was forced to memorize in history class. I wanted him to tell me about himself, so I could remember things about him instead of learning it for one test and then immediately forgetting everything afterwards. I wanted him to want to tell me about himself.
But I couldn't just leave her hanging. "His favorite color?"
She chuckled. "Wow, you can ask any question in the world and that's your pick?" She frowned, immediately returning back to her stunning smile. "It's red, he's obsessed with that color, I swear everything he owns is red: his apron, all of his school supplies, most of his room decor, even his spatula is red. He has a problem."
Her lips curved into a demonic smile. "Maybe I'll dye Estrella red," she said more to herself than to me.
Before I could ask who Estrella was, Ryder came into our line of sight.
Alexia swam closer to me, taking my hands in hers, her face suddenly becoming serious. It was perhaps the most terrifying thing I'd ever seen, making the anticipation for her next words far more extreme. "One more thing before he jumps down here with us. He's worth it. He's loyal, if he trusts you, he's loyal. You don't know how many times I've seen him go down for Mateo. I'm fairly certain he'd help Mateo commit a felony if Mateo asked him to. He's a lot of work but he's worth it, I promise."
I couldn't reply, though I'm sure that was her plan. She didn't want me to reply.
There was a loud splash as the water rippled into waves, sending me and Alexia apart.
Ryder popped up from the water beside me, his hair matting to his forehead, blocking his line of vision.
I treaded closer to him, brushing his hair out of his face gently. "What did she tell you?" He rushed out before I'd even gotten all the hair out his eyes.
"Nothing important," I answered.
Alexia joined the conversation. "I just told her how you used to run through the sprinklers naked when you were mad at dad."
"I was two!" He splashed her directly in the face.
Alexia floated on her back, drifting softly with the waves. "I should have told her about that time you started crying because a duck was chasing you."
Ryder buried his face in his hands, slowly sinking below the surface of the water.
Alexia's whole body tensed up as she watched Ryder like a hawk, as if she felt if she didn't, he wouldn't come back up.
But he did come back up, splashing water in Alexia's face. She glared at him, immediately splashing water back at him, missing and smacking me directly in the face. I popped back up gaping at her. And thus started the splash war, leaving every man for themselves as we tried to see who would get splashed the most.
Ryder lost.
A/N
Hi lovies!
What do we think of the story so far?
This isn't the end of the chapter with Alexia I just had to break it up into smaller portions because it was kind of a long chapter.
Also, question for you guys, what are your guys' favorite tropes?
And regarding It All Started with a Dare, we've sold 18 copies but like ten of those were my family and friends so I've really only sold like 8. But that's okay it's still progress.
Anyway, I hope you all have an amazing day :)
Lots of love,
Rachelle<3