Sawyer isn't in bed with me the next morning. I sigh out, not ready for the day.
I slowly get out of bed and head for the shower. I quickly rinse myself, wash my hair, and brush my teeth.
I slowly walk back downstairs and make sure Sawyer isn't anywhere I'm going to be. Avoidance is key.
I swing the kitchen door open and as I'm about to step foot inside I hear Sawyers voice and I back out.
"Opal?" Avery calls out my name, dammit she's in the kitchen too. I walk back to the living room but Avery catches up to me. "Hey, you're not going to eat?" She asks and I turn to look at her.
"I forgot something in my room. I'll be back." I make up some lame excuse. She eyes me suspiciously but nods and she slowly walks back to the kitchen. I breathe out, that was close.
I run back upstairs and grab my drawing book and head to the round room. It's at least two in the afternoon and my stomach growls.
I've spent all morning drawing those zombie things I keep having dreams about. It's weird. I hear heavy foot steps coming toward the only door in this room and I start to panic. I quickly put all my drawings into one pile and hide them under a couch pillow.
"Opal." Nancy breathes out, she's holding onto her chest. "There you are. Everyone is looking for you." She says and I nervously laugh.
"Sorry." I apologize for scaring her.
She looks around the room then back at me, "What are you doing up here?" She asks.
"Clearing my mind." I head for the door, "is there any food. Is there cereal? I think I'm going to eat." I start to babble and walk back down before she can answer.
Once I make it back down I bump into Evan.
"Opal?" He questions and his line of sight eyes where I just came from as if someone else were to be trailing behind me.
"Is Sawyer with you?" He asks and I shake my head no.
"Hmm, weird." Evan mutters and he starts to turn away from me.
"Why weird?" I ask.
"Hmm? Oh I thought he would just be with you." He says with a small shrug. Sawyer doesn't hang out with me enough for Evan to think that, right?
"Oh nope. He isn't here. Nancy is." I try maneuvering around him but he stops me,
"If you see him, let him know I'm looking for him." With that Evan let's go of me and heads off somewhere in the house.
I slowly make my way into the kitchen and grab as many snacks before someone comes in. The soda I bought the other day and a few bags of chips should keep me through the day. Oh cereal, I need cereal. I grab a box and quickly head out. The door swings open into Sawyer, hitting him right in the face.
"Ah, fuck." Sawyer winces in pain.
I don't say anything, his eyes are closed, he hasn't seen who it is. I quickly run to the other door and exit before he can say anything. My heart is racing, but I make it to my room on time.
"Opal?" I hear a knock at the door as I'm about to eat a bag of chips.
Drew barges into the room.
"What are you eating?" He questions.
"Snacks." I open the bag up and pop a chip into my mouth.
"Where were you all morning?" He questions.
"Outside drawing." I shrug.
"Of course." Drew rolls his eyes. "Sawyer is training me." He says almost excited.
"Training you?" I question.
"Yeah, he's training me to fight and use a gun."
"Don't sound too excited. He's trained me and it's brutal." I roll my eyes.
"Something going on between you two?" Drew picks up on my tone.
"No. He's just an asshole. You will die." I warn him.
"You're telling me, you're a better fighter than me?" He asks and I nod. I've trained for hours and weeks with Sawyer. I'm sure I am.
"Yes." I nod and open another bag of chips.
"I think you should eat real food." Drew tries pulling the bag of chips in my hand and I swiftly pull back before he can grab them.
"Fast reflexes. That's new." He looks at me.
"You want to wrestle don't you?" I ask.
"I always win." Drew says and I shake my head.
"Drew?" I hear Sawyer yell and my eyes widen.
I quickly hide all the food under the pillows.
"Tell him I'm not here."
Drew looks at me,
"What did he do?" He seems angry.
"He didn't do anything, just don't want to see him. Tell him I'm not here. Please, Drew." I beg and quickly hide inside the closet.
"Fine." Drew breathes out.
"In here." Drew calls out to Sawyer.
"Ready?" Sawyer asks. I can see both of them through the crack of the closet door. Drew nods and walks out. "Have you seen your sister?" Sawyer calls out and he surveys the room slowly. His eyes are glued to the bed for a second too long before he turns around and walks out.
"No man, I've been looking for her." Drew lies straight to his teeth. I breathe out when I don't hear them anymore and quickly close the door to my room. Back to eating, I'm starving.
A few hours pass and I make my way downstairs again.
"Opal, have you been in your room all day?" Avery asks.
"Yeah, just need to be alone." I catch a glimpse of Drew falling hard to the ground, he's sweaty. Sawyer is all sweaty too as helps pull my brother back up.
Sawyer turns to look inside, feeling me staring at him. I quickly look away and maneuver Avery into the kitchen. Shoot.
"Tonight is pasta night. You need to eat." Avery commands and I nod. We serve ourselves huge bowls of pasta and garlic bread and sit down.
"This is nice. Just the two of us. Us girls. We never get to talk. Evan always has me doing busy work and you're always off with Sawyer somewhere." She says.
"I'm not always with him, am I?" I question.
"Yes. Yes you are. You're almost inseparable." She laughs as if my question was the dumbest question.
"I don't see it like that." I mutter.
"Everyone else sees it like that." She shrugs.
"This is really good." I take a huge bite, changing the subject.
"Thank you. I made it." Avery wiggles her eyebrows, "Nancy has been teaching me."
"It's so good." I smile.
"I need water." I hear Drew breathlessly say and he barges into the kitchen with none other than Sawyer right behind them.
Sawyer walks in shirtless, and glossy from all the sweat. I choke on my water and his head snaps to me. I take one last bite of the spaghetti,
"Thank you, Avery. This was good." I quickly place the bowl into the sink and rush out of there.
I run into the nearest bathroom. I wash my hands for no reason and pretend I'm using the toilet. Ten minutes pass and I feel okay to open the door.
Drew is standing there waiting for me to come out.
"Sawyer is looking for you." He says and he enters the bathroom with a towel in his hand.
I walk back upstairs to my room when I hear Sawyer on the phone.
"All I'm saying is that there was an accident, and I want to know why it happened, huh?" Sawyer sounds angry as he tries to get to the bottom of something. "I wouldn't put it past Whit and his assholes, man. You don't know them, they will do anything to get to her." I hear him pacing around his office as he breathes hard, "Listen, why not make sure? What's it going to hurt?" Sawyer questions, demanding answers. It goes quiet for a few seconds before I hear Sawyer talking, "Thank you." Sawyer breathes out relieved.
Before I have time to leave Sawyer swings open the door. He's surprised I'm standing there, I can smell the mint shampoo. He just took a shower.
"Why are you avoiding me?" He questions.
Because I think I'm falling in love you, okay? That's why I'm avoiding you, but of course I don't say that.
"I'm not avoiding you." I say. He looks at me not believing a word I say. He grabs my hand, and closes the office door behind him.
"I got this." He says and uncovers a small gold thing from a piece of cloth. I gasp,
"Woah."
"Our family is in trouble. Your parents are gone. Im the one who stepped up and had to do something, okay?" He looks down at me. "Im taking care of business, alright?" He looks at me waiting for me to answer.
"Mhmm." I nod.
"This thing is going to make everything go back to normal. Do you understand that?" He grabs my arm and I pull away.
"Honestly, I've seen this movie before. The more we try to fix time the more it fails. I don't care about this. I care about right now. Are we okay? No one tells me anything."
Sawyer interrupts me, "We talked about this, Opal! Listen, this is real, it's the compass that belongs on the watch. They say this isn't real, but we have it. We have control. I got this for everyone, for our family." He says and I get the feeling he isn't talking about our family.
"Sawyer stop." I push him away from me. "Nothing is ever going to change!" I yell.
I run out of there and into Evans office.
"This is all too much." I start throwing out words and pacing back and fourth, crying. Evan gently helps me sit down across from him. I lean on my hands as I control my crying.
"Sawyer can be... well Sawyer." He softly explains. "There was a time where he almost lost all of us. We almost didn't make it." He smiles a sad smile, remembering an accident from their childhood. "I'm sure whatever he's done, it's for a good reason."
Sawyer walks in angrily eyeing both of us. I sit up straighter and Evan turns to look at him. Sawyer doesn't move from the doorway as Evan continues,
"Opal, what I want you to understand more than anything is that we never imagined any of this to happen to you. I know Sawyer has wanted to tell you immediately about your parents but I told him to wait. He wanted to tell you that everything will be okay. It broke all of us that we couldn't explain it all. But I have to make sure this whole family is safe." He continues, he thinks we're arguing about my parents, he doesn't know about the little contraption Sawyer found.
"Thank you, Evan. At least one of us is grateful." Sawyer cuts in, staring me down.
I move away from both of them,
"That's a little insane, for both of you."
"I promised Sawyer that he could fix all of this. I needed his help. I'm just trying to keep my promise."
"Not that you care." Sawyers looking down, rubbing his ear. I look over to him angry,
"Did it look like I didn't care when you left?" My voice rises.
"It looked like you cared about running off with some asshole." He says referring to his brother.
"Sawyer, please." Evan tries calming us down, but we continue to scream.
"It looked like all you cared about was leaving to fix whatever you broke." I yell right back.
"Yes! Both of you care! That's the point!" Evan shouts at the both of us. "I know you're angry, but we all have to try and move forward. That is all behind us."
I shake my head at Evans words. "We're gonna live a new life, all of us together. Opal, we just want to make sure you're safe." Evan continues.
I don't say anything as Sawyers burning eyes are only on me.
"She's never going to be on our side, Evan." Sawyer angrily spits. I glare at him,
"Sawyer." Evan warns him to shut up.
"Especially now that Drew is here, right? So as long as Whit knows where she is,
we're never going to be safe. We need to think logically about what we need to do to..."
"Sawyer, shut up. She's fine. We're all fine. Stop trying to fix everything!"
"So now all of this is my fault?" I fire back.
"Everything is fine. Everything is good." Evan stands up. He's lucky Sawyer is on the opposite side of the room, blocking me from running to Sawyer and punching him.
Sawyer pinches the bridge of his nose. He's thinking.
"Look, I'm on your side. Why would I give you up to Whit? He killed my parents and is trying to kill me."
"Opal," Evan grabs my hand, "we haven't given you a reason not to trust us. We're sorry if we ever made you doubt. We're here, okay." He softly says and Sawyer snorts. We both glare at him.
"Okay." I whisper. I slowly get up and walk out.
"I'm sorry." Sawyer says as he chases after me.
I turn to him, and breathe out.
"I didn't know showing you that would make you mad. I thought you'd be happy." He says and now I feel like I overreacted. Maybe we needed a little scream match, there is too much tension between us.
"It's just that you're obsessed with something you can't fix."
"I'm not gonna stand here and let the world die."
"I wanted that too. But every time you tell me you try to fix something you say the outcome is worse. When are you going to stop?" I question.
He looks at me and runs his hands through his hair frustrated.
We're in his office and he walks to his desk. He opens a drawer and pulls out my drawing pad.
"Nancy found this." He says. My heart sinks, oh no.
"I must have left it in the tower." I tell him and I quickly pick it up and start walking out. I don't want this conversation.
"Stop." He says.
"You're angry I'm obsessed with fixing all the shit that's happening. Here you are obsessed with that." He points to all the loose drawings his desks of the gruesome faces of zombie like creatures.
"When are you going to stop?" He counters.
"That's different." My voice is low.
"We don't know how that bite is going to affect you here. I can't lose you." He says.
"You're not." I say, unsure.
"I'm not taking a chance." His knuckles softly knock on his desk.
"Okay, why are we doing this again?" I question.
"Because if we don't stop the bad guys from making the good guys mistake, the bad guys will gain a foothold in our government which will then lead to them having power, and taking over more than our country, and eventually the world." Sawyers hands are flying in the air.
"Right, glad it's that simple." I sarcastically mutter. "I don't understand, the good guys are making this mistake and the bad guys are using it against them?" I question.
"Do you trust me?"
"Yes." I nod.
"Then you know enough." Sawyer smiles.
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