A/N: when dialogues are italicized (i.e. "I really hate Monday mornings.") it means they're in a non-English language the perspective character understands. Italicized words (i.e. "I really hate Monday mornings.") still mean emphasis.
. . .
"Hazel!" Megan was already scrambling to interrogate me, a large knife in one hand and hair up in a neat bun like she always has when she cooks. "What happened?!" She followed me as I threw my school bag halfway across the room and into the study.
"Nothing." I snapped. "She wasn't there."
"Oh." She sighed, her posture slumped with disappointment, but she quickly forced herself back up and faked a hopeful smile-frown. Like she wanted to smile and frown at once with equal zeal, so she sort of switched between the two in a halfhearted way. "She's probably just getting herself together-"
"You're bullshitting me again, Megan." I rolled my eyes. "Talk."
"Mm..." She pulled her lips in for a moment, exhaling and gesturing for me to follow her to the kitchen. "Did you see any of her people?" She started, turning her back to me as she resumed the vegetable-chopping she'd been doing before I came home.
"Yes. I didn't talk to any of them." I remembered the small, firm nod Micha had given me, how I'd just felt that troubling myself or Grace's group with immediate contact would not have been a good idea.
"Mm." She went quiet again. "Maybe you should try to talk to Micha." She suggested slowly.
"And why the hell would I do that?" I snorted irritably, wrinkling my nose with a strong feeling against her idea.
"Get close to her, you get close to Grace's friends and there's no chance you have of being back with her if they don't think it's a good idea. Like it or not, Zel, but Grace believes in them more than she believes in you at this point." She shook her head. I growled lowly. "Stop growling at me, I'm just helping you fix your relationship."
"I'm not becoming friendly with Micha. And Grace's friends do not like me."
"I can't imagine why." She grumbled, clearly getting tired of my emotional deficiency. "It won't happen overnight, Hazel. Take small steps and get the foundations of your relationship together so you don't have to build everything from scratch each time you fight."
"But she said she loves me! Doesn't that mean she wants to be with me?! What's the point of her being in love with me if she wants nothing to do with me!" I hissed, an indignant growl trying to tear out of my throat.
"Dear fucking lord. The point to her being in love with you is that she is in love with you! But that doesn't account for much because you completely disregarded her confession!"
"I didn't disregard it! I told her how I felt! I don't want her loving me!"
"Sure as hell sounds like you do." She shook her head, her movements becoming choppy with frustration. "If she told you she was in love with someone else, would that make it better?"
"No-" I clenched my fists. If she fell in love with someone else, I'd probably end up committing another murder (which terrifies me because A. I don't want to kill anymore and B. Why would I fall back on old ways just to keep Grace to myself?! I don't even want her loving me!... Right? I mean maybe- no!).
"So you want her loving you?" She snapped as a half statement.
"I want her wanting me." I retorted.
"And I'm sure the fact that she is madly in love with you makes it even better." She sighed. "Make a choice, Zel. Accept she loves you and make it work like that, or make distance until she falls for someone else and move on. I know what you want. I think you know. Hell, I knew Grace knew. The problem is getting you to realize it."
"I want her to be with me without loving me-"
"Well that's not an option, Zel. I've given you your equations. Weigh them. It's one or the other. You have until Grace decides you're a lost cause." Why did that make me feel like I'd been shot? What if it were Grace who was shooting me with those invisible bullets each time Megan said something like that? Trying to tell me something? The image of her holding a gun to me made me want to tear myself apart-like it was my fault she would be crying and hurt and she would look at me like I was perfect and like I'd held the same gun to her chest and fired... I liked how she looked at me yesterday morning... Was that love? Because of it was... Maybe I did want her to feel it for me... She looked so happy even though I could hear her little grunts of pain when she moved.
"I-I just want Grace..." I admitted, a huge breath of relief left both Megan and I, a weight lifted off the room.
"I was really scared you were too stubborn and thick to realize it." She muttered under her breath. "I know you're still going to need time to sort out your side of this, but make sure she knows you were wrong."
"About what?"
"Oh, I don't know. You being gay. You wanting her to love you. You having no feelings for her. You wanting her to give you space... Should I keep going?" Megan snorted.
"Humor me," I rolled my eyes. "How, exactly, do you suggest I go about this when she is avoiding me and I should avoid confrontation with her?"
"I don't know. I mean, if it were Bryce I'd probably blow up his phone, but it's not and you may look good in subtlety."
"I'll try it... I guess..." I sighed. "What if it doesn't work?"
"Roll with the punches, Zel." She mused, suddenly humming like she had a breakthrough. "Right! N.S. Wants you at one. Something about Riley giving you an update in a new schedule or something. Something involving Director King's plans for remodeling. Or maybe that was me... Hm... Either way, Riley wants you at her office for morning shift."
"Okay. That all?" I started to make my way to the living room, laying down on the couch. I drew my phone out of my back pocket. I had a few messages from Riley, but none from Grace.
Me: Grace?
I waited. Then I decided to turn on the television, leaving the channel on a cooking show it had turned on to. Likely, Megan was watching it before I arrived.
After a while, I sent another message to Grace.
Me: I need to talk with you. Why weren't you in school today?
"What are you doing?" I jumped when Jamine snuck up behind me and chirped in my ear. She had stealthily sat herself on top of the couch, her fur camouflaging with the color of the furniture.
"Not your concern." I retorted, rolling my eyes and putting my phone into sleep mode.
"No? Your special friend was very unhappy with you, last I saw her. What would you be messaging her about?" She crawled down and morphed into her humanoid form on the space beside me, her hair now matching the color of the couch. She switched to her other native tongue and stopped speaking in her annoying chirping.
"I don't see why it matters to you. You weren't close to her, as far as I know." I narrowed my eyes. She laughed.
"I liked her. Very... Clean girl. Had stars in her eyes." She shrugged, folding her arms. "It would be a shame to let such a beauty go." Jamine, being a Fairy, was obsessed with things of beauty. Mostly sentimental beauty, but she definitely could be vain with physical beauty. Which was why it made me a little irritated, I think.
"Still. She's my business, you shouldn't be getting involved with my relationships."
"You're right. I'm involving myself of my own accord. Therefor, you cannot prevent me from taking interest." She shrugged with a victorious little smile. "I also meant to ask you how your sex was." She snickered.
"Why the sudden interest? Yesterday, you wanted nothing to do with me." I rolled my eyes, the room suddenly growing hot against my face and neck.
"Well, you're trying to make amends. And I take interest in the personal affairs of my housemates. I have never had sex with a human. I'm interested in the dynamics." Jamine chuckled.
"Jamine! I don't want to hear anything about my sister's sex life!" Megan groaned from the kitchen.
"It is not your sister I'm asking about, Acorn." The Fairy laughed.
"I don't want to hear about Grace's sexual characteristics, either!"
"You can tell me later." Jamine winked at me.
"Or not. I'm not telling you about it." I sighed.
"But I would like to know. What did she taste like?" You can imagine what a wonderful time Jamine had in giving me 'the Talk' once Megan figured out I'd never had it. I learned things I never wanted to know about her sexual history.
"Jamine!" Megan shrieked.
"Acorn!"She laughed again.
"First, I consider Grace a friend. Second, that's my sister's soulmate. Third, I really would not like to imagine sex with another female. Fourth, I swear I will replace you if I hear one more mention of-"
"Your unclothed sister, hot and bothered, buried neck deep in Grace's vagina?" Jamine threw her head back with laughter, returning to her animal form and bolting away to hide from Megan, chirping loudly with amusement.
"I'm going to turn you into a fur coat!" Megan screamed. "Hazel, say nothing! I do not need validation of that statement!" I actually found myself amused by my sister's resistance. I licked my lips almost subconsciously; I didn't been neck deep... Had I?
...
"Hazel!" I growled inwardly as I noticed a familiar girl waiting for me outside Riley's office.
"Micha." I sighed.
"First, thank you for not getting involved today." I scowled. Micha thanking me? Her girlfriend had to have put her up to this. "Yeah, Marley isn't too happy with you, but she wanted me to let you know that she was glad you kept your distance and effectively kept Kayla from paying ransom." She shook her head. "So... You slept with Grace, she confessed her love for you, and you rejected her." She nodded slowly to herself. "That's one thing I need to talk to you about. The other... You apparently know who my soulmate is. I would like to know." She frowned at me.
"Your soulmate is dead so I wouldn't worry."
"Yeah. Mhm." She rolled her eyes, "what if Grace died? And you got amnesia. Wouldn't you still want to know who she was?"
I didn't say anything and tried to get past her to Riley's room.
"Hazel! I want answers!" She blocked me.
"I don't want to give them! What happened in history is dead and gone and what you're asking me to share is personal and unimportant!"
"Unimportant my ass." Micha rolled her eyes. "And I believe it would be considered a personal issue for me too. My soulmate. I have a right to that information." I growled angrily. She was going at me from a very smart angle, knowing well that I knew she had every right to know who her soulmate was. It was me who wasn't ready to put the name put for its relevance to me to be questioned.
"It can't be Grace. It can't be Megan. It can't be Alexa... Who else would you care so much about that you wouldn't want to bring into conversation?" Micha scowled at me, reading me as best she could. "Someone you murdered?" She muttered, noticing the subtlest tension of my muscles at the word. "Yes. Someone you knew. Someone you killed or feel responsible for... Had to have been from your time at the Academy..." Something registered in her eyes. She knew. "It was her, wasn't it? The... HTO, right? What was her name..." I opened my mouth but closed it again once I realized I had no words.
"Did you kill her, Hazel?" Micha suddenly asked with unnerving calm. I parted my lips to say yes, but my head began to shake and signal a no.
"N-no... Not directly..." I sighed, "I didn't save her."
"Alexa killed her." She stared at me for a sign of disagreement but saw nothing. "Is that why you don't like me? Do I remind you of her?" She narrowed her eyes again, not threateningly, more to just prove the point that she was interrogating me. "No..." She tilted her head and eyed me for a good while before saying more. "Jealousy... And... Fear? Worried that because I distracted her from you, I'll take more. You're afraid I'm going to get with Grace." She concluded with a laugh, scrunching up her nose. "I hate to break it to you, but I have absolutely no interest in Grace romantically or sexually. She is a friend and no more."
I kept my eyes on her with a blank expression. She was completely right about all if it, naturally; Micha had a hell of a lot of skill when it came to reading people.
"Hazel, you do remember that I called you in, no?" I jumped at the voice behind me. "Micha, please." I guessed Riley had made a gesture behind me for Micha to be on her way, because Micha gave her a small, polite smile, glanced at me again, and then strode away on her heel like nothing had happened.
I followed Riley back in to her office, taking my usual seat on the comfy chair in front of her desk. She sat in the chair next to me. Great. That meant she would be giving me advice.
"So..." She began, shrugging, a confused look on her face. "What's up?" She asked before folding her arms.
"If this is about Grace, I'm dealing with it." I sighed deeply.
"Mm... Partially about her. Partially about you. Director King wanted to meet you and talk to you about possible changes to the curriculum and structure of the N.S. since you are a senior agent and you have been to the Academy. But mostly Grace. You're dealing with it? How?"
"Megan is helping me sort out my feelings and trying to help me resolve the damage done to my relationship." I replied as briefly and concisely as I could because I really had no idea how I would go about fixing Grace and I.
"Okay. I'll accept that. By the way, Grace is probably very stressed with this, so when she somehow asks you if it is at all possible for you to impregnate her, it's because the stress has delayed her menstrual cycle and not because you've actually made her pregnant. You'd be surprised how many times I have to explain that." She stated. "And the same goes for you. You're not pregnant." A thought passed through my head like electricity. What if, someday, Grace and I really did have a child? I imagined the swell of her stomach if she carried it, or her hands on mine if I carried. I wished, in the moment, nothing more than for her to be with me. Maybe her head would be on my shoulder, if she were here, or maybe she'd sit on my lap and I'd be able to run my lips over her nape. I touched the necklace she'd gotten me like it could summon her. It didn't. And my chest was made heavy again by sadness.
"Hazel." Riley chided, demanding attention.
"Sorry." I sighed.
"Fix your relationship. If you can't do it alone, ask and I'll step in. I need your focus back on your work and clearly that isn't happening right now."
"I'm focused." I scowled indignantly. Granted, my heart and mind weren't in the conversation, but there was no way I'd let her figure that out so I was doing my best (more or less) to be present.
"Hazel, I just explained to you the plan Director King has for the remodel. Do you remember any of it?" Riley sighed and rolled her eyes.
"Yes...?" I looked up through my eyelashes. That always worked on Grace...
"Liar. That won't work on me." Riley laughed, "but it's cute. If I were you, I'd incorporate it into my confession speech." She added. "It also works well in marriage, from my own personal experience.
"Anyway, I told you that Director King has a slot open on Wednesday and Friday. Both would be during school. Take your pick."
"Friday." I answered, "can you get Megan to cover for me?"
"Of course I can." Riley pouted, "you insult my authority.
"So. Meeting with with the Director on Friday, and... You have make up sex with your girlfriend by next week? Hopefully you'll be able to function before then, but I am patient when I need to be." She shrugged. I just rolled my eyes. I sort of expected Riley to make a crude remark about my sexual experience at some point today, so I wasn't at all surprised when she made it.
**Blarg... Sorry for the slow updates... Still working on those personal problems... Hopefully my new medication helps but *shrugs* I'm doing what I can. Vote comment, inspire me <3 love you all