Secret in the Heart ||Descendants|| (♡Ben)

26

I am panting from all that running and fighting, but luckily we got Ben out of there. I look to my left and see Ben looking at me. He is panting too. "I'm really sorry that things didn't go the way you wanted them to." he says. "I mean...As long as you're safe, that's..." I say still panting. "I mean, at least I got to see the Isle. They're my people too." Ben says. "Uma helped me see that." he says after he takes in a deep breath. "Ben, Uma captured you." I say. "She's an angry girl with a bad plan. That's not so different from you when you came to Auradon, Kara." he says. My mouth drops open. How can he say that? He knew Maleficent forced us to do that. Uma isn't being forced by anyone, this was her own plan. I look out of the window. "Awkward." Dude says. I ignore him and keep on looking outside. "Dude..." Evie says and she clears her throat. "Dude, I know you can talk, but it doesn't always mean you should." Carlos says before Evie can continue. 

"Here we go." Jay says and I see the golden strings of the magic bridge appear. We drive over the bridge and back towards Auradon Prep. We stop and I get out of the car as quickly as I can. I walk towards the back of the car and grab the box full of my father's stuff out of it. Lonnie appears next to me and grabs the swords. "Thank you for your help Lonnie." I say. "Of course." she says and she walks away. I close the tailgate and walk after Carlos, Evie, Jay, Mal, and Lonnie. Ben falls into pace beside me. We don't say anything. Lonnie walks away and Jane comes walking towards us.

"Ben! There you are. Cotillion's tonight." she says and we both stop beside her. Why I stop I don't know. "Come here. Look." she says and he leans forward to look at her tablet. I don't hear what she is saying because I am too deep in thought staring at the box thinking about how I am going to solve the riddle. I feel Ben's hand on my back and look up to see him standing next to me. "Do you want to cancel?" he asks. I look him in the eyes. He would cancel this thing just for me? "Uh, you know what? I can come back. Uh, but like, really, really soon." Jane says. "No, no, no." Ben says and I nod slightly. He steps back towards Jane. "Now's fine. Um..." he says as he looks. Then he steps back towards my side. "Do whatever you need to do." he says. I look up at him and then Evie walks towards me. I walk towards her and she grabs my arm. "We need to talk." she says as Mal joins my other side. We start walking towards the dorm.

"No." Carlos says. We stop and turn around. "No?" Evie asks. "You guys are always going off in a huddle, whispering your girl-talk stuff or whatever, and Jay and I are tired of it." he says. "I'm..." he starts but then seems like he rethinks that. "I am." he says. "We're your family, too. We've been through a lot. Together. I'm not stopping that now. Okay?" Carlos says. He's right. Besides, I think that I owe them all some kind of explanation. "Everyone, sit." he says as he sits down on the grass. I sit down next to him. "Come on." he says when nobody else follows.

When we are all sitting down we look at him. "I don't know how to start girl talk." he says and looks at Jay. He raises his shoulders. "What up?" Jay says. Evie chuckles. "Um...Well..." I stammer and let out a sigh. "I'm a mess. I'm such a mess. I mean six months ago we were tormenting the Isle. And now, everybody wants me to be this Lady of the Court, and I have no idea how to keep up the act." I say tears filling my eyes. It's good to finally tell this to my friends. "Then don't." Carlos says. "See? This was dumb." Jay says as he moves to stand up. "Maybe it wasn't." Evie says and Jay stops. "We're always gonna be the kids from the Isle. I tried to forget it, I really tried," she says and she looks towards me. "But those are our roots." she says and looks at the rest of us. "And we all did what we had to do to survive, but it made us who we are. And we're never gonna be like anybody else here. And that's okay. That's okay." she says. "And we can't fake it." Carlos says with a small smile. "No." Evie says. "Yeah, I mean, especially not without Mal's spellbook." I say. "Well, if Ben doesn't love the real you, then he's not the one." Carlos says. He's right. "I like that." Evie says. "Give him a chance." Carlos says. I just look at the ground.