The Vortex: Rectification

Chapter Five.

Chapter Forty-Five.

It didn't take a lot of detective skills to figure out that Kyla and Fitz room hasn't been reinhabited, I've known for a long time that I wouldn't see them again and I never would have thought that Jamie would have taken over their room, so really, I have no reason to be surprised that their door is locked.

The other thing that I find strange is that I've made my way into the other townhouse, everything flipped on its head and round the other way. I don't fight Liylah on it or bore her with complaints about how weird it is to be on the serious side of the house, which is the way it ended up.

Kyla, Fitz and Nessa were so serious in their lives and careers outside of school and when Aleera, Harry and I spent so much of our time catering to her needs. It wasn't a surprise that a wall of separation started growing between us, even when we all tried to ignore the wedge.

While I crave the ability to know what happened in my absence, to get the concrete answers to the millions of questions I have spent four years thinking about. Knowing for certain all the things that they went through, without me, is a hard pill to swallow and I don't know if I'm ready to take it.

Though I know, without a doubt that if they offer me up even the smallest crumbs of information, I will take them all in without a second thought to my mental wellbeing. Not that it's something that has been a priority for a while now, somewhere in the back of my head I think that everything is going to come crashing down the second I let it.

Which is why I don't let my eyes wonder from Liylah from the second I follow her into her room, confusion laces me when both of her bedside tables are full of knick-knacks. There's a large pile of clothes pooling out of the laundry basket and more threatening to come spilling out of the closet and drawers pressed against the cream walls.

"Liy?" I call, her head whipping back in my direction as I sit in the middle of her bed, swallowed by her pink and yellow duvet covers as she looks for clothes I can use. "Do you live here with someone?"

The smile on her face drops, something I didn't imagine was even possible given the way things have been so far. I can understand the underlying feeling of joy, hell, even I feel it being surrounded by everyone again, but it doesn't erase, or even mask the pain.

"Well, yes... it's quite obvious, isn't it?"

I nod, a smile pulling at my lip's despite of the cautious look on her face, and I know that whatever leaves her lips next will blow my mind or break it. "Very much so, I knew you to have a lot of things but not this much and I doubt you fill your days with shopping"

"I don't" She nods, setting the folded stack of comfortable clothes on the edge of the bed and crawling over to me, until she is wrapped in that very same blanket and staring at me with brutal honesty. "And there isn't a lot of value in fancy clothes these days, not when they get destroyed more often than not"

My eyes drift down to my own tattered clothes, what once was my favourite shirt because it reminded me of home, is now shredded and stained beyond fixing. "I get that, it's just, it doesn't seem like you live with a boy Liy"

Recognition crosses her tan features, blue eyed widen just a fraction as if she's just realising that if she's made a massive life confession to everyone... I wasn't here.

"I don't" She confirms, nodding her head a few more times than necessary and pushing her hair back away from her face, blue eyes still swollen from the crying. "I don't think there's a word for it 'Rora, I just like everyone"

I never dwelled on that passing thought after I confessed it to Aleera, but the more time we spend surrounded by her and her girlfriends' possessions, the more I think that I wasn't too far off. I might have been an awful friend at times, more wrapped up in books and my own feelings than being attentive with them but I did have an inkling about it. Though I don't think now is the right time to divulge to her the time Aleera was kissing me and had me pressed against a wall.