The Vortex: Rectification

Chapter Fourteen.

Chapter Fifty-Four.

You know how I have been complaining for the last few months that everything feels stagnant and rather insufferably not done anything but read despite all of it. Yeah, well it feels like everything has exploded all at once, and even though the stress has all of a sudden tripled there's no dread anymore.

Okay that's a lie, there's a lot of negative feelings still swirling around me but with the discovery of rituals that may actually help Aleera and the small development of Jamie and his lips on mine. Things are feeling a lot better than they were two days ago.

Ever since Liylah admitted that Elizabeth had pulled away from everyone and not just me, and yes that was only two days ago. This reinvigorated need for her to know that I'm here as well as everyone else has been bumped up close to the top of my list, where it probably should have been the whole time.

Where I try and have a plan for everything there isn't a way to study and prepare for all the trauma we have gone through and Elizabeth has lost more than most, with her gone all the time it was easy to push checking in on her further away. Liylah is her lifeline to us all and assumably the only thing that has kept her from falling all the way into the deep end, losing two families and then members of the third is enough to make someone shut off emotionally.

It's any wonder that we all aren't all emotionless and completely detached zombies after all this time, and as it seems there is still loads of time for that to happen unless we can get this final battle on the move.

My socks squeak against the tiles of the kitchen floor when I round the corner and Elizabeth stands in the centre with her back to me and head buried in the fridge it all comes a lot faster than I am prepared for. But, as much like the rest of my life adapting is becoming second nature.

I hate the tinge of awkwardness that resounds around us as I break the silence, "I thought you might have left by now, normally you're out the door before I'm awake these days"

"Normally but I'm doing a late shift tonight, so Nessa went in early for me" Elizabeth explains, the fridge door swinging shut behind her, long dark blonde strands pinned in a bun on the back of her head and dark brown eyes avoiding my own. "I guess I didn't expect to see you either"

"I know we have been dancing around each other since my first day back and the effort to rectify that on my part hasn't been as pressing as it should have been and for that I apologise" I blurt, coming forward to stand on the opposite side of our dark marbled counter. "Everything was so confusing for me being back here and having both of my world's colliding, but I never want you to think that I have any plans of going anywhere ever again"

The polite smile on her face drops, a frown pulling her mauve painted lips down as her dark misted eyes continue to avoid my own. "I never should have avoided you though, Liylah has been a thorn in my side about it since she's realised. I thought that family dinners and birthday parties would distract her, but I should have known better"

"When it comes to the people, she loves there is no exceptions" The new hint of a barely-there smile feels more genuine and less awkward as time passes, "And I think you rank at the top"

"What a strange twist of events we have landed on when that's the case" She grins and all the traces of the uncomfortable force from before has smoothed away with shockingly, some open conversation. "And for what it's worth Aurora, you being back is just about the happiest any of us have been in years and I don't say that lightly. To make you think I am anything less than ecstatic that you're here is a failure on my part, but you were right... it was easier to pull away from everyone than admit that it felt like everyone was leaving me again. It felt selfish to make that about me when you were gone and Percy was dead, Jamie lost his parents, and everyone's homes were unliveable"