Sparring Her Heart ⚔️🥀 | Clorivia

10 | Third time's the charm

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The following week I didn't show for lunch either. I don't know why, but I just couldn't bear seeing her face. Though I do miss the smile she gave me when I smiled at her. I miss our friendship, but I also miss him. Father, please forgive, but this duality is tearing me apart. I can't hold back my feelings anymore. The more I try, the stronger they get. I wanna kiss her, but I want revenge. Make her feel what I felt, what I feel. In reality I didn't want that, I wanted my only feelings for her to be love. Thought it was hard to feel that when she killed my own father. If only that hadn't happened maybe we'd be together now. No, I doubt so. We barely spoke before this. Strangely enough, we only started talking more ever since my fathers death. Oh, Clorinde, if you wanted my attention you could've gotten it without killing him. You already had it to begin with.

Even if I didn't show for lunch, I was still there to spar with her. I couldn't miss an opportunity to beat her.

My fencing uniform was itching under my skin, but I still gave her a smile under my mask.

"Clorinde, it's good to see you." My muffled voice spoke.

"Likewise." She gave me a small nod, no smile visible. Why wasn't she smiling? Won't she smile for me?

The rest of that practice went as any other, we sparred, she won. We sparred, she won; we sparred, she won... Though the last time we sparred, right before she touched me with the tip of her sword, she grabbed my waist and pulled me closer to her. Her sword touched my chest as she pulled me close, marking the end of the duel. The feelings of her hands on my waist sent me into panic, I completely froze up. It had been a while since she last grabbed me like that. And oh how, I missed that so much. She that was once so gentle when she held me, now only did so to deceive me. Though she may not have been touching me directly, those glances that she gave me the day of the duel were much touching than any other moment she's laid her delicate fingers on me.

I couldn't think about anything else but that he rest of the night. I went to bed lingering on that simple physical contact. I knew that next week I couldn't bail out on lunch, I had to show up. Poor Clorinde had been waiting for me there, who knows if she'll even show up next week. I'm sure she believes third time's the charm, because that's the case this time.

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"Clorinde, do you think we'd still speak once every blue moon if you hadn't killed my father?" She asked me. "I mean, we only started meeting weekly since."

I nearly choked on my food when I heard that. I hadn't put much thought into that, but I suppose she was right.
"I guess not." I tried to be as vague as possible, I didn't want to upset Navia any further. Last time she stood me up for 2 weeks straight. Which speaking of, I wanted to ask her about, but I was far too scared to do so.

"I'm sorry for not showing you these last two weeks." Her fork poked the food on her plate. "I've been extremely busy"

"That's alright."

The hours passed by and we just talked like there was no tomorrow, we talked like how we did in middle school. I saw that smile I was so familiar with. This was the first time we had talked like this in years. Was this the beginning of our resolution?