How the Star Fell for the Moon | Layla

Two

"My family moved to New York after my dad finished his schooling, which was before I had begun kindergarten," Brandon begins explaining. "With how close all of our parents were, Danny, Lily and I were practically destined to become best friends. We grew up together. I know those two better than I know myself sometimes," Brandon softly laughs.

"All I wanted to know was-" Ayla says, before getting interrupted.

"Please just let me finish," Brandon retorts. "Trust me, you want know this."

Ayla purses her lips, and gives him a slight nod to continue.

"As you know Lily is a year younger than us. Once we began school she had a hard time making friends from her own class, and would usually hang out with me and Danny at recess. Eventually she was allowed to skip a grade, and when she did her and I became closer than ever. I made sure that someone was always by her side, so she would never have to feel alone again. Most of the time that person ended up being me. When we got to middle school things changed. Well for me at least."

"You had a crush on her," Ayla blurts out.

"Yeah," Brandon shyly smiled. "There were moments when I thought that maybe she liked me too, but then," he says, before his voice trails off.

"Then what?" The girl questions.

"Then one day Lily spotted an abused and homeless puppy, that was sitting all by herself in the cafeteria, and insisted we go sit with her," Brandon finishes with a devious smirk.

Ayla narrows her eyes. "Did you just call me an abused and homeless puppy?"

"What if I did?"

"I don't know," she shrugs with a soft laugh. "I guess I would have to admit that was a pretty good description of me. Plus puppies are pretty cute, so I'll take it."

Brandon rolls his eyes, and shakes his head in amusement. "Moving on. You were the first person Lily ever even tried to become friends with besides Danny and me. In fact you were her first ever girl friend."

Ayla's eyes widen. "Girlfriend? Want do you mean by girlfriend? Did she tell you what happened that night on the roof?"

"I meant you were her first ever friend that was a girl," Brandon pauses. "What happened on the roof?"

"What? Nothing has ever happened on the roof. Why do you ask?" Ayla nervously responds.

Brandon stares at Ayla for a few seconds, as she tries to hide her lie with a smile. "Yeah, okay. You two started to become closer, and Lily started to change."

"What do you mean?"

"Since the day that she met you, there was suddenly this new sparkle in her eyes. You made her the happiest I had ever seen her before," Brandon explains. "That day you came up to me and asked me if I liked her I lied. I saw how much she liked you, and her happiness is the thing I want most in this world."

A small smile forms on Ayla's face. "You really think that she liked me?"

Brandon glances over at the girl. "I never said think."

Ayla's smile grows, as she diverts her eyes from Brandon's to the ground.

"Then it happened. Riley and Maya called everyone's parents telling them that you had collapsed and were in the hospital. Lily and her parents went to visit you as soon as they got the call. Once they arrived they were told that you would be in surgery for most of the night. From what I heard she raised hell before she was eventually able to be dragged out of the hospital by her dad. That night she called me around midnight balling her eyes out. The light in her moon toy stopped working, and for some reason she thought you died because of that. You liked that toy, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I did," Ayla shyly admits.

Brandon lets out a small sigh, before continuing his story. "While in surgery your heart stopped. The doctors were able to revive you, but you never woke up from your anesthetics. You were in a coma for fifteen days, and the doctors said that you might not be the same when you woke up, if you ever woke up. Lily went from the happiest I had ever seen her to the saddest. At school she never left my side. During the first week it was a miracle if she said as much as a word during the day. After school, Danny and I would go with her to the hospital to visit you everyday. I went over to her house a couple of times to try and keep her company, but all she would ever do was read books about astronomy. Every once in a while I would catch her looking up at that moon toy. I think that she was hoping it would start working again, and you would wake up... Everyday our visits got shorter, and the doctors said the chances of you ever waking up got smaller, smaller. Lily eventually became in a rush to get home, so she could continue reading her books. I don't think she liked seeing you lying there on the hospital bed, knowing that there was nothing she could do to help you," Brandon pauses for a second. "You gave her the ring with the moon on it, right?"

"Yeah, I did," Ayla answers. "Why?"

"I don't think she knows that I realized it, but by the second or third day she had moved that ring from her right hand to her left hand's ring finger."

"Really?"

"Yep," Brandon replies. "But don't tell her I told you that."

"I won't," Ayla smiles.

"On the fifteenth day you woke up. I had visited you by myself earlier that day. That's when I told you everything you have written down. Well that's when I told you something really similar to what you have written down, because you know... you weren't dead. Just when I had thought that I had already seen Lily the happiest she would ever be, I went with her to the hospital after we heard that you woke up. And when she saw you... well there's only one word to describe the look on her face, and what she must have been feeling."

"And what would that word be?"

"Love," Brandon confidently answers.

"You-you think that she loved me?" Ayla utters, in a voice just above a whisper, as she couldn't manage to make it any louder than that.

"No," Brandon replies. "You have to stopped loving someone, before you can say that you loved them."

Speechless, it takes Ayla about a minute before she can figure out a response. "You're not saying that she's still-"

"What I'm saying is that over these past few years Lily hasn't showed any interest in dating anyone. And I say that knowing that her and I actually dated for a couple of weeks. Things between us became awkward quickly, so we both decided that it would be best if we just remained friends. What I'm saying is that the closest Lily has ever come to falling in love was when she had you... You stayed for two years and then you left. You left us. You left her. I told you what you wanted to hear. Now it's your turn to answer some of my questions. Starting with why did you leave?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A/N: Next, how Ayla and Lily's friendship died. Ben.
Also just to make everything clear, the letter that Ayla had Brandon read in the first chapter and that was mentioned in this chapter is basically the last chapter of "Halo of Light Around the Moon." Brandon said something very similar to her at the hospital, the only difference was that he wasn't speaking to her like she was dead. It will be explained how Ayla knew what Brandon said in the next chapter.