KOTLC- Short Stories

I Fell (Sokeefe )

Final chapter. My next short story will be published probably by tomorrow in a book called KOTLC - Short Stories II. I'm also changing the cover, so yeah. 

Dedicated to empire-of-dreams who asked for this a little over an eon ago, sorry.

They had been searching for the missing ratquail for hours. That little feathery bat creature had to be somewhere in this impossibly big forest. 

"Maybe we should rejoin the others." Sophie suggested to Keefe, though she doubted any of the other pairs had had anymore luck then them.

"What?" Keefe asked snapping out of his thoughts, "Sorry, yeah sure. I mean whatever you think is best." She gave him a look. He wasn't usually this... bumbling, but decided to ignore it. He's been going through a lot, best just to give him space. 

"How about we search for fifteen more minutes, and then go back to Havenfield for a snack and small break?" 

"Yeah, sounds good," he agreed, as he pushed handsome blond hair out of his eyes. 

It was warm and humid out. The air was heavy. Sophie could just hear all the blood feasting mosquitos swarming, waiting to devour them. Thankfully, Edaline had put a weird sparkly spray repellent on them before they left that smelt like a strange mix of a grandmothers attic and garlic. 

The dirt ground of the path became uneven, holes, rocks and roots were scattered about. Grady probably hadn't come this way in a while. She wondered what the others were doing, Dex and Biana were probably complaining. Tam was probably brooding (as always). Fitz searching, maybe she should  transmit to him... she'll do that later. And well she didn't know what Linh would be doing... Suddenly her foot caught under a root. She yelped as she tumbled on top of Keefe. 

She blushed, but forgot to move. She looked into his light electric blue eyes, her breath hitched. Time froze. He cleared his throat, snapping her out of her trance. She scrambled to get off him. Her face was probably redder then a rose. 

"Are you, um... alright?" She managed to ask, looking at anywhere but him.

"No, I fell" he stated the obvious.

She put a hand on her face. She would be anything to switch places that ratquail right about now. "Yeah.. sorry about that."

"No..." he said and took a deep breath before continuing ,"I fell... for you."

Well, that was unexpected. Is what she first thought, before the words settled in. Oh. Wow. Keefe Sencen. Sophie Foster. She took a deep breath. The world was turning. She looked up at him. He wasn't blushing or fidgeting, just looking right back into her. If possible even more heat rushed to her cheeks. 

"Sorry" he apologized. For what? she wondered.

"No, let's just... sit down." They sat in the cool shade of a pine tree. The silence was... thick, and unbearably long.

"It's not a crush." He whispered to her. "I know." she told him.

"I know I've made lots of mistakes. I've lied. I'm definitely not a saint..." "No." Sophie agreed. "And you're so... perfect. I swear it's like you walked out of one of my dreams. I can't even understand how, well, you're real. You mess with my head, and I can't get you out, yet I love it. I love thinking about you. Your very existence overwhelms me, Sophie. But I'm not perfect, not like you. Not like Fitz," He sighed. 

She puts her hand on his, "Keefe, I don't want anybody perfect. I'm not perfect, neither is Fitz. You're hard to trust, hard to get to know. But I don't want you to change. When you betrayed me, and when you were dishonest and lost, I was heart broken." She ran a hand through her blond hair, embarrassed, happy, sad, unsure, everything at once, jolting through her like electricity. This must be love, she realized, it was to confusing to be anything else. And he had to be her crush if her broke her heart,  but... friends could easily break her heart too. 

"I'm so confused," he said (at least they had one thing in common,) "do you like me?"

She couldn't say it. Three words, impossible to say, even harder to understand. Did she? Maybe... yes?  Maybe... no?  It felt like her brain was causing her heart to explode. Fitz almost kissed her, Keefe loved her, and Sophie? Her heart was tangled, and it hurt.  She started to laugh, because really in The Odd Life of Sophie Foster, boys certainly shouldn't have been the most confusing thing. But she mostly laughed because she was clueless, and loving, or whatever this was between her, Fitz and Keefe, was torture.

"Why are you laughing?" he asked perplexed. She looked up at him with tears flowing down her cheeks. "Why are you crying?" Laughing and crying really weren't really that different, both caused by two extremes of an emotion. And Sophie was extremed by every possible feeling.

"How I'm I going to make this work?"  She asked him, but mostly herself.

And then Keefe kissed her and all Sophie's doubts vanished. 

*Gag*