Kingdom Keepers: Once Upon a Dream

Chapter 9

Willa Angelo did not like to think about high-school. High-school was a part of her past, and everything she did in life was meant to help her put her past behind her: choosing a school that was a 12 hour drive away from home; spending most of her summer vacation at a meaningless job so that she'd have the money to move out. Keeping herself tied to her past at all could only hurt her, and Willa's main priority was to look out for herself.

Willa's life had never been what others would consider easy. She was never popular in school, was bullied even, and her home life wasn't much to celebrate either. With two older brothers who were both in college before she even started high-school, she'd spent a good amount of time living like an only child. Almost having lost her father in a car accident when she was ten, stressful was an understatement when it came to living in her house. Her mother had never learned to handle the grief of almost losing her father, or of watching him go through the medical issues that he still did on a daily basis. As a result of this, she was often angry and on-edge, completely different from the mother Willa had known as a little girl, and sometimes it felt like all they did was fight.

Things had only gotten worse as Willa got older. As she became her own person and searched for what she wanted in life, it felt like she only got more pushback from her parents. They were overprotective and critical, and while it was all done in the name of love, she found it entirely too hard to handle. When her brothers visited home they were no better. She loved her family, without question, but for years all she'd wanted was to break free and be on her own. Her greatest dream was to leave her past behind her, get out into the world on her own, and find out who she could be without anyone doing anything that might hold her back.

All of this was why Willa Angelo did not like to think about high-school. So, when her high school crush came bursting through the doors of the place where she worked, she immediately put her guard up. She couldn't let herself get involved with him, as much as he made her want to; he was a part of high-school, and high-school was a part of her past. Nothing about talking to Dell Philby would help her move forward to the future. But yet, he was here, trying to drag her in to some ridiculous fantasy about a book being real.

She hated that he'd come to ask her about Finn's house, because she hated that she hadn't gone. She knew just as well as Dell did that what Casey was saying wasn't crazy. But she needed it to be crazy, and so she told herself it was, because if it was crazy it gave her a reason to not get involved. Because if she got involved, it would spell disaster for everything she'd ever worked for.

That day, at Earl of Sandwich, being around the others, being invited to Finn's house that night, she'd immediately began to wonder if that's what it would be like to have a group of friends like the groups of friends in the books she read, and the movies she watched: friends who she really felt cared about her, and who she liked being around. Talking to Finn for only five minutes had been so comfortable that she'd felt like he could be that kind of friend. Dell made her smile whenever he talked, and when she watched him at school she'd always thought that maybe there was someone out there who thought just like her. That level of comfort was exactly why she couldn't go to Finn's house that night.

If she had real friends like that, here in Orlando, then she'd have something to miss in Orlando. Orlando wasn't supposed to be a place that she missed, wasn't supposed to be a place she had any kind of connection to; it was just supposed to be a place to wait until she could finally move to DC year-round, and leave everything else behind.

Of course, being with the others that day, seeing Dell Philby again, had made her start to wonder for the first time if having friends to miss in Orlando would really be all that bad.

Her train of thought was finally stopped when a voice called out to her.

"Willa!"

She looked up, startled, and saw the group of girls she was with staring at her expectantly.