Submerged in Your Love (✔️)

Chapter Twenty-Three

(Josephine's POV)

I sat by Marie's side with Reid. She woke up for a minute or two but then fell asleep. Last night, Reid and I spent the night at the hospital refusing to leave in case something happened.

"It's to quiet in here." Reid said. "I don't like hospitals."

"Me neither."

"At least she's sleeping good." He said twirling my car keys in his hand.

"When I first moved in and she started doing stuff for me and with, we walked everywhere and took taxis. We walked to the grocery store and the mall and anywhere else we needed to go."

"That's why you bought car."

"Yeah, I could tell it was talking a tole on her to walk that much but she said it was good exercise. We went car shopping the next day. Told her to pick something we would both like but mainly her since she was going to be driving it."

"That was nice of you."

I shrugged. "She's a lot nicer. She went out the next day and bought a mat for the backseat for Titan. Said she wanted his car riding to me as comfortable as possible."

He chuckled. "She told me last week that she wanted a cat."

I shook my head. "That's the last thing she needs. A cat would drive her crazy. You know one time, she got a pet bird."

"A bird?"

"Yeah. It was shortly after I moved in. She named it Tweety."

"Tweety?"

"Yep. She had it for maybe two months."

"Why'd she get rid of it?"

"It drove her crazy with its noises. It also started mocking the sound of someone knocking on the door and her soap operas. Not to mention the fact that it didn't like crackers. The audacity of that bird to not like crackers when she offered was unimaginable."

Reid died laughing. "That's amazing."

"Then he got a fish."

"Oh boy."

"Oh yeah. The fish didn't last long because she couldn't take it with her when she went out."

"She took the bird?"

"Oh yeah. Tweety was quite the regular on bingo nights. Everyone loved that bird."

"You went too?"

"Bingo? A few times. She played my cards for me and told me when to shout bingo. I won a bottle of wine once. She took it from me. Said it wasn't my style."

"She's amazing."

"Yeah."

"Does she ever talk about her husband?"

"Sometimes not often though. He was good guy from the way she talks. He was a general contractor for sixty years."

"I can only imagine what he was like."

"From what I've gather, they were alike."

"That'd make for an interesting household."

"Agreed."

"Have you....spoken to Kai?"

"No. He's still MIA. I'm getting worried about him."

"I'm sure you'll hear from him soon."

"I hope. I've left message after message. So has Austin."

"Austin said he did something like this after Mason died. Said he eventually will snap out of it."

"Hope it's soon."

"You and me both."

An hour later, Reid went to get us some lunch. It was at that time that someone came in Marie's room.

"Josephine, how are you?"

"I'm good and you?"

"Pretty good. How is Marie?"

"She's alright. Sleeping now."

"That's good. Are we still on?"

I smiled. "Yes. I'm excited."

"Good. Don't be late."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

~~~~~~~~~~
(Kai's POV)

I sat on the ground in front of him. I'd been there for hours at this point.

"I don't know what to do, Mason." I said. "I'm a mess. I...I f*cked up. I lost to Hawkins. Out of all people."

I shook my head.

"I don't know what's wrong. I came to terms with everything, but something is holding me back. What do I do? At practice, I swim fast enough to beat anyone. At practice, nothing is holding me back. I don't think of anything. I'm one with the water and all that crap. So what's getting to me during competition?"

I stared at his gravestone for hours before I decided to leave. It was when I turned around that I got my answer. I realized what was blocking me. I realized what I hadn't done.

I turned back to Mason.

"I've forgiven myself. I've come to terms that it wasn't totally my fault. I got back in the water. But I didn't do that. Thank you. You're gone but you still listen to me and you're still with me. Thank you."