Normal

40

I was left rather speechless—but the mere look of utter determination on Nathan's face let me know that there was no getting out of this one. He brushed past me, and looked at me once more.

"And uh," he scratched the top of his head. "Why don't you stay out here for a minute?"

He didn't even allow me to answer because he quickly slipped in the door and locked it behind him. Did he really just lock me out of their house? More importantly, what did the two of them possibly have to talk about? I could only assume that they were talking about me, and that just made me more furious.

I crossed my arms and paced around the front yard. The Williams had a nice place; their porch flowed into a landscape that was lined with little rocks and a large patch of grass. I noticed a small, plastic pinwheel spinning in the breeze; intrigued by the bright colors, I knelt down to see what it looked like up close. Grabbing one of the curls to stop it from twirling, I noticed some faded writing etched into each of the sides. Every tail had been signed by one of the kids, and the fourth was signed by Mr. and Mrs. Williams. I chuckled at the faint details of each child; they were so intricate compared to the parents that simply wrote mommy and daddy. Kyle had written on his curl in large capital letters that stretched across the entire side, and Nyle's section was the complete opposite; it was so small that I would have missed the small marked lines if I wasn't looking deeply. Sarah's was the last; she picked the pink section, and drew lots of hearts and flowers surrounding her name.

"We got that at the Fairbank carnival last year."

My hands flew from the delicate item; my body reacted like I was a little girl caught with her hand lurking inside the cookie jar. I stood and turned to see Kyle standing behind me, with his hands behind his back. His eyes were glazed over as he continued to stare at the little object that I had been so infatuated with.

"Sarah begged our parents to get one, but they refused," he smiled at the memory as his arms relaxed. "You should have seen her little face, she was a devastated little four-year-old."

He let out a chuckle as he trudged over to the pinwheel. "Anyway, Nyle and I gathered all of our hard-earned tickets and went back and got it for her at the end of night. What a simpler time that was."

It was bizarre to hear Kyle talk about his family in such an adoring manner—he was a completely different person than the one I had met at the cabin, where he was violent and threatening. Now, Kyle seemed like a sad, lost child—just like his brother.

He cleared his throat, ending my train of thoughts. "I uh...I'm really sorry Nina," he began nervously. "From the bottom of my heart, I regret everything that I said and did; like I said at dinner, I'm not proud of the things I've done, but I want to do everything I can to bring down Bruce. He's ruined too many lives."

I returned a tight smile; this was a big step for Kyle from just two days ago. What could have possibly changed in such a short amount of time? Could I really trust him?

"It was the necklace," he bursted out, as if he was responding to my unspoken questions.

"Huh?" I had no idea what he was talking about.

He pointed to my neck and blushed in embarrassment. "You're wearing the necklace that I gave Jade before I left town."

My hand shot up to feel the small, silver bird between my fingers. I had almost forgotten about the origin of this jewelry since it had been so long since Jade gave it to me. I did remember her saying it was from her ex, but at the time it probably didn't occur to either of us that we would see him ever again.

I realized I had been staring off into space, so I immediately began to unclasp the charm from my neck. "I'm so sorry, Kyle; let me give it back to you." I bunched the chains into my palm to hand over to him.

He held up his hand in protest. "No need, Nina. If Jade gave it to you, she definitely did it on purpose."

What did that mean?

He grabbed the delicate item from my hand and held it up for us both to see. "Do you know what bird this is, Nina?"

I shook my head, it was such a simplistic design; I never thought it was anything specific, and Jade was so casual about giving it to me; wasn't it just a piece of metal?

"It's a falcon," he explained while walking around me and placing the charm back around my neck. He carefully brushed my hair to the side as he connected the ends once more.

"The falcon represents so many things, but at its core—it's protection," he smiled grimly as he walked away from me with his hands stuffed in his jeans. "I was leaving her, but it was my parting gift for Jade. She knew I was going, but she promised me that she would always keep it with her when I told her the meaning behind it, just as I have explained to you now."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Jade was perceptive—and Kyle was right. It was no accident that she gave this to me right before my first party when I was obviously so skittish. Kyle was looking right at the pinwheel as he continued.

"The falcon is everything; power, wisdom, gracefulness, and—" he paused to look me right in the eyes with an unnerving force. "The power to rise above."

A small gasp left my body as I thought about the weight of this small figure that I had worn everyday. I always did think that it was bizarre that Jade gave me such a beautiful item from her ex, but she knew. Jade knew exactly what she was doing. Even from the very beginning, she was aware that something was wrong with me, and she gave me her personal layer of protection. It must have meant a lot more to her than she was letting on, given that she promised Kyle she would keep it.

"As soon as I saw you wearing it tonight, I knew I had fucked up," he sighed. "And I knew that you were important to Jade."

This was so much information all at once. However, I realized that if Kyle came out here, the door must have been unlocked at some point, so I headed for the entrance. It's not like I wanted to ignore Kyle, but I hadn't forgotten that my brother was here right now.

"Nina, wait," he reached out to softly grab my arm. "Thank you."

I gave him a bright smile which he immediately returned. "I know you're the reason Nyle organized all this. As bad as tonight might have looked, it was progress. Truly—thank you for not giving up on our family, Nina."

I felt my eyes prickle at his sentiment, but I remained strong.

"Kyle, you and your brother are deserving of so much more love than you think." 

***** 

A/N please read! 

I can't tell you how excited I was to bring up the necklace, you guys! I had this in my outline and planned to return it to the plot since beginning this book 3 years ago! 

Bird Spirituality is actually a really cool thing, and I sifted through a lot of resources to find one that I thought would match this moment. The falcon has everything that I wanted for Nina and I just thought it was such a neat thing!! I'm literally referencing chapter 8 in chapter 40! 

Also Kyle????? He reminds me of Zuko in some ways from Avatar. My dream is to write another book about him, with what happened with him and Jade when Sarah died, and how he met bruce and his future etc etc. I just don't want to derail the main story because there's so much to be said there! Ugh, really wish I had a book for Kyle tho. 

Y'all. I was so excited to write this chapter. Thank you so much for reading! 

Also my heartttttt. I have so much stuff in the works for this story you guys! 

Fun Fact: did you know that my outline originally put Normal at 45 chapters?? (the cabin was ONE chapter in my original, high school, outline). Now being in college, I really want to flesh out the rest, and the first 25 chapters desperately need rewriting lol. But wow, I'm so excited for this! I think we're about 2/3 done?? maybe??? who knows... I will say this: I've written the epilogue already. It's been written for a long time. I know exactly how this book is going to end, and I'm not changing any of it! :) to be continued.....