Chapter 9

Vulnerability

3 Weeks Later, Kentucky

Tyler

It had been a little over three weeks since she had arrived, and I was still surprised to see Aqua there when I took over the watch from her at around three in the morning every day. It was strange to have somebody be around all the time, and to still not be used to it. I couldn't understand it. Gabby and Tanya both treated her like she had always been there, but for some reason I couldn't do that, and I had absolutely no idea why.

It wasn't like how when Gabby was a baby and would wake me up with her screaming in the middle of the night and I'd be a bit surprised because I wasn't used to somebody waking me up then. It was like I didn't expect her to still be there day after day, like I thought she would just leave in the dark when we all were asleep and wouldn't be there when I went to take over the watch and that kind of freaked me out a bit. The thing that freaked me out more was that I realized that I cared.

If she walked out in the middle of the night, abandoned us, I would care. I realized that a little more than a week after she got there. I didn't want to care, though. Caring just brought more pain and more suffering. Things get complicated when I care. Between my parents and Mia and Connor, I had cared about plenty that had ended with heartbreak, and I didn't want another person to add to the list, or even to have the ability to make the list like Tanya and Gabby could if something ever happened to one of them.

Why did I have to care when it was only going to hurt me in the end?

Aqua

Tyler was avoiding me. Well, it wasn't exactly avoiding, seeing as we had never interacted all that much in the first place, but for the last week, he had most definitely been trying to spend as little time with me as possible. I had no idea why. Had I done something to offend him?

I didn't think I had. There weren't really all that many manners that applied when you were in the middle of the wilderness anyway. Plus, if I had offended him I probably would have offended Tanya just as much, although Gabby would most likely have remained completely oblivious no matter what I had done.

Either way, Tyler was avoiding me and I didn't know why and it was getting on my nerves a little bit. I wanted to know why, and I wasn't exactly one to wait around and let a problem solve itself. I needed to nip it in the bud, and that meant that I would have to figure out some time to talk to him about it. My first thought was that I could just corner him sometime, but I had a feeling that that wouldn't really work all that well, especially if I wanted the conversation to remain private. Then the obvious thought struck me. He had the watch after I did. Since he had to be up, I could just stay for a few minutes before I went to bed and ask him. I quickly made my decision, but thought that it might be a good idea to wait a few days instead. I'd give him another week to talk to me first, but after that week was done, if he hadn't spoken to me, I was going to confront him. After all, confrontation was something that I was good at.

1 Week Later

Aqua

He was still avoiding me, and I wasn't about to let it rest any longer. I was getting antsy not knowing it. Secrets and mysteries had never been my strong suit. I tended to try to avoid them because I just got aggravated when I didn't know what they were, which merely meant that I usually found out what they were and had a lot of them hanging on my shoulders. Let me just say that when you're a sophomore in high school, that means that you know most of the juicy gossip, which was both a good and bad thing.

I let out a sigh when I heard his footsteps coming through the grasses behind me. He always made noise when he walked, no matter where it was. I didn't understand how it was possible, but somehow he managed it. Tyler. I didn't think I actually knew much about him at all, except for that. Yes, I knew his name, and that he cared deeply for his siblings, but could I really come up with anything other than that? No. I didn't even know something menial and boring like his favorite food or color.

He sat down a few feet away from me and said quietly, "You can go to sleep now," the same way that he did after he took over every watch.

I bit my lip. Now was my moment, I just had to take it. "I think I'll stay up a bit longer, if you don't mind. I'm not really all that tired," I replied. This wasn't a lie. I was certain that if I went to bed at that moment that I would never fall asleep, what with my mind racing as it was. I wanted to ask him my question, and damn it I was going to ask him my question.

"That's alright," he answered. We sat in silence and I could taste the tension. He didn't particularly want me there. I could tell.

I chose to be blunt. "Why have you been avoiding me?" I asked him.

He turned to look at me for the first time since I had heard his footsteps, his brows crinkled together. "Avoiding you?" he asked uncertainly.

"Yes," I said firmly.

"How have I been avoiding you? We live in the same place. We're always here, all the time, except for when I took Tanya on the raid," he said slowly.

"Yes, but you don't speak to me unless its absolutely necessary," I insisted. He still looked confused. I sighed and resisted the temptation to roll my eyes. He was being kind of stupid. "I mean, like how every time that you take over the watch you say 'You can go to sleep now'," I said, crossing my arms.

"Oh," he mumbled. I waited. He didn't say anything.

"So why do you do that?" I questioned once more, more quietly. "Why don't you want to talk to me?" I didn't even know where the second half of that had come from, and I was somewhat embarrassed that it had even come out. I was sure that he thought that I sounded like a whiney three-year-old who wanted her mother's constant attention.

He was quiet for a minute and I was standing up, convinced that he wasn't going to answer, when his hand shot out and gripped my wrist. His touch sent electricity running through me and I stared down at him, meeting his eyes.

"Because if I talk to you, I'm going to start to care more than I already do. And if I care more, that only increases the chances that I'm going to get hurt. And I've already had enough of that for one lifetime."

His voice was so serious and certain that I could tell he had been thinking about it a lot. For some reason, that made me happier, despite what he had said. God, this was confusing. "Just… try it," I suggested. "It might surprise you."

I stood the rest of the way and his grip on my wrist went slack as his hand dropped onto his knee. I walked slowly back to the abandoned farmhouse where the girls were asleep, having no idea what had just passed between their brother and me. I sat down on my sleeping bag and looked at Tyler's back for a minute. Then I shook my head and climbed into the bag. I could almost feel his strong hand still wrapped around my wrist.

Tyler

My head made a quiet thump as it fell against the wall behind me and I winced from the pain that the contact created. Why had I said that to her? Why? She didn't need to know that. She had no business to know what I was thinking. It had just sort of… slipped out.

"Damn," I whispered.

The worst thing was that she had attempted to talk me out of it, albeit briefly, she had still said something against what I was doing, and it was just going to test me even more now that I knew that she actually had noticed that I was avoiding her and that she wanted me to stop. Now I was going to start feeling guilty about it if I continued, but I would just worry if I stopped because I would start to care and… These thoughts were getting me absolutely nowhere. I sighed quietly, rubbing my temples and closing my eyes for a second.

Dark wavy hair swinging to the side to reveal a line on her neck, dark eyes with silver behind them, the scar easily visible at the edge of her hairline, a ring of silver surrounding her pupils, that little pink line and that little silver ring… closer and closer.

Then it changed. I was backing away now. And her eyes weren't dark anymore, but bright blue, her hair was longer, she was taller, her face changed, her smile more vibrant because of its rarity. Still the silver ring and the thin pink line were there, growing more obvious with every second that I watched, my mouth dropping open in horror, my eyes bulging. She walked towards me, her grin turning malicious, her eyebrows knitting together, her hand came out, beckoning me forward.

"It's just me, just Aqua. Come on, Tyler. Don't you trust me? I'm not going to hurt you," she said, her voice a mere whisper.

I backed away. "No. No. No…"

My eyes flew open and I gulped in air, trying to pull myself out of the dream, but the images wouldn't leave my head. All I could see were those silver rings around her blue eyes. I didn't want to see that happen. That was enough without the rest, without her trying to make me one of them too. It was too late to try not to care. It was too late. I already cared far too much. And I knew—deep down—that there was absolutely nothing that I could do to change it.

But that didn't mean that I sure as hell wasn't going to try. I would get that girl out of my mind and out of my heart if they were the last things I ever did. She wasn't going to be the one to break me. Her capture, her beckoning; those would not be the things that ruined me, that made me something that I wasn't. I wasn't about to let that happen.

The problem was that I couldn't abandon her either. I couldn't just walk off in the middle of the night with the girls. That would be cruel, and they would never understand it, anyway. They wouldn't want to leave her. And, although I hated to admit it, neither would I. I already cared. And she was already a vulnerability.

Yay, another on time update! You should all be celebrating. I even have the next chapter most of the way written, just so you know. Anyway, how did you like the chapter? It's a bit more filler and kind of too similar to the last one in my opinion, but it gives a little more insight into how Tyler is feeling about it, and his creepy dream. Tyler's dreams are fun to write.

Please read and review! Chapter will be up next Saturday, as usual.

Ian lover: Yeah, them meeting up was kind of predictable, wasn't it? And yes, he is quite the mystery for her. She needs to crack him. (Did that sound wrong?) I hope you liked this chapter!