The Girl of the Wild Ch. 20

Difficult Relations

I opened my eyes slowly and sat up from my bed and sighed. It was another sleepless night. The dreams had been going on for weeks now and I could barely focus on my studies. Sir Justin began to notice and every day he would ask me if I was okay and every day I would tell him the same thing. I was fine. I just wasn't sleeping well. But the truth was that I wasn't fine. The nightmares were getting worse, each one different, and each one harder to wake up from. I had no one to confide in. Nightwing had been gone for weeks and whenever I asked someone why he was gone they would just shake their head at me. Nightwing was the only one who knew about my nightmares and I was too embarrassed to tell anyone else. They wouldn't understand. They would try to get me help, but I didn't want help. I wanted someone to understand.

The room was quiet, but all I could hear were the cries of my family in Zimbabwe. In this vision I had returned to find all of Zimbabwe destroyed. Everything was burned to the ground, leaving a scorch mark across Africa. I had heard the cries of my family, asking me why I hadn't been there to save them, but I had no reply. I tried to speak, but my voice was drowned out by the cries of my family's anguish as they burned. The bed creaked as I got up and walked toward the bathroom. All I wanted to do was stay in bed, but that wasn't possible, because if I stayed in bed that meant the nightmares had one. They hadn't won, because I was fine.

The striking white light of the bathroom turned on, and my eyes squinted at the mirror. I looked like a ghost of my old self. My once sun kissed skin was now a sickly pale and my golden hair had almost lost its glow. I looked different from the person I was when I first appeared at the Watch Tower. My blue-green eyes had lost their spark and were blood shot. The lack of sleep was changing me and I needed to get help soon… What was I saying? I washed my face, changed my clothes and headed out. I didn't need help.

I shuffled down the hallway to my lesson with Sir Justin when Cassie ran up to me. "Nightwing's back," she said. "He'd like to see…" The girl of wonder stopped when she saw the state I was in. "What happened to you?" She asked but I ignored her and asked her where Nightwing was. When she said he was in the training room I ran off, ignoring her calls for me. Now that Nightwing was back, maybe things could be better. A smile appeared on my face as I ran down that hallway towards him. But once I saw him, that smile would disappear.

He looked different. His back was toward me, but his shoulders were rigid and tense, making the muscles underneath his thin shirt even more pronounced. I stopped in my tracks behind him but somehow Nightwing heard me and turned around. His face was forlorn and my heart dropped when I saw the sad state he was in. But as quick as I saw his lost appearance, it had vanished, hidden behind the black mask that he wore. I stumbled for words to console him, to question him on where he had gone and why he seemed so lost, but he stopped me before I could. Nightwing threw a wooden bo staff at me and, with a bit of difficulty, I was able to catch it. Without a pause or explanation, Nightwing ran at me with another staff. I stumbled to bring my staff up in-front and block his shot and when he charged again, I back-flipped to create distance between us. "Nightwing…" I gasped but couldn't say anymore before I had to duck. I lifted my staff in front of my face and a large 'crack!' came from our sticks as they connected.

I grunted and pushed the dark haired man a few feet away from me. "What are you doing?" I shouted. Nightwing ran at me again with his bo staff out and we battled for a few more seconds, but I was struggling to keep up. When we had spared before it hadn't been that easy to keep up with him, but with the unhealthy state I was in, it was even harder. Nightwing twisted his wooden staff in his hand and knocked mine out from my grasp, sending it clattering to the floor. He stabbed the wooden stick at me and as I stumbled backward, he tripped me and I landed hard on the floor. There was no mat below me, so the hard fall knocked the breath out of me.

Nightwing stood above me and shouted for me to get up but I couldn't. The task was too arduous for my weakened state. My whole body ached and along with the burning feeling in my lungs, there was a pain in my heart that I couldn't understand. "Get up I said!" He shouted, with his face contorted in anger and frustration. "I can't!" I shouted back at him as I rolled over to my side and tried to catch my breath. Nightwing's anger slipped away for a moment to a blank stare before returning back to anger when I looked back at him.

"What is your problem?" I yelled once I was up and had my breath back. "You disappear for weeks without a single explanation. You didn't message me when you were gone. You didn't ask me if I was okay. I was beginning to think the worst. What if you were hurt? Or dead?" I shouted and flung my arms up in to the air. Not taking a pause for him to respond, I began shouting at the top of my voice, not caring if people could hear me out in the hallway. In a softer voice I said "And then you show up all of the sudden and I think 'wow, he's back. I hope he's okay. I'm sure he must have a good explanation, because he's my friend and nice like that.' But no!" I shouted then when my anger erupted again. "The second I walk in you attack me! You don't ask me if I'm okay. You don't give me an explanation as to why you were gone. You just attack me!" Then, in a softer voice, I said, "Well, you know what? I'm done. Do whatever you want to, I obviously don't matter." And with that said, I plodded out of the training room, slamming the big door behind me.

Music: "Between the Lines" - Sarah Bareilles

I stopped suddenly outside the door and looked around. People were stopped in the hallway looking at me with wide eyes and tight lips. My chest heaved up and down to catch my breath from the fight between Nightwing and me. When I saw the on lookers, they began what they were doing before and sound picked up again in the hallway. I tried to keep my head up high and ignore the stares of the members of the Justice League as I made my way to my room. I couldn't believe the way Nightwing had treated me. I thought we were friends. He hadn't even noticed the tired state I was in, or the redness in my eyes, or my jumpiness at the slightest sound. I had noticed his unsettlement, why hadn't he noticed mine?

Once inside my room I closed the door and made it to my bed before sitting down. I stared blankly at the wall before pulling out my English textbook and notebook. I turned to page 394 of my textbook and opened up a fresh piece of paper in my notebook. I picked up my pencil and twiddled it in my fingers before dropping it as tears dropped from my eyes. My head dipped down and my hands grasped the corners of my textbook as I cried silently in my dark room, alone.

Time had passed since then, but I hadn't fallen asleep. I was in the land between sleep and awake, afraid that if I slept I would dream. Dreams led to nightmares and nightmares led to… The blinking red light of my alarm showed that it was three in the morning and, knowing that I would not sleep tonight, I switched into some workout clothes and got ready to leave. As I switched open the door, there was a vase of orange flowers and a note attached to it. Looking around the hallway and seeing it empty, I bent down and picked up the vase before walking back into my room. Placing the vase on my desk, I picked up the note and it read: This is the Gazania flower, native to Southern Africa. Battling the harshness of summer, this beautiful flower, blooming in colors of orange and red, demonstrates the beauty of the African sun. This flower is much like you, growing up in Zimbabwe must have been hard, but you overcame that and turned into a beautiful flower. "

The flowers were beautiful and whoever left them was right in saying that they looked like the sun. The pedals were a deep red around the middle, slowly bleeding into a bright orange and then a light yellow into the tips of the pedals. I smiled and wondered who had left the sweet gift. They were something I needed to cheer me up. I turned to leave and as I opened the door once more to leave, I took a fleeting look back at the Gazanias.

I pulled my chin back up to the bar, held myself up for two seconds and then dropped back down to do it again. The time was unknown to me now but I had built up a sweat in my light blue long sleeve top, and gray yoga pants. My arms ached and my teeth hurt from gritting them as I pulled myself up once more. Suddenly I felt someone stand behind me and I stopped. A line of sweat slithered down my face and dropped onto the floor. I dropped to the floor and turned to see Nightwing in the door with a black expression. I turned my head from him and walked over to wipe the chalk off my hands and get a bottle of water. "I need to talk to you," he said as he made his way over. I looked down at the towel in my hands, trying my best not to turn and look at him, because I knew that if I did I wouldn't be able to stay mad at him.

"Well, I don't want to talk to you," I said as I slung the towel over my shoulder and began walking down the hallway. I wanted to leave Nightwing behind and go back to my room, but he didn't grant my wishes and still followed me. My anger flared and my strength broke in trying to avoid eye contact with him. My calloused hands formed into fists and I whipped around to glare at him. "Can't you understand?" I spat at him, but his stance remained neutral before he pulls his brows forward behind his dark sunglasses and pleaded with me. "Please, just let me explain." I loosened my footing, but my hands remained fisted as I looked down at my feet.

"Delmira," he paused and then spoke again with his voice low and pleading. "Please," his voice cracked as he begged me one last time to listen. My hands loosened and I slowly lifted my eyes to look at him.

"Okay," I said and a tiny smile reached his lips.

"Okay," he said as we made our way to the cafeteria.

Nightwing walked behind the counter as I sat down at our regular spot. No one was working, as it was still the middle of the night. "What could be his excuse? What could make up for what he had done to me?" I wondered. A cabinet was opened, dishes clinked in the back and something was poured. I looked up to see Nightwing push away the swaying counter door with two mugs of something topped with whipped cream and steaming in his hands. After placing the mugs on the table, Nightwing pulled out a chair and sat down. Nightwing grabbed a green mug with the Green Lantern symbol painted on the front. Assuming the Green Arrow mug was mine, I took a sip of my drink. The drink was warm and creamy, very much like the iced mocha I had before with Wally.

"You like it?" Nightwing smiled as I licked the whipped topping off of my lip. I nodded and drew another sip. "It's hot chocolate with two spoon-fulls of whipped cream and a pinch of cinnamon. Alfred use to make it all the time when I couldn't sleep."

"Who's Alfred?" I asked as I placed my mug on the table. Nightwing froze and shuffled in his chair. It seemed he'd let something slip. "You were going to tell me what you acted the way you acted." I reminded him and he looked up.

"Oh yeah," he said as he shuffled in his seat. "Right, well," Nightwing looked down at his lap and twiddled with his thumbs. I had never seen him more out of his comfort zone before. He looked up at me. "That last day when we had finished practice and M'Gann and Kaldur came in and talked to me while you were leaving, I had found out something that…" Nightwing stopped and looked back down at his lap. Swallowing, my friend paused and looked to the side. Blinking a couple of times, he swallowed again and formed his hands into fists. "They informed me of something that I had imagined happening so many times, but no matter how many times and scenarios I imagined it in, it couldn't prepare me for this."

Author's Note: So Delmira is having nightmares and doesn't know why they're caused or how to stop them. And Nightwing and Delmira had their first fight! How did you guys like the mini fight scene between the two? I hope no one is too mad at Nightwing for being mean. What happened that caused Nightwing to be so shaken up? Comment your thoughts and theories. You'll figure out what happened that night in the next update.

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