WARNING: The first 250 words of this chapter contains an explicit make out scene. If such scenes make you uncomfortable, please scroll more until the italicised text is over.
Chapter 17
Bereavement
.:Jay:.
Jay moaned as he placed Nya on the edge of her desk, pushing off the books blindly as his entire attention was on the girl in front of him. She devoured his mouth brazenly, pushing her tongue desperately into his mouth as her fingers flew to his coppery hair and fastened themselves deep within the strands. Jay groaned deeply as he returned her kisses just as fiercely. His ears could hear the moan Nya released when he pushed her tongue out of his mouth before taking her mouth possessively in a passionate and promising kiss that had them panting and pressing against each other.
It didn't take Jay's hands long to undo the buttons on Nya's grey blouse then to open the clothing item to the side just so his hands could feel the small waist he had felt when he danced with her. Jay swallowed visibly as he felt her bare, warm, waist under his palms and fingers that trembled with his need.
As they continued to kiss frantically, their hands divested the other of their clothing before roaming the other's body – grasping and caressing as though they would never get enough.
Jay's hand eventually gently entangled in Nya's chestnut hair. He softly pulled her head back as he started to spread desperate kisses across her face, down her throat-
"Jay, come on, wake up."
Normally, it would take quite a bit to wake Jay up whenever he was having a dream – but, he was actually so relieved he woke up instantly when Nya woke him up. Why? Well, when he opened his eyes and came around to the world of the consciousness, Jay was on his back with his pillow in his arms and his lips firmly against a wet patch on his pillow.
"Ah!" Jay shrieked, throwing his pillow across the room before wildly turning his head to the right to see Nya -already dressed up as her brother- snickering. His face flared red upon the sight of her. "How long was I doing that for?"
"A good minute," she chuckled. "If it makes you feel better, I caught you making out with your pillow a couple times before."
"What?!" He squawked, sitting up.
"Yep, and you got a situation going on as well," Nya commented as she twirled a single finger towards the middle of his bed. When Jay looked down, he swore he could see his own face radiated bright red.
"Ahhh!" He exclaimed before quickly scrambling out of bed and straight into the bathroom.
Despite the echoing sound of the door slamming shut echoed in their small bathroom, Jay could still hear Nya laughing. As much as he had tried so hard to get her to laugh -like genuinely laughing!- he did not want her to laugh over something like this!
Jay felt embarrassed. Humiliated. He didn't need to look in a mirror or even a blurry reflection to know that his face was currently as red as a beetroot and radiate heat like a hot pan – so hot that he could have cooked a three-course meal on his face. There had never been a moment that he wanted the earth to open up and swallow him whole as bad as now.
Why?! Because Nya freaking saw his erection! An erection caused by having a dream of making out with her!
Think gross thoughts! Think gross thoughts! Yes! Remember the time when I walked in on Mum and Dad having- UGH! NOT THAT GROSS!
Jay groaned, hitting his forehead against the wall and slumping against it. He looked down to his pants and was relieved to see he was no longer excited after his dream…
Yet… He couldn't stop thinking about that dream.
Maybe his crush on Nya from right after the ball was coming back at him with full force. Maybe that was why he dreamt that dream of her… Or maybe it was his teenage hormones torturing him because he actually had a girl sleeping in the same room as him.
"Jay, come on! We got twenty minutes until we have to be in the courtyard and we still haven't had breakfast yet."
"… The courtyard for what?"
"The next round. Duh."
"Oh-!"
Profanity.
.:Nya:.
Nya couldn't help but let her amber eyes watch as the grass flattened in waves with each gust of wind, only to spring up as fresh as a bunch of flowers right after. It was nothing like the uniform green of the meadow back home that almost looked combed… yet Nya couldn't help but feel longing to be back home, back in Ignacia. Back with her parents. Back with Kai. Back when her life was happy.
"As you all have guessed; this next challenge is riddles – so thinking outside of the box rather than trying to fill it with facts. For every table, there is a Borg Tablet, supplied by our very own professor Borg. When the challenge begins, a question will come up on the scene and the team will have one minute each to figure out what each riddle means before the next question will come up."
"Hold up, a minute?" Brad whisper immediately drew the attention of their team.
Nya looked over to the dark-haired boy and truth be told, he looked pretty worse for wear. Not only was his body posture was screaming at them that he was still sore from yesterday's challenge but the circles under his eyes were nearly as dark as his hair. His hair was a mess and his shirt was actually inside out. She knew better than to ask. She had saw Lloyd give a small nod to Jay during breakfast but didn't mention anything of it to Brad… Perhaps she could ask Jay later.
"Yeah… Didn't it used to be three minutes? Your uncle asks the hardest riddles ever!" Jay exclaimed in a whisper towards Lloyd's direction, to which the blond just shrugged.
"Like I have mentioned many times before, I don't get told anything! Maybe the riddles are easier this year?"
"Maybe…" Jay sighed.
"Don't worry about it," Nya softly said, drawing their attention, while also trying not to draw attention from the teachers. "We'll make do."
"Hopefully," Brad muttered before tiredly rubbing his hands over his face.
"Hey, if you need to sit out, you can," Lloyd gently murmured, resting a hand on the boy's shoulder but Brad shook his head.
"I'll be fine. I promise…"
"Brad, it's-"
"I said I'm fine," Brad hissed, quickly pushing Lloyd's hand off his shoulder.
Nya quickly looked over to Jay, but the boy was just staring at the other two, with a hint of sadness on his face.
Yeah… she definitely had to ask Jay what was going on after this.
However, once she heard Master Wu start counting down from ten, the girl sat up straighter and positioned herself to get a better view of the tablet. That was when the other three boys also huddled around.
"Three… Two… One… Go!"
Immediately, the dark screen of the tablet lit up to a soft blue colour with the riddle question in black text.
'Name an eight-letter word that has 'kst' in the middle, in the beginning, and at the end.'
"Oh," Nya immediately said. "That's easy."
"Easy? You call that easy?!" Jay groaned.
"It is! It's just a trick question. It's Inkstand because 'kst' is in the middle, 'in' is the beginning, and 'and' ends the word."
"Oh… So the riddles are easier this year," Lloyd sheepishly said. "Great, so we just wait for the next one."
.::.
"At least Cole, Zane, Griffin and Gene didn't come first…"
"Yeah, but they still ranked higher than us."
"We'll just have to get our act together and beat them for the next few rounds."
"Hopefully…"
The four of them headed were currently walking to Lloyd's room to try and organise new strategies. Lloyd and Jay walked ahead, discussing about their loss to Cole's team once again. Nya and Brad hanged back a little, which allowed the girl to observe the gloomy boy once again.
Brad walked with a slight drag to his feet, leaving long shuffled sounds against the wooden flooring of the hallways of the academy. His hands were stuffed in his pockets, shoulders shagged with invisible weight and his head casted down low where his dark bangs covered his face.
The more Nya observe him, the more she saw herself in him… after her parents had died… after Kai had died. Then it occurred to her that maybe this morning, Brad had received word that someone close to him have passed?
"Brad, Lloyd, you wanna head in first? Just need to talk to Kai really quick," Jay said, drawing Nya's attention from the gloomy boy next to her and to Jay, who was standing in front of Lloyd's dorm.
"Yeah, sure," the blond simply replied with a shrug of his shoulders as he entered, beckoning Brad to follow him.
"… What do you want to talk about? And just letting you know, talking out here in the hallway isn't that private," Nya muttered, as she looked down the hallway to see other students entering their dorms.
"It's about Brad… I thought that maybe you would want to know what he's going through at the moment," Jay ended up sighing, pinching the bridge of his noise. "Remember how I told you that Lloyd knew Brad beforehand and pretty much begged me to let him be our newbie last year?"
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, he and Brad had been… I guess distant childhood friends. Like they would see each other from time to time because of their mothers. But the reason Lloyd really wanted him in our team last year was because Brad really needed the scholarship. His mother got diagnosed with cancer so having the scholarship from winning the tournament can really help Brad out at home."
"… And this morning he heard news his mother lost the battle?" Nya asked quietly, to which Jay nodded.
It made sense… Nya could remember times when Brad would always ask to leave training early to finish up on assignments that were due the next day… Probably because he would have been stressed from the news of his mother.
"Shouldn't he be going home then? To be with his family?"
"I guess but from what I heard, Brad isn't going to join them. I'll have to ask Lloyd. He'll know more about it."
"So Brad is going to continue on with this tournament? Despite all of this going on?"
"Lloyd did try telling him he could sit out… but we both saw he didn't want to do that. Maybe he just wanted to stay to try to distract his mind from it all?"
"Most likely…" Nya murmured.
"Well, that's what's going on at the moment. Thought you would like to know."
"Yeah… thanks."
.:Brad:.
No matter how hard he had tried to, Brad couldn't get out the soft voice in his head that would comfort him or offer words of encouragement. He couldn't get out the twinkling gaze of the hazel eyes that would brightly stare at him while the body that they had belonged to deteriorated away. He just couldn't get her out of his head.
The thought about never hearing this voice again or seeing those eyes full of life made Brad's stomach churn with nausea… to the point he barely uttered a hoarse 'excuse me' to his team at the dinner table and just walked out of the cafeteria. He just had to get away from all of the excited chatter of students, of students who probably never experienced what he was experiencing. Who have never experienced the emptiness in their hearts, the numbness taking over their body, and the shear nothingness that would take a hold of their souls.
Eventually, Brad's feet led him to the courtyard in front of the academy. He numbly dragged his feet over to one of the benches and sat on the cool wood. Then, he propped his legs up to his chest, arms holding them close, and looking up to the night sky above.
"You see all those stars up there?"
"Of course, Mum. I'm not blind."
"I know. But, for every star that's up there, is a life that has passed. A loved one that'll always watch down on you."
"Mum… You are aware that stars are just balls of gas and all those lights that we see could be stars that have already exploded billions of billions of miles away?"
"Look at my young man, all smart and intelligent."
"Muuummmmm…"
"Well, you can think they're balls of gas but I still like to think they are loved ones looking down at us."
Brad used to think that those words from his mother were stupid… but he had never wanted them to be so true until now. He just wanted a way to just be able to stay in touch with her… Just… Just anything.
"… Brad?"
The boy immediately jumped at least a metre in the air before frantically looking around to see who had snuck up on him… to be surprised to see Kai, of all people, standing there. Not Lloyd. Not Jay. Kai.
"Kai? What do you want?"
"Mind if I sit?"
"Uh… Go ahead," Brad mumbled, regaining his composure and wiggling down on the bench to allow more room for Kai to sit.
The silence that followed immediately made Brad feel uncomfortable. It made his blood as cold as the autumnal air that brushed passed them. His eyes would constantly flicker from the night sky then to Kai's face, where the boy would only look straight ahead at the glassy plains, blanketed in the dark of the night.
Was he going to say anything?
Was he waiting for Brad to say something?
Did he just come out here to see the view?
Brad sighed as he stood up without a single word uttered from his lips. He came out here to be alone. Not to be accompanied by a silent somebody. If that was the case, he would have gone back to his dorm to his roommate who normally wouldn't say a single word to him.
"Brad, sit back down," Kai calmly requested.
The dark-haired boy looked down to the hothead and saw that his amber eyes were piercing into his own hazel ones. There was a certain firmness in those eyes… Maybe it was also because of the way that Kai's brows had furrowed but he still didn't emit any hostility or anger… So it made Brad sit down.
"… What do you want?" He asked quietly, his head casted low.
"Just to talk."
"Why?"
"… Because I've lost both of my parents as well."
That immediately made Brad look up to Kai.
He barely knew anything about Kai. All he knew was that Kai was hot-headed, but he was also smart and great when it came to samurai swordsmanship. He used to work in his parents' blacksmith store. He was the lucky guy who got to date Skylor.
… But both of his parents were dead as well?
Brad took back what he said earlier… about students never experiencing what he was experiencing, about them feeling emptiness, numbness and nothingness. It was quite obvious that Kai did with the loss of both parents… Was that why he was quite irritable? Why he was distant? Why he kept quiet about his past?
"You lost both…" Brad murmured.
"Yeah," Kai muttered, a slight hesitation to his voice.
"Can I ask how?" Brad asked.
"… Car accident," Kai murmured, his eyes moving to stare at his hands.
"I'm sorry to hear…"
"Sorry doesn't change anything. Like me saying sorry about your mother isn't going to bring her back or make you feel better, right?"
"Y-Yeah," Brad said with a frown, realising the cynical truth to Kai's words.
"But… someone have told me some things which I think it needed to be heard by you," the brunet sighed. "My br- sister, she told me after our parents' death that they wouldn't be wanting us to still remain solemn and in grief over their deaths. Instead, they would want us to try to move on and be happy, live our lives to the fullest."
"Easier said than done," The younger boy muttered.
"I know. Even I'm struggling to come to terms with the deaths of my loved ones but… I still try."
"But… Isn't that basically trying to forget them?"
"No," Kai answered curtly. "Never ever forget your mother, Brad. Forgetting her will cause you to forget a part of yourself. But at the same time, when you do remember her, don't remember her by how you last saw her. Jay told me she had cancer… So don't remember her through that, but instead, remember her for all the good memories you have made. It's not easy… I can still vividly remember my parents' bodies in the caskets, but we can't let one image define them forever. They had good lives, good memories with us, like we had with them."
Brad watched carefully as Kai's face morph into one of utter devastation, with a dark haunt lingering behind those amber eyes. It made Brad question whether or not if there was more to Kai's past. Could it be someone else who was close to Kai also passed away?
But suddenly, Kai's face quickly faded of emotions. A hard look came over his face before quickly getting up.
"Look, I'll let you go back to your own thoughts. When you're in grief, you need some time alone. Just remember what I said tonight, okay?"
"Y-Yeah…"
"And… if you need the day off tomorrow from the challenge, Lloyd, Jay and I will understand."
And without another word, Kai walked off.
Okay, really short chapter compared to all the other chapters but I promise that next chapter is going to be long! Like 5000 words plus long. I've gotten it written already but I still need to make major adjustments for it and edit it. But also, thank you everyone for your support. I'm honestly all okay – I was the one to end things even though I didn't want to. I was super upset and hesitant but he turned around and suddenly accused me of stuff so, yeah, not upset. Just mad now hahaha. ANYWAY WHO CARES ABOUT MY PROBLEMS?!
But massive thanks to: HHQFandoms, Endeavor16, RandomDragon2.0, JSNI, Jaell, Nightlybirdie, A Huge Fangirl, unknown, Natalie Singe, EchoIsACutie and all my silent readers!
Sorry for not replying to reviews but I got work in an hour so I just want to update this before I have to get ready. But, will our favourite team be able to FINALLY defeat their rivalry in the next round? Will Brad still be able to compete with this new burden on his shoulders? All will be revealed next week with a new chapter!
Until next time! Xoxo – ZaneLoverFan88