Chapter eight- Daphne

Daphne hadn't bothered to go back to sleep after Kathryn had left for work. Bay however had dragged herself to her bedroom to get a few more hours of sleep before they had to meet up with John to get a tour of his new "office".

John had recently been hired on to be the head coach of an independent semi-pro baseball team, The Kansas City T-bones.

When he had told everyone about the new job a few months ago all the kids had expressed excitement for John. However Toby and Bay changed their attitudes on his job when they got the news about their parent's separation.

Bay was now sighting the fact the team was located in Kansas City, Kansas and not in Kansas City, Missouri, as indisputable evidence that her father was planning on moving out of the state and out of their lives forever. The fact that the two Kansas Cities were actually only a few miles apart didn't seem to dissuade Bay from this notion.

Toby now referred to John's new job as, "yet another step in his mid-life crisis career" and had told his dad plainly he wasn't in the least interested in seeing the stadium.

Daphne for her part was trying to appear as neutral about it as possible so as to not make her siblings upset with her. She did however secretly think it was a positive thing for John. It seemed to her that he was finally working towards something he cared about. John told them he hoped this new job would be a first step in getting a position as a major league baseball coach. Daphne was crossing her fingers that happened for him. She did however know better than to express any of these opinions to Bay and Toby, as they would shut her down and tell her she didn't understand or maybe didn't even care about the separation because she hadn't grown up with J & K as her parents.

That was always hurtful but she had to acknowledge they might have been partially right. While she absolutely didn't want John and Kathryn to divorce she didn't view it as being a life and death situation, like her siblings did. Both parents would still be there for all of them.

Daphne was feeling bored and restless. She had been wandering around the house for several hours trying to find something to do as she waited for Bay or even Rex to get up so she had someone to talk to.

Daphne checked the time on her phone yet again. It was now 9:48 a.m., nearly 10 a.m. She wondered if she should just go wake up Bay. They were due to be at the stadium at noon.

As she was weighing the pros and mostly cons of waking a sleeping Bay a new email popped into her account.

Daphne felt butterflies in her stomach, as she had been feeling the last few days anytime a new email came through.

There was a certain someone who had yet to reply back to her email about Daphne and Bay's return home.

She tapped on the new email hoping it would be the email she had been waiting for.

Her heart sank a bit when she saw the email was spam. Just spam.

She let out a disappointed sigh. She wondered if she should just text Mango, she could let him know she had landed safe. That seemed harmless.

With a stroke of bravery she thought, why not?! She was a modern woman she could text a guy she use to date and not have it mean anything.

She got as far as typing out the first two letters in her text when Rex came down from upstairs.

Daphne turned over her phone like she had been caught doing something wrong. "Good morning!" She offered up way perkier than she felt.

He yawned and wished her a good morning back.

"Do you want anything to eat or drink?" She asked.

"If you show me where the tea is, I can make it." Rex said.

"Oh, I don't know if we have tea." Daphne said, "We have coffee?" She suggested hoping that would work since if the Kennishs had tea she had no idea where they kept it. She actually couldn't recall seeing them ever drink tea now that she thought about it.

Rex made a face that told her that coffee would not work. "I'll just have some water, thanks."

Daphne got him a cup and poured some filtered water. "We can stop and get you some tea at the store today."

"Cool." Rex signed, "Thanks."

It was nice of him to learn to sign even if they barely saw each other. She barely saw Bay either for that matter, what with both their jobs and Bay practically living with Rex.

"So is there anything you are looking forward to doing while you are here?" Daphne asked.

She felt her phone buzz. She looked down at it. Since her phone was still turned over she couldn't see what the buzz actually meant.

She turned back to Rex.

"You're not going to see what that was?"

Daphne shrugged.

It buzzed again.

"Do you want me to?" Rex asked.

"No, why would I have you check?"

"It seems like you might be afraid to look, for some reason."

Daphne let out a sigh and turned her phone over. It was probably junk mail again.

She glanced at her screen and her heart jumped into her throat.

It was two new texts from Mango!

"What does "La" mean?" Read the first one. "Is everything okay?" The second said.

Confused, Daphne read the text above the two Mango had just sent her.

Oh no, she had accidently sent the beginning of the text she really hadn't planned to send at all.

"Yes sorry, I just wanted to let you know I landed okay." She typed and sent off quickly. Her heart was racing. She felt silly and very un-modern to be so concerned about texting Mango.

"Everything okay?" Rex asked.

"I texted my ex L-A."

"You American girls sure have strange ways of wooing."

Bay came down the stairs holding her cell phone to her ear. "Yep, she's alive. I'm looking at her right now." Bay signed that it was Mango on the phone.

Daphne put her face in her hands.

"Oh, you just got a text from her… Great… Well thanks for checking in… I'll have her call you later… Okay, bye." Bay hung up the phone.

"Sorry about that." Daphne said.

"Why did you text Mango La?"

"She was trying to woo him." Rex explained.

"Well he was ready to go full Liam Neeson to find you, so it might of actually worked."

"I doubt that. He never even emailed back about us coming home to visit."

"You mean that group email you sent to everyone we have ever met, after not talking to him in months? Hmm, I wonder why?" Bay asked rhetorically.

Daphne sighed, "He's the one who stopped talking to me." She felt a little juvenile for making that excuse but it was the truth.

"Well maybe call him now and see if he wants to talk." Bay suggested.

Daphne nodded, grabbed her phone, and headed to her room in the guesthouse.

She spent a few minutes in front of the mirror before face timing Mango.

He picked up after two rings.

"Hi." Daphne waved.

"Hey." Mango said.

Daphne noticed his hair was cut short now. "Wow, your hair."

"Hmm, oh yeah. Does it look terrible?"

"No, of course not."

"I lost a bet and had to shave my head so you are actually seeing it in a much better state than it was in two months ago."

"What was the bet?" Daphne asked.

"Nothing interesting." Mango said moving on swiftly, "So I'm glad you're not dead."

"Yeah, sorry about that. But did you really think L.A. meant I was in a ditch somewhere?"

"Well, it's really hard to guess since I haven't heard from you since Christmas. You know, after your boyfriend snapchatted me that photo."

Mango meant the snapchat photo of Daphne sleeping next to Jace in bed, wearing next to nothing. The text had read, "Together again, and better than ever." Jace had sent that to Mango using Daphne's phone and snapchat account. So it had looked like it had come from Daphne.

Daphne winced at the memory of the strange turn of events that put her back together with Jace while she had been in England.

Mango and Daphne had fought terribly about it. Mango hadn't believed that the photo wasn't from her. She was beyond furious that Mango would think her capable of such a cruel act.

She had been infuriated with Jace for so violating her.

Jace, maybe feeling regretful over what he had done, ended up contacting Mango of his own volition to confess that he was in fact the one behind the photo.

Mango had sent a begrudging email to let Daphne know he was sorry he hadn't believed her. She had emailed him back, texted him a couple times, even tried to call once but nothing. She hadn't heard from him since.

"He's not my boyfriend." Daphne said slightly annoyed to be telling Mango that yet again.

"Okay, your hookup then. Whatever he is, he clearly wanted to lay claim to you."

"Mango…"

"Look you're allowed to date other people. We aren't together anymore. So it's fine." He still didn't seem fine with it.

"I'm still really sorry he did that. I would have been really hurt if I had gotten a message like that from a girl you had been with."

Mango nodded. "So welcome home." He said changing the subject.

"Thanks." Daphne felt relief that Mango wanted to talk about something else. Maybe he was ready to move past the incident.

"What brings you back?" He asked.

"John and Kathryn separated."

"What? Really?"

"Yeah… John moved out, Kathryn doesn't seem to ever be home and they are talking about divorce." Laying everything out like that Daphne could see why her sibling's were worried.

"Hey, I'm really sorry."

"Thanks." Daphne said surprised to find her eyes stung with the threat of tears. "So, I'll be in town for a while it looks like. Bay, Toby and I are going to try and talk them out of it."

"I'm sure you will."

Daphne nodded at his kindness "I was hoping… that maybe… we might, be able to see each other while I'm here?"

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"I mean just as friends. I miss talking to you."

"I know what you meant." Mango said simply.

"Oh."

"Look, I still have feelings for you and seeing you again is going to really confuse those and I just really want to move on since it's clear you and I aren't going to be a thing anymore."

"Okay. I understand." But she really didn't. Why couldn't they be a thing again?

"I do wish you the best, with everything."

"I wish you the best too." Daphne felt her eyes stinging again.

"Thanks…"

They looked at each other on the screen for a moment.

"Okay… well, I have to get to class. So bye." Mango said.

"Bye."

Mango ended the call.

Daphne looked at her phone's black screen and started to cry. She buried her face into her pillow and let her mind whirl with all the choices she had made over the last 10 months.