Hello, it is Wednesday, and I am back with a new chapter! This is a chapter pretty close to my heart, I would say. In this one, we get to see both Katie and Lucy dealing with and discussing the situation where Lucy splits up with Eli to rekindle a relationship with Justin instead. Like the title suggests and like nearly everyone knows, what ifs can be brutal thoughts to deal with. But as you can see here, in Katie, Lucy finds someone to not only comfort her but to wisely guide her to see better days ahead. I hope you enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own the story and the OCs mentioned :)
Laughter is truly the best medicine. I knew this well and yet was taught furthermore as Katie had a careful hand wrapped around my snout, to stifle my giggles, as we made our way from the rest of the house and towards the annex instead. If my paw was half as sizeable as her hand was, then I would have surely done the same to her, for she had a curving motion of her lips almost as much as I did!
However, this wasn't possible for me physically or otherwise. Soon enough, we walked in through the front door of the annex and a Vivillion decorated messenger bag was dropped down towards the floor.
As a woman with hair the color of a spring day looked up, Katie and I were encouraged to confess what was tickling us both so much on that particular day.
"I don't know what on earth kind of experiment David and Rupert are doing today but the whole kitchen is filled with smoke!" Katie exclaimed, her hand finally removing itself from my nose and even though we were further away from the smell than before, it engulfed my nostrils. My eyes watered from more than just glee. "Oh well, it makes them happy."
Now that they required something to do without acting like a muzzle for me and also fingering the tassel of the messenger bag that had once hung around her hip, Katie's fingers nonchalantly made their way to her own hips.
Meanwhile, we both watched Lucy properly sit up off the sofa to greet us and she did so with more than just her actions, the book that she was reading being momentarily discarded onto the coffee table.
"I don't think they'll be happy if the place goes up in flames." Lucy responded humorously even if her tone of voice was unable to match her quick response. From upon Katie's shoulder, I observed how they both got stuck into conversation, without speaking so much of even one hello. "I can't believe I hardly noticed it until you mentioned it now." Lucy was then sitting further up out of politeness as much as anything. "I confess that I have barely moved from this position today."
And to indicate that this was true though of course she didn't need to, the yellow haired woman seemed to no longer feel the need to offer politeness, resuming her prior position of lounging up against the arm of the sofa and her book seeking refuge against her stomach rather than the coffee table.
Katie's eyebrows wandered closer to her hairline as she noticed her friend's nostrils then crinkling in the same manner that ours had done when we had passed Rupert and David in the kitchen.
Knowing when to call it quits regarding a joke, however, Katie didn't mention their shenanigans all over again and she instead allowed her expression to become a cushion of her own for good, making the strides to join Lucy on the sofa.
"Are you in pain today?" she asked, my chest softening rather than my expression as I saw Katie briefly glance down to what she was wearing in order to take off her bag before she realized, she had already done that. "That sucks."
Her kind, simple offering of empathy escaping her before Lucy even had a chance to confirm whether her guess was correct or not. The sofa moved as Katie climbed on as well and Lucy was forced to scoot her legs a little closer to her body than before to give her friend extra room.
I watched from Katie's shoulder as the book napping against Lucy's stomach appeared to dip and she didn't answer for a couple of moments, her own touch lingering on her forehead before it found better things to do, roaming through her silky locks.
Eventually, she knew better than to hide anything from her good friend. I watched as the book bobbed on her stomach once more and her shoulders followed suit also.
"A little bit. But to tell you the truth, I want to just keep myself to myself for today." Lucy decorated her answer with a smile, but her eyes didn't light up like the morning dew etching on the grass like they often did when she truly beamed.
Yet as if Katie were portraying actions for the both of them, I could feel more than I could see from such a close angle the way that her being radiated at this notion from her close friend. Her body moved as she nodded understandingly. Gratefully, too.
She just wanted to keep herself to herself. But she still had accepted her offer of company. And apparently, Katie figured that she was okay with more than just my own company as, after she lifted me away from her shoulder and lightly touched her forehead against mine, I was handed over to Lucy, almost as if I were a child of theirs going from parent to parent.
Needless to say, I didn't mind in the slightest! And I was shown that Lucy felt the same. She had a tiny bit more lightness clutching her eyes then, but not much, as she accepted me in her hold and even let out the softest of cooing noises as she held me.
I made the most of some extra affection, not realizing then that it was probably her who needed it the most. And rather than studying this, Katie's attention averted otherwise as Lucy's phone from the coffee table lit up and vibrated.
Other people weren't quite so content to let Lucy keep herself to herself like she was, Katie thought to herself from the moment that the phone flashed. I could feel Lucy's body contorting against me from the second that she saw the notification but couldn't read it from that distance and I at least figured it wasn't the gentle strength of which she was clutching me.
Katie made moves when the notification disappeared into the ether – or rather, into the inbox instead of the lock screen as it went unanswered – and she leaned forward.
For a rare occasion, Katie didn't think about how she acted and what she would go on to say before she spoke her mind.
"I didn't know this was your lock screen again." She observed, knowing Lucy well enough to reach forward and take hold of the phone, getting a closer look at the silhouette she had worked out from a distance of about a meter. She had tried to stifle it, but I felt Lucy's throat bob as my blushing cheek nuzzled against there. "What a silly boy."
Though I was engulfed by my closeness with Lucy during those few moments, I did find an instinct within me that I couldn't ignore that lead me to glance over at Katie instead.
How funny that she chose to say these words above anything, instead commenting on the appearance of the photo at all which probably could have warranted a good number of things to say.
Taking half a glance myself but not knowing if I were welcome to intrude as much as Katie was, I knew that Eli would have surely died at the photo that Lucy had decided to take place there! It was not a side of him that he let known to many as the photo depicted him wearing his black hoodie but with his ears poking outside of the veil and his tongue escaping from his lips goofily to match.
Yes, Eli would have surely fell to his knees. In hindsight, I think that he probably would have felt this more because she still had his photo lingering there.
"Oh." Was what Lucy mustered first of all, and I could feel her breath vibrating against my cheek as I still didn't pull away from the closeness. Although the phone was fixed permanently in Katie's palm, she didn't let go of looking at her friend silently studiously either. "I was just clearing out old photos and I found that particular one." Her hand sought the comfort of her locks again. But they fell out again to offer a wave of the hand. "Silly, really."
I added some distance between the two of us but tried my best not to make it too obvious as, privately, I noticed that she was using the same word as Katie but describing her own actions rather than the charismatic man depicted on her phone screen.
Then, it was both Katie and I looking as Lucy's back slumped further against the arm of the sofa that we were all lounging against, and she moved her book from her stomach entirely, dropping it dismissive down towards the carpet and pulling me closer to her torso, as if I was a hot water bottle of some sort.
I knew I wasn't mistaken with the way that it was Katie's turn to look as though she was secretly trying to swallow a rough mouthful of sand. I, however, made an effort to look as if it wasn't my business until it was made my business, making the most of Lucy's wordless message and padding my paws lightly against her belly.
While it was true that Katie often acted in ways similar to how I portrayed myself there and then, she had also learnt that holding your tongue and letting people come to you wasn't always the best option. And besides, she had sensed something in the air that day - that was why she had phoned Lucy to see if she wanted company before she popped round.
Quivering breath mixed with a stiltedness that could be detected by only a close friend. And while Katie rid herself of the phone in her hand at last, like she couldn't look upon the sweet face of Eli for much longer, she didn't hide her observations from Lucy.
Her companionably gentle shoulder bedding against hers from the second that she was properly addressed.
"Is it too bold to wonder if that has anything to do with why you don't feel like doing all that much today?" she said, contrasting the desert sand that had previously been itching at her vocal cords by offering a natural gentility that was almost as tactile as some of the softest clouds overlooking the Pokémon World.
For half a heartbeat, because she had been trying her best to avert her attention elsewhere and also not look at her own phone as if it were a solar eclipse even if that was the object being discussed, Lucy wondered what Katie was getting at.
I felt her middle twitch as I gave up padding against it and started curling around and around instead, preparing to make a nest there that was as comforting for Lucy as it was for me. My eyes resisted travelling anywhere other than the task at hand, my ears attentive instead.
Lucy's outline properly contracted like she was intending to deny. Katie could see the lines penciling over her forehead much clearer than I could. But then she had a change of heart.
Really, it was useless hiding anything from Katie. She suspected it sooner or later anyway.
Lucy admitted:
"I really am feeling a little sore today." She said, her hand resisting any urge to tussle through her own locks and one of them sank towards her middle instead. Because I was lying right there, she had to rest her hand against me rather than her own dress and I of course would never complain about this. "But it is causing a lot of memories to flood my mind, I must confess.
Lucy confessed about confessing and Katie listened as much as I did. As she did so, it wasn't just her shoulder that started to bed against the older woman and her cheek sought refuge against the roundness of her bone as well.
I couldn't help but see that Katie's voice sounded like it belonged to somebody else, yet her own attentiveness shone through.
"What kind of memories?" she asked, reading from an invisible script. Thankfully, Lucy knew better than to get offended.
Above anything else, she had a great deal of other things to focus on than the fact that Katie answered in a way that was typical rather than personal. And furthermore, how personal could one get at that moment? It would be a little while longer for things to properly spill.
Feeling the exhalation forming inside Lucy's belly long before she allowed it to torrent from her nostrils, I looked over at Katie rather Lucy as I remained present.
And in the same manner that I sensed her sigh long before it made its formation, I could kid myself that I saw Lucy's mind as a machine in an arcade, spinning around and whirling and swirling, trying to figure out what kind of answer she would put forth.
Eventually, she told herself to stop overthinking what she had been thinking. And to just say it.
"Many things." She snatched a bit more time for herself, taking a break from going over the same range of motions and clasping her fingers together instead. Katie's gaze dropped to her chipping nail varnish. She wanted to look after her then, but she would want to even more as time would go on. "It's times like this that remind me of how good he always was with me. Still is." Lucy continued. We wondered if a name would ever tumble off her lips like had been seemingly effortless for Katie. "When I would wake up in the middle of the night, he would just sit there. He would be just right there. And that would make everything better even if it weren't okay. Can you believe that?"
My eyes didn't need to wander anywhere other than an unimportant ornament in the living room of the annex to see Katie long to promptly nod her head in my peripheral vision. She, however, didn't act on it as quickly as the natural desire came.
Instead, she seemed to wait until she had words to say in response as well in order to bob her head up and down, the hollow of her cheek bone making motions against the bone of Lucy's shoulder.
The image that the older woman had been thinking about was seemingly accessible to the young one too, a memory shared between the two of them even if it had only ever lingered really in one of their minds.
A cloaked figure he seemed to be in his black figure coming to offer comfort even if it was the middle of the night and that particular word wasn't always his forte. He would make it his most special skill in the entire world when it came to Lucy, there to cosset her with a kiss on the kneecap and an offer of any sort of assistance she needed, whatever it was.
"Course I can." She confirmed, humanness lacing her vocal cords at that time and her shoulders rising up and down absentmindedly at the same moment that her friend's did. I noticed that she copied more than just her stance, not speaking any names then either. "He's… He's the best."
I couldn't refrain from looking over at Katie with more than just my peripheral vision at that point. Silently, it ran through my brain that I maybe would have used a different approach, certainly not confirming how great the Unovan male was even if that were true to most people that I encountered.
Still, I was stood correct and shown that my imagined approach wasn't always the right approach, and it was for good reason that Lucy had discovered herself to be seeking comfort from her best friend rather than just from me.
It was if a leak had been prompted. The slightest of trickles at first. But a leak, nevertheless. And one that encouraged more words to spill.
"He is." Lucy agreed and her tone of voice intrigued me as much as it caused my heart to feel bigger in my chest, or my rib cage to shrink all around it, I didn't know. We both listened as it seemed painful for her rather than joyous to speak of someone's kindness. "It's just so silly…" she spoke that word again. Katie lifted her chin upwards off her friend just so at the right time. Lucy went on to begin to embody a leaf caught in a breath of wind. "I can't help but fear that I've made a terrible mistake."
And in that moment, it became clear that Katie had inadvertently moved away from a shoulder for the benefit of both her and her good friend.
From the instant that she heard these words and she saw more than just her shoulders shaking, that rippling ricocheting down to her fingertips before spreading seemingly everywhere, anxiety that showed itself out of habit started to course through more than just Katie's heart, pumping it.
It throbbed through her veins. And for half a second, rationality went out of the window, and she wondered if Lucy's aching clutching at her stomach was down to sheer remorse rather than just the time of the month.
"What kind of mistake…?" Katie questioned, in spite of her worry that she was trying to take a hold of and encourage to the back of her mind, she reached for her friend's trembling fingers.
They felt like a winter's day and as fragile as in icicle that had formed on the tip of a tree branch and would take only the wind to snap. Funnily enough, feeling this within her own hold was enough to pull herself together and to just listen rather than speculate.
Quivering as if that too was the victim of the wind, Lucy's lower lip fell into her mouth, and she bit down on it to try and gain some more control. But it was to no avail. The leaking had been slowly at first. But now it was tormenting all had once.
A dam had been burst. And it would be up to Katie and me to mop up the damage.
Lucy's front two teeth stopped holding her lower lip hostage and it tumbled out, words of vulnerability flying out in the same way as another confession came.
"What… What if everyone gets just one shot at love and I've let mine go and be with another man?" she invited the difficult question, coldness shooting through the rest of her body rather than just her hands.
I felt it presenting itself through the thin floral fabric of her dress and it caused me to lift my cheek away from lulling against her even if I had been so very comfortable in spite of it all. I knew that I couldn't look at her for long at all. Now that she had confessed one thing, it was like she was confessing everything without saying anything at all.
All that had lived inside her and had been shoved down for the past six months was coming to light.
Almost helplessly and struck with my own emotion, I looked at Katie, figuring that even if she didn't have the words to say then she would have an expression that could transcend language barriers. I don't think I had ever been so surprised in my whole life to see the true expression that had washed over her.
Sitting there, close to her good friend and hearing her admit something that she had probably already figured out months go anyway but that was beside the point – Katie had a dewiness in her eyes that was not just empathy. She had something tugging at her lip that wasn't just disappointment. It wasn't even disappointment at all.
She had to go on to apologise for what was pulling her mouth when even Lucy in the middle of trying to process overwhelming emotions that had hit her all at once had caught sight of her friend's expression.
Lucy had at last some sign of life back in her eyes, but it was hurt rather than the kind that anyone welcomed within her as her lips found themselves pursing together and her eyes giving the saucers in the kitchen cupboard a run for their money.
"Sorry…" Katie began, a stray finger wiping underneath her nose that was also attempting to swipe away her curved lips without being too obvious or suspicious. "I'm not laughing at you, I promise." she knew she was taking a chance by moving her body closer to Lucy's on the sofa. Even more so with the way that her hand that had since been dropped wrapped around the ball of the older woman's shoulder. "It's just… You j-just spoke aloud words that used to run through my mind more than I can ever say."
She had looked at her more intently, more knowingly, than she had ever looked at anyone.
And with that, it took everything in Lucy's power to not dodge Katie as she ran an almost motherly hand through her hair and to listen instead. I watched as the older woman's expression took it's time but after a good couple of exhalations later, her features stopped looking so much like cut crystal and decided that they didn't have the energy other than to be equally as present as well.
I felt her hand moving towards me and rest there and I couldn't help but feel that it was intentional and because she wanted to rather than to soothe any sort of ache in her middle, whatever the reason for it was. It appeared to me that the more that she lingered and the more that she thought about what her friend put across, she started to soften as well.
It wasn't entirely clear with the way that she sighed and with the way that one of her eyebrows still twitched. And it wasn't clear from the way that she made contact with me but not her friend. But after a while she really and truly listened. And she answered as well.
"You didn't have to laugh at me…" Lucy's reply came at last, and she didn't hold back these words despite the fact that Katie had reassured her that this wasn't the case. She looked at her with a tilted neck and with eyes that remained watering. Liquid even clutched around the rims of her nostrils as well.
For half a second, even though she knew that she had been telling the truth about her reasons and they had been through enough turns of calendar pages together for Lucy to realise that her initial worries were not the case, Katie wanted nothing more than to go back in time and change her tactic. She would erase her smirk and the fact that she had made things about herself.
But the more that she thought – and thinking was something that didn't need to practice often – she realised that it was wrong to go against her own feelings, like it had been for Lucy all those months. She didn't exactly know why her friend's confession had brought her comfort and why it seemed so necessary to express it. But this was the truth.
And eventually, she would be grateful for the truth and reality as it stood when Lucy finally healed enough from some of the things scratching at her heart by re-taking the hand of Katie's that had previously been reached out to her.
"I wasn't. But I'm sorry…" Katie replied practically almost as soon as their palms touched and although she figured that she may need to look Lucy at some point, it felt right to rest her cheek back against her shoulder as she went on to say words that were more in line with the person she wanted to be. "You don't have to worry about what's around the corner, you know…? You really need to give yourself plenty of time."
While the two women's fingers became intertwined, no names were spoken for a little while longer. I half wondered who would be the first to break that. But then after I decided to just listen some more, I gathered that it didn't matter. And while being present, I allowed myself to think of the things that Katie didn't quite say.
Yes, Lucy just needed time. She had been joined at the hip with Eli for as long as she could remember, even when great distance clamped between them both and he was twisting and turning in turmoil, and he came to terms with the person that he really needed to allow himself to be.
That kind of thing took quite some time to get over. It required a lot of healing. It would take time. Hopefully not a lifetime. This was a worry that latched itself onto the forefront of Lucy's mind from the moment that her eyes wandered shut each night.
"I should have known that this was around the corner." Lucy interrupted the majority of my thoughts. She appeared as though she half wanted to scoff. But as the flesh of her palm bedded against Katie's further still, it was if any sort of portrayal like this was out of the question. "I just should have known…"
Katie knew what she wanted to say from the moment that it flashed across her mind. She, however, at least played with her friend's fingers a little bit to give them both grace and a moment to breathe before she pointed out too many things that would render Lucy of all people breathless.
"You did a very selfless thing, Lucy." Katie began again by reminding her, potentially going against her concise timing by lifting her head away from her shoulder at this point and giving her the option of looking right at her in return if her head wanted to swing around. It didn't. She still continued. "Memories are going to come at the best of times, and you can't stop them…" she took a breath, leaving me wondering if she was noticing how aligned her and Lucy's paths were. "But I know you did the right thing."
I understand in hindsight more so than ever that then and there, Lucy wanted nothing more than to clutch Katie's hand in return and bask in the fact that she really had done right. And even if she didn't think it for herself, she could trust her friend enough to hold her head up high and believe that what had been done had been done for the right reasons.
However, though she trusted Katie almost more than anybody, it was true, there were parts of her that were battling inside her, and, on that day, it was anyone's guess which side of her was going to win.
The peacemaker, the one that was content to let go without worrying about her own fate. Or the destroyer, the one that needed to cling to what had used to be, even if neither party fit together anymore and were gasping to go their own ways.
It was funny how familiarity could sometimes be held onto so tightly that it scratched you like the thorns of a stem belonging to a fading rose.
"The right thing for who, though?" Lucy couldn't help but wonder aloud. She still didn't have the energy to scoff but stifled pain was displaying itself as frustration and made itself clear in the vocal cords of her. "What if I've ruined everything for myself by doing the right thing for somebody else…?" she needed to ask. Then, the frustration mellowed. It's true nature of vulnerability showed with the pooling of eyes. "What if-"
Somehow, Katie gathered the question that was next going to be posed before it even had the chance to form. Kindly, her other hand cupped around the singular hand of her good friend. For a second occasion, she allowed herself to smile though that time, it quirked up equally at each corner and she also inwardly prayed that it would be read correctly.
As soon as more contact was made, wind escaped from Lucy's nostrils that were her trying to get rid of any extra weight that she had been carrying around on her shoulders as well as dry her eyes that had since been turned into a puddle residing on a bed of springtime grass.
"Look, I don't have all the answers in the world. Far from it…" Katie admitted, leading me to believe that this was a good choice as I sat on Lucy's stomach rather than curled up and I could feel the muscles of her belly weaken underneath me. "But if there is one thing that I do know then it's that in life you don't get given just one chance and then that's it…" she looked down as she continued. It was endearing how her kneecaps were always the most interesting thing as she spoke from the heart. "In life. In love. There's always more out there. Even when it seems like there's not." Lucy listened. And she was grateful rather than suffocated to feel four eyes looking at her as Katie's head lifted to conclude. "You'll be okay."
This was what she needed to hear the most. Of course, this was what she needed to hear the most. All anybody really wants in times of turmoil is to know that they will be okay in the end. Even if they don't quite believe it themselves. Sometimes hearing those words can be the band aid of the heart. And they acted this way for Lucy on that day.
Feeling air shooting out of her nostrils like a balloon that was deflating, it was her turn to need her cheek resting against her friend's shoulder. As Katie felt a weight lifting off her own shoulders for similar reasons and her hands didn't even think of leaving Lucy's as if her digits were a pearl and her own ones were the oyster, she went on to acknowledge the older woman as a bit of wondering remained in her throat.
"You really think so…?" she asked. They were then back to being the childhood friends that they never had been, and Katie was the older, wiser one and Lucy was the one that needed guidance.
Neither seemed to mind this development – or regression – in dynamic and I for one was comfortable with it as well. In fact, I decided to make myself comfortable on a leg of each of them as I knew that that was the best place to be.
There for them both, whatever it was that they needed. They seemed to have a handle on working things out for themselves. But I liked to be there anyway.
"I do…" Katie confirmed, not needing to nod her head but the way that her thumb twitched against Lucy's speaking of this action even if it never came. The round of her chin nestled against wispy yellow locks that could almost seem white in the right light. "I'm not saying that it won't be hard and that memories won't continue to come, and you won't subconsciously compare every man you look at for the next while to Eli…" His name sounded. And it surprised us all how, when the time actually came, it just hung in the air but didn't surround us all like a very deliberate cloud. "But when it comes down to it, I know that you will have the strength to focus on what matters."
As I sat on each leg of the women, it was like an invisible string had spindled down from the ceiling and attached itself to the top of my head, lifting my chin upwards. To follow suit, my chest absentmindedly puffed forward. I couldn't help but think about what I believed mattered to Lucy.
Moving forward. Happiness could be in the very next step of yours and it was easily missed by looking at what had been and could never be replicated. She deserved nothing more; I knew that without looking at her for much time at all and feeling my already red cheeks deepening in colour and tingling also.
I was shown in that moment, however, how individual we as beings all are. Evidently, both Katie and Lucy agreed with what mattered most of all. While Katie's line of vision was filled with my very erect posture, Lucy glanced over at her mobile phone as if that photograph were flashing for all to see all over again.
Sometimes you could put other people's happiness in front of your own too much. But when it came to Eli, it was kind of natural to do so. Not only would he do the same for you, but he was someone who truly deserved it.
He lived in the shadows for so long. He deserved to shine in the light. Even if people lost the light in their own eyes for a couple of months as they came to terms with their own redirection.
"They are so good together, aren't they?" Lucy at last responded to Katie. And her tone of voice sounded the same as when she had complimented her prior life partner so. Something tugged at her throat and was the opposite of contentment.
Even so, tautness no longer latched onto her features. So, Katie knew that it was more than okay to speak her mind again, as the two women looked at each other rather than anywhere else or even down at me.
"So annoyingly good together." agreed Katie, copying Lucy's tone and rigidness locking over her own features but only to prove a point. After she noticed the sinking down of the shoulders of her friend, she wrapped her arms around them to function as a buoyancy aid. "Have you seen Eli's newly painted office and how he has canvases of all the people that he looks up to including Justin?" she somehow managed to forgo making a comment that Eli looked up to everyone from his short height! One word instead escaped. "Sickening."
I could have wondered how Lucy felt hearing a succession of names and them at that point seemingly coming in thick and fast. It was the same with how her emotions erupted out of her after just the tiddliest of leaks. I could have wondered how she felt. But I didn't need to.
All I needed to do was cast my gaze up and over to her and I figured most of it out as well.
Along with her good friend, she had a lightness taking over her face that wasn't natural, but it was intentional in the hope that a natural ease would soon be to follow. Then, now that emotions were heading a little back down under the surface and not in a supressed way, she had a chance to take a step back and address other things that had been swept under the carpet.
As she looked at Katie but didn't hold onto her, it was as though this momentary lack of contact made her not only able to see things more transparently but speak in align with the person she wanted to be tomorrow too.
Lucy's knuckles found their way underneath her chin for something to do.
"You know, sometimes I forget that all of this could, in some ways, affect you almost as much as it does me…" she began and immediately, although Katie had unintentionally started to use her own knuckle to rub against the top of my head which felt delightful, a questioning action started to knit her brows slowly together. "Sorry about that."
The questioning knitting of eyebrows together quickly became a thing of the past. Those two eyebrows of Katie shot closer to her hairline, and she portrayed a natural ease as she heard her friend apologize to her.
For what…? It didn't take long for it to become clear.
Katie refrained from fully nodding but her head did twitch down and up at least once. She wanted to pull her legs towards her chest in order to protect that sewn together heart of hers that was still thumping proudly somehow but with me still on a leg of both her and Lucy, this was impossible.
Besides, she didn't need to revert to old ways either. She answered Lucy, braveness being the main decoration of her features but a crinkling of the bridge of her nose also.
"He will always be the person that commands my weakest spot…" Katie confirmed, the causation of this being Lucy's lower lip falling into her mouth for the second time. She, on the other hand, didn't need to pin it down with her two teeth this time. "But I learnt a long time ago not to resist things that are inevitable." Her expression brightened, leaving me with the knowledge that one thing among many that still bound her with Justin was the way that they turned wounds into badges of honor. "You might have encouraged all this into motion. But there was never going to be any stopping something that was meant to be."
And with that, as if this were a hidden message between those two women that wasn't quite meant to be shown in its easiest state at that point, I found myself lifted up underneath the armpits by Katie and a kiss was planted to the center of my forehead.
Initially, I started to see the young woman from an angle as I looked at her quizzically. Then, as another kiss came from that same pair of lips, I melted into it, and I understood it for exactly what it was.
Katie was sealing the future with a kiss. In whichever way it was meant to turn out.
Lucy didn't quite bless me with a kiss either, but I did find her warming fingertips roaming through the thin layer of fur that crept around the join of my head towards my ears. This was enough for me. And it seemed that this devotion was enough for her to find her own words.
"I guess things are going to be how they are meant to be…" she added for herself. Katie couldn't help but detect wistfulness latching onto the throat of her good friend. I for one speculated it too. But then I saw bravery as she decided to continue. And that courage started to encourage a real sparkle in her eyes at last. I hoped that the touch between us both was one of the reasons. "Hey, maybe we should move back in together before all this drives us too insane." Lucy surprised Katie, who wasn't then as in tune to her as I was when her shoulder collided with hers. She then caught me off guard too, me feeling her hands underneath my armpits rather than Katie's. "Pikachu too."
In spite of the fact that I wanted to be casually tickled pink, I couldn't help but feel my own paw scratching the back of my neck and a bead of sweat appearing as I tried to stop my cheeks from going a color that was entirely worrisome.
I murmured out my own name in shyness.
Fortunately, Lucy went on to be more focused on Katie who felt an unforced lightness taking over her own eyes, her shoulders that had previously been barged into practically rising towards her ear lobes.
"Yes, and we can finally have our congregation of cats all together." she supplemented, encouraging Lucy to utter such a noise of agreement that is really was as if they were once again the childhood friends that they had never been. Still, we then listened attentively as she added other, different words. "You know, without meaning to, you're basically proving one of the points I've been trying to make this whole time…"
At that point I was then back in the cradling arms of Lucy as I had been at the beginning of this tale. And I still don't know in retrospect whether I was appreciative or not when she took some of her attention off me in order to look over at her friend in a quizzical manner.
Still, I know even now that I was almost glad when I saw her expression change from this portrayal to humorous in a way that she hadn't been able to muster when I first saw her on that day. She kept her head on the one side and her shoulders near to Katie and she didn't hold back from asking despite it all.
"What, that the best way to get revenge on Eli is to make the living arrangement of his dreams that he is no longer a part of?" Lucy questioned in a way that was meant to be dry and stoic. Her expression betrayed her, though, and her eyes found themselves lighting up as she realized that she had actually mustered up some humor at her situations expense and it actually felt okay.
A name had been uttered all over again. It was beginning to no longer carry the same weight. And on that day, among many other things, this was one of the things for which she was grateful.
Katie's chin fell down below her and if I had been residing in her arms rather than Lucy's then it probably would have collided with the top of my ears! She still managed to recover from this promptly.
And quick as ever but still with a wonderful sense of humor, she playfully narrowed her eyes at her friend and answered her, Lucy having to be the one to deal with a shoulder colliding into hers that time.
"No…" Her answer made itself clear. This had not been her intention at all. And now it had been presented to her, it still wasn't her intention, but she couldn't stop gladness from capturing her throat that her good friend was being more like herself. Even without Eli. "I meant that you're proving that life doesn't just have a plan A." she tried to explain herself, Lucy already listening even if her expression of glee could cause one to believe otherwise. "We can go all the way up to Plan Z and beyond if necessary. Whatever it takes."
And with that, Lucy didn't just feel a bumping of Katie's shoulder against hers. In fact, she didn't feel this at all though she still felt me remaining lingering in her arms.
Katie switched things up and wrapped the entirety of her shoulder all around her all over again. And Lucy might have been the type to keep words and sentiments and even feelings to herself a good amount of time, but she also knew when to set things free.
Of course, she did, didn't she? Recent events had proved exactly that.
There and then, Lucy's words were a balloon drifting into the skies. And if she had possessed a spare arm, I know she would have wrapped it around Katie in return.
"Sometimes I forget how completely wise you are." Lucy complimented, inwardly self-conscious about sounding as insincere as she believed that she sounded as her front two teeth appeared but following it up with humor before she could let herself be too vulnerable. "I want to be exactly like you when I grow up."
Arms wrapped around each other then as Lucy cradled me in just one of hers instead, shoulders still managed to be companions. Yes, laughter really was the best medicine. And I was shown this quite a while after the first time, but it still made just the right impact.
Katie tried to revolve her eyes towards the ceiling. But then she couldn't help but chuckle, shaking her head fondly at her good friend but most importantly, basking in the fact that she had got another piece of her back.
She knew that she had been acting nothing but her compassionate self by making one of the greatest sacrifices in her life. But that kind of act could also lead you to get a little bit lost on the way.
So, this was why Katie was so grateful to see a glimpse from the person that she had grown to know and love.
All the same, she didn't show any part of this in that moment! She instead quipped with her equal level of humor.
"Well, I'm sure you can grow up to be anything you want but not everybody is naturally as smart as me." She dryly replied but with amusement etching on her face and in her eyes and it was well received by Lucy who chuckled in equal amounts as her friends.
And in that moment, speaking of the fact that not everybody could be intelligent…
Do you know what? No. I'm not going to finish that point! I'm just going to tell the tale of what happened next.
You see, at long last, the three of us stopped being the only people in the room as Katie wasn't the only one who decided to drop by that day. Almost tripping over the bag that she had discarded on the floor earlier on, a tattoo adorned man was none the wiser to the real reason of the smell that continued to prevail around the entire estate of Rupert and David thanks to their latest scientific experiment.
"Smells like David and Rupert's lunch has gone a little bit wrong." Sammy announced in the amiable if a little simple way that he often spoke, slamming the door behind him and kicking off his shoes. Both Katie and Lucy had been clutching each other and giggling before but now they were doing that more so than ever! His ring clad hands fell to his hips. "What are you two girls gossiping and giggling about anyway?"
His question came. I lingered in the hold of Lucy and while I was often overjoyed to be a part of moments of radiance, now that I was in the presence of another man, I couldn't help but wonder if I should scrabble away as Sammy had seemingly included me in the gaggle of girls!
Lucy's touch was as firm as it was kind, though, so I didn't stand a chance. And I was left looking up between both her and Katie as, although part of them wondered whether they should make up an answer or not, they soon decided that honesty was the best policy.
And truthfully, honesty and vulnerability connected people.
Katie and Lucy stretched out more calmly on the sofa to prove that it wasn't a big deal.
"Oh, we were just talking about guys and how their troublesome tendencies can ruin our days on occasion." Katie was the one to answer and then she paused, trying not to burst into laughter all the more as Sammy paused getting closer to either of them, wanting to find the metal of his padlock in between his teeth to prevent him from letting out anxious noises. "How is your day going?"
In the same way that Katie had been forced to suppress her giggles at the way that Sammy reacted to this, Lucy was encouraged to act in the same way as, from the Alolan male's point of view, she went from very menacing to sweet as candy in the next couple of seconds.
Sammy's next proceedings proved that he caught onto it in equal measures. Of course, he did!
"Oh." He began, his toes privately shuffling about in his socks as he still believed that it was best to stand loitering in the same position. He managed to resist ruffling his own hair. Then, he confessed, with a sigh deciding that he had more in common with the two of them then he liked to admit. "To be honest the words guys and troublesome and day ruined pretty much describe how my day has gone too." he said. Like Katie, he copied her ability to go from morbid to sunnier in seconds. That simple smile presented itself again. "It's nice that you two get to hug it out and feel better about it."
So many of life's great moments can be shared in a second of eye contact. In that moment, however, Katie and Lucy knew it was in everybody's best interests not to glance at one and other. They already had that familiar sensation tickling in the center of their throats. If they looked at each other following Sammy's words, they would have surely erupted into even bigger giggles!
Lucy finally set me free, and I hopped up to and lingered on the back of the sofa rather than anywhere else. And following this and regardless of the fact that she hadn't looked at her friend, she knew that she didn't need to glance her way to know that it was okay to answer in any way that she saw fit.
Her hair that was no longer hanging as limply around her face found a hand roaming through it. Lucy answered Sammy plainly at first.
"It is." Came her reply, her shoulders not needing to rise up and down to accompany her words. She wasn't naïve to the wistfulness that assumed Sammy's nature at the best of times but absolutely did in those few moments. The way his lips nonchalantly formed a union then proved her point ever further. Her turn to properly shrug presented itself. "I guess that qualifies you to join us here, doesn't it?"
For half a second, Sammy remained stilted in his stance. Even those words couldn't have gone over his head, could they…? Maybe they could! He watched and waited, like a jungle cat surveying its prey.
In actuality, he was monitoring the situation and his eyes spun around to Katie, who he knew far better, and he waited to see what kind of response she would go on to have.
I couldn't observe her expression fully from lingering behind her at the back of the sofa, but I knew her silhouette almost as well as I knew my own. It was becoming harder and harder for her to suppress any noises that longed to appear.
So, because of this, this quality lent itself to her words as while she openly showed the corner of her mouth quirking upwards, she also held open her arms and gestured to Sammy. His expression erupted into sunshine from the moment that she did this, let alone as he was properly welcomed.
"Come here, you." She encouraged and with that, even with the history that the two of them had thanks to Justin couldn't prepare her for the reaction that came next.
He might have been like Lucy and found it easier to hide true feelings at times but in that moment, he couldn't hold back a thing. And if his platform boots hadn't been kicked off already then they surely would have shot off with the speed in which he complied to the younger female after being more subtly encouraged by Lucy too.
"Ooh, yay!" Came his response. And with that, it seemed that there was no moment to lose for him. Unlike me, he had no qualms about appearing to be one of the girls in front of another guy and he didn't bother to stop himself from diving between both Lucy and Katie, his arms immediately constricting around the one with hair the colour of a sunflower during sunset.
He waited for the one with hair a shade of a springtime sunlight during the early morning to welcome him also to which she did after she let a couple of giggles escape.
It seemed that Sammy's woes were far more easily soothed and all it took was the embrace of two women and being in the middle of them both! Then again, he kept a few more things on the surface compared to Lucy.
Regardless, on that day, one thing that they both had in common was their ability to be comforted by Katie. But what they never would have anticipated was on that day, not that it would be obvious at all for a long while yet, that they would go on to be comforted by each other.
It's true that hardships often bond people. Yet when it came to Lucy and when it came to Sammy and it eventually came to the two of them together, joint hardship was actually meant to be part of their story. It couldn't be resisted, really.
Like Katie expressed, things would be however they were meant to be. The right thing had been done so the right thing would prevail.
In the meantime, though, one more thing prevailed. I got over myself and enjoyed being one of the girls as well. That embrace sure was a good one. Laughter was the best medicine. But so was closeness. And I knew that all of us had no choice but to lean into the healing. But lean into love too.
After all, Katie got right another thing right on that day. Some of the greatest love stories were still just around the corner.
The End.
There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) What ifs can certainly take up a lot of your mind, can't they? No wonder Lucy has these feelings. Like Katie says, she did an insanely selfless thing by encouraging Eli to try things with Justin again, but that doesn't mean that everything is happy families for everybody involved straight away. I like the ending involving Sammy though. Not that it's really tackled here, but no doubt can he related to Lucy. No wonder those two end up finding each other as well. Like Katie suggests, you simply never know what is waiting for you. I think that's a good thing for everyone to remember in times of struggle :) Thanks again and I will be back on the 28th with Letters That Changed Everything, so see you then!
Amy signing out :P