Chapter 888 Skewed Intentions

Chapter 888  Skewed Intentions

No tears…

I was expecting there to be a few ones falling away already sometime between then and now. Some heartfelt final words too, if nothing else… unless they've happened already and I just didn't notice.

It didn't feel right. This didn't feel right, or maybe it was just me that was feeling this way. When it comes to farewells, if I'm at all honest, I've never really been in any kind of situation where goodbye actually was goodbye - never seen someone I knew disappear 'round a corner and have that be the last time I actually saw them again.

So perhaps this was it. Goodbye, how it really was, how it really felt… this hollow, free-falling feeling of discontent.

Was it? Could it?

Between the three of us, if everyone was truly wearing their hearts on their sleeves here, then I had to be the only odd one out. Because in their eyes, in their expressions, Ria and Irene both… goodbye looked very different.

Nobody seemed to be able to take their gazes off each other; like we all developed a crick in our necks simultaneously. Ria got around hers by just simply walking backward, step by step, treading down the hall, her all-consuming orange making the white walls glow and flicker.

Suddenly, halfway through, Ria paused in place - one foot behind and left teetering on a tiptoe while the rest of her hung frozen at a slight angle. For that brief second, I still manage to hold out on enough hope and stubbornness to believe she might have had a change of heart.

But turns out it was nothing like that, she just noticed something I was far too caught up in indecision and doubt to catch, something a lot more surprising than anything I could have hoped for.

In a march, with floorboards clacking to a steady strut, Irene strode past, gradually closing up the empty space that Ria had made.

Halfway through, she stopped too - I couldn't see her face, couldn't get a read on her intention as much as I wanted to. Ria had that view instead, and from what I could garner reflecting off of her expression… seems there was more to Irene's intentions that I had failed to catch.

"Goodbye hug?" Ria guessed extending both arms out in an embrace, lowering them back down in an instant when Irene didn't reciprocate. "No, guess not," she sighed, lips in a light frown, head cocked to the left. "So then - anything else?"

"Just a question," Irene said, and I couldn't help but overhear, or rather, not hear, the quaint sense of contentment she had. Maybe only barely, but still only barely.

Ria sighed again, shaking her head wearily yet blithely. "Sounds like a lot more than just a question."

I didn't hear her deny it, instead she just went for it, asking anyway, speaking as if giving out surveys, "Did you have fun?"

"Fun?" Ria pulled out a face, flabbergasted near to the point of full-on laughter. "Is that… okay, wait, clarify - are you actually being serious right now? Is this a serious question?"

"Wouldn't be asking otherwise, would I?" Irene reaffirmed. "With me? Did you have fun with me?"

"I did. I had. Tons of it. But girl, you definitely already know that. So what are you really asking me? Where… where's this going? What's the real question you're trying to ask here?"

"That was the question," she replied. "That was all I wanted to know. Just needed to make sure you were… and that you weren't just… killing time. If you were just waiting out the clock this whole time - well - I just wanted to make sure that - "

"Did I give off that impression? Do I " Ria interrupted, her foot returning forward, her body back upright. "What makes you say that? That's… wow, I have a heart, you know?"

"No, of course you do. I know. You… I just…" Irene relented, backing off a step, and dismissing herself. "No, nothing. It's nothing. Go, Ria. I don't want to keep you for any longer."

"Yeah, as if you haven't already," Ria scoffed, little flames dispersing ruffled. "I ain't letting that one slip past. This, everything we did - killing time? That's slander through and through - oh no… oh no, no, no, no. Now why would you say that?"

She waited patiently for a reply, tapping her foot, crossing both arms, like a mother in the middle of reprimanding her child. And when Irene had nothing to say, Ria was there ready with a lecture.

"What happened? Weren't we just about to part ways? We were so close, we were right there. Irene… you can't be defaming me at the last second, tarnishing my character with such a baseless accusation. That's dirty. You know I care, you know I wouldn't be doing anything I do unless I genuinely wanted to. And I did genuinely enjoy the time I spent with you here - that's twice now I'm saying it. To say I'm just merely waiting the timer out, like I just can't wait to get this all over with… do you really believe that you matter so little to me that I would even think that? No, 'course not - that's stupid. So you tell me, what made you think that?"

What she was saying, what I was hearing… sounded much too tone-deaf and oblivious to be actually serious. But yet there she was, giving it the sincerity, the cadence as if it really was. Did she really not understand how Irene could possibly think that way? It's not a puzzle, it's no riddle, so why was she acting as if the answer wasn't already right there in front of her?

"So you think I'm just being stupid then?" Irene asked after a long while. "That there's no reason for me at all for me to have a thought like that in my head?"

"None that I can think of anyway," Ria said. "So, c'mon, enlighten me, please. I'm seriously at a loss here."

"Can't do that."

"No?"

"I won't do anything to stop you from leaving," Irene said, rehearsing the words like scripture. "That's the promise that we - that I - made, remember"

"Oh, for the love of… really?" Ria let out a groan. "Okay, look, first things first, I'm gonna be leaving either way no matter what - "

"No matter what I say?" Irene said, suddenly firmer, suddenly louder. "Right, exactly. So what's the point in telling you anyway? It's a waste of time - mine, yours especially. Ria, I told you to go. Just go."

"And suddenly now you're upset at me, Irene, just, what - ?" Ria flailed her arms, billowing flames whirling about in confusion. "You were happy! Just now, weren't you happy? Weren't we? We were having fun! I thought we were gonna leave it at that - on the best of terms - what happened? Divines - just tell me!"

"I was! We were! We still can be if you would just - Ria, just leave! You don't have to know, you don't need to know - it doesn't matter. Why do you keep insisting? Why do you care if - ?"

"Why do I care?" Ria said, breathless and fuming. "I care because I care! Irene, I care about you!"

"No you don't!"

Things were just spiraling quickly.

One moment everything was cordial, peaceful, then suddenly the next… in the blink of an eye, it just… Irene told me plain out that she didn't have a plan for anything. Back then, I was a bit doubtful. But now I have no choice but to believe her.

Because this… how do you plan out for things to be like this?

"No, you don't… you don't care," Irene heaved, softer, heavier. "If you did, you'd know. You wouldn't have to ask. You wouldn't have to guess. You wouldn't have to go!"

"Irene!" Ria snapped back at her, anger snuffing every other emotion in her scowl. "We've been over this. You know, you already know why I have to go - why I want to go! It has nothing to do with you, there's nothing personal about any of this! You told me you understood. You know I need this."

"And I don't need you?"

"You're missing the point."

"You left us, you know? You just left us! Me! When the Blight came down, I called for you! I tried to wake you up! And you didn't answer, you didn't want to wake up!"

"Irene…"

"And you say you care? If we couldn't get rid of the Blight, if something had happened to me then… and still, you slept. The Elf on the other hand. Her, she woke up - for him - she woke up! She had the same dreams, the same feeling of bliss as you! But for me? You? What did you choose? Are those dreams of yours really that important to you?!

Irene lashed out at her, speaking so vehemently, ferociously… feelings, emotions that had laid stewing and festering in the back of her mind all this time. She had always intended on keeping them all buried too. Because in her own words, the truth frightened her far too much.

"Tell me, Ria," She said, demanding, asking, regardless of it all. "Are they really that more important to you than me?"