Previously on "The Otherworlders" - Ava and Inez are chatting on the train, on their way to the Hidalgo estate where they'll be staying during their mission. Ava tries to include Fiona in their conversation and then also subtly tries to pry information from her about Farid. The results, unfortunately, are the exact opposite from the goal Ava had, and she ends up pushing Fiona away as Fiona gets increasingly uncomfortable the conversation.
When the girls reach their destination, they're awestruck by the Hidalgo family's home. Inez's house is an opulent Mediterranean mansion, complete with a Telekinetic butler.
Later, Sr. Hidalgo has a serious conversation with his elder daughter, Marisol, expressing his concerns about Inez attending the Academy. He feels guilty having had to send her there because of an age-old family obligation to the Otherworlder High Council.
**********
In the post-dinner tranquility, Sr. Hidalgo, Marisol, and Inez are nestled comfortably in the living room, engaged in light conversation. Behind them, grand French doors reveal a sprawling patio adorned with luxurious teak outdoor furniture and trellises overflowing with bougainvillea in a riot of red, yellow, and orange hues.
Fiona, who had been maintaining a polite distance from the group, ventures out onto the patio. Wrapping her arms around herself, she approaches the low stone wall enclosing the patio and gazes up at the star-studded night sky.
Despite her fondness for Inez and her family, Fiona is worn out. She's weary of obligatory smiles, drained from the constant small talk, and, if she's being honest, feeling increasingly isolated as the only Vampyr among them.
A sound pulls Fiona from her thoughts. She turns to see Ava stepping through another set of French doors on the opposite side of the patio. Ava carries a tray laden with mini-sandwiches, fresh fruit, and a plate of warm, freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies. Ava places the tray on the patio table, removing the plate of sandwiches and the bowl of fruit and setting them aside.
Fiona watches her with a puzzled expression. "What's all this for?"
Ava straightens and grins, "Hector asked the cook to bake cookies for dessert." She shrugs, "Apparently, they're Inez's favorite. I was in the kitchen getting some water, so I offered to bring the tray."
Fiona's gaze narrows, and she gestures towards the other food on the table. "No, I mean that."
Ava follows her gaze to the sandwiches and fruit. "Oh, that! I noticed you didn't eat lunch on the train today, and you barely touched your dinner." She picks up the plate and offers it to Fiona. "I thought you might be hungry, so I asked if they had anything in the kitchen that could make a good snack." She laughs, "I think Hector got a bit carried away with the pesto chicken, but hey! It's healthy!"
Fiona frowns at the plate, then looks up at Ava, "Why are you doing this?"
Taken aback, Ava lowers the plate and cocks her head, a look of surprise and confusion on her face. "Well, I believe no one should skip meals. It can lead to mental fog and lethargy, and--"
"No," Fiona interrupts. "I mean, why are you making all these gestures? This..." She points to the sandwiches. "...and at the archery range earlier? I don't understand."
"I'm just trying to get to know you, Fiona," Ava responds. "I'm just being friendly."
"Well, you know what?" Fiona retorts, "I wish you would stop."
Ava, taken aback, looks around as if seeking a witness to this bewildering exchange. "Seriously? Have I done something to upset you?"
Fiona rolls her eyes and turns away. She hugs herself tighter and looks back up at the night sky.
Ava steps closer to Fiona. Her voice is soft. "If I've done something wrong, please tell me. I'm just trying to be your friend."
Fiona spins around, her frustration now palpable. "Stop it, Ava! Just stop! We don't have to be friends to work together!"
Ava steps back, raising her hands in a placating gesture. "Okay, okay... I just thought it would be nice toâ"
"Well, you thought wrong!" Fiona shoots back.
Despite Fiona's best efforts the storm of emotion inside her swells and the tears begin to spill. She swipes them away, desperate for them to stop, but they come anyway.
"I need you to stop, okay?" Fiona pleads. "Just stop! Stop being so nice! And so thoughtful! And so pretty! And for the sake of the gods, stop being so... so..." She grimaces as if she's in pain, "...so perfect! I'm trying... her eyes glisten with more tears. "...but this just isn't working. You're making it way too hard!"
"Making what too hard?" Ava asks. "What's not working, Fiona?" She shakes her head, truly baffled. "I'm sorry but I don't understand."
Fiona throws up her hands, finally giving into defeat. "Damn it, Ava! You're making it much too hard NOT to like you!"
Ava pulls back, blinking rapidly in awkward silence. Okay... how can you possibly respond to that?
Shaking her head furiously, Fiona turns and runs back inside, going in through the side doors so that â with her face all puffy and her dignity crushed â she doesn't have to face Inez and her family.
Ava, speechless and caught in a total "WTF" moment, can do nothing but watch Fiona leave.
***
Later that night, Ava can't sleep, so she finds herself sitting out on the Hidalgo patio, in her pajamas, sipping a cup of hot chocolate and contemplating all that transpired between her and Fiona earlier that night. In an effort to relieve some of the stress knotting her stomach, she closes her eyes and lifts her chin so she can fully enjoy the silky caress of the warm evening breeze.
Fiona, worked up and agitated on the other hand, is pacing behind a giant potted bougainvillea, trying to summon the courage to face Ava and have it out with her once and for all, come to some sort of understanding that would allow them to be successful on their mission, even if they can't find a way to be anything close to friends.
After having paced off her worries for the past fifteen minutes, she finally sucks in a deep breath, and murmuring words of encouragement to herself, marches out from behind the enormous plant.
Ava looks up when she hears footsteps approaching. "Oh, hey..." she says hesitantly.
Fiona comes to a full stop before her. "Hey," She says stiffly as she points to the empty space on the bench next to Ava. "Can I... Can I take a seat?"
"Sure." Ava scooches over to make enough room for Fiona, and then she and Fiona sit in awkward silence for a few moments before Fiona huffs out a breath. "So," she says, her voice filled with tension. "I've apologized to Inez, Marisol, and Mr. Hidalgo for disappearing on them tonight without a word."
"Oh, that's good," Ava says softly, placing her hot chocolate on the low table before her. "We were all wondering where you'd disappeared to."
"Yes, well, it wasn't my finest hour." Fiona admits, then she clears her throat. Swallowing hard, she pushes herself to say what needs to be said, no matter how painfully awkward it might be.
Pressing her lips into a tight, thin line, she forces herself to turn so that she's now face-to-face with Ava. "I apologized to them, and now, it's my turn to apologize to you."
Taken aback, Ava's eyebrows shoot up as she stares at Fiona blankly.
"Ava, I'm really, really sorry I was such a bitch to you earlier this evening," Fiona confesses.
Surprised by the frank apology, Ava finds herself at a loss for words. Then after a long beat, she smiles. "Thank you, Fiona," she says. "I appreciate the apology. I do." Then after another moment, Ava adds, "And, to be honest, I don't think you were being a bitch to me really, maybe you were justâ"
"Ava," Fiona cuts in, shooting her a Let's not do this look. "I was a total bitch tonight. There's no need to sugar coat it."
Ava's about to counter Fiona's assertion, when she stops herself and instead lets out a soft laugh, then nods. "Yeah, okay," she says, "fair enough. I accept your apology." She tilts her head. "I guess I'm just trying to figure out what prompted your attitude towards me in the first place. I mean, what is it? What did I ever do to you to make you dislike me so much?"
Fiona faces forward on the bench, props her elbow on her thigh, her chin on her palm and then sighs. "Nothing, Ava. You didn't do anything."
"Okay, then, why?" Ava pleads, giving a slight shrug.
After an awkward pause, Fiona warns Ava cautiously. "Do you really want to know?"
"Yes, I do! I really do!" Ava insists, holding her hands up at her sides.
Fiona lets out a weighty sigh, straightens, and looks out across the patio into the night. "Because, I see the way he looks at you, and to be honest..." She shrugs sadly. "...on some level, it kinda kills me."
Ava looks at Fiona, confused. "I'm sorry. I don't follow. Who... Who are we talking about?"
"Farid, Ava!" Fiona utters, doing her best to dampen her residual frustration. But not wanting to lose her cool and let her impatience get the best of her, she lets out a slow, calming breath. "We're talking about Farid," she finishes quietly.
"Ohhhh..." Ava immediately responds, and then says, "Wait, what?!"
Fiona shakes her head and lets out a soft chuckle, amused that Farid wouldn't be the first thing that popped into Ava's head. "He likes you, Ava," she says. "I can tell by the way he looks at you when you're not paying attention, and the way he acts around you. He really likes you."
Ava furrows a brow in disbelief. "Oh, I seriously doubt that." She waves the possibility away. "Honestly, I think he hardly ever notices me. And when he does, it's mostly to take pity on me. Our Shifter fighting skills are so raw, not nearly as sleek and sophisticated as yours."
Fiona arches a brow. "I don't think it's your fighting technique he's noticing," she says with a hint of amusement. "It's you."
"Really? Really?!" Ava asks, not quite sure whether Fiona's reading too much into Farid's behavior or maybe just trying to be nice. She scrunches up her nose. "Do you really think so?"
Fiona slides her a Seriously, girl, don't push it look, then lets out a muted laugh. "Yes, really. I know Farid very well. You're good to go on that front."
"Wow," Ava gasps softly, and barely able to contain her excitement, she cracks a full-on, face-splitting smile, jiggling her legs with a sense of glee.
Then her smile slowly fades, replaced by a worried grimace. "Okay, so..." Ava says. "What do you think I should do about it? I mean, I really want to ask him out, but we always have training and missions; and honestly, where would we go out on a date anyway?" She looks around as if lost. "I mean I guess we could probably go to theâ"
Ava stops suddenly as she notices Fiona's warm smile fade. Then, it hits her like a brick. "Oh, by the gods, I'm so stupid!" She slaps her forehead. "I'm so sorry, Fiona! I wasn't even thinking! Are you and Faridâ"
"Oh, no!" Fiona is quick to offer, brushing away the thought. "No, no, no. There's nothing going on between me and Farid."
"Okay," Ava responds, then proceeds with caution. "But was there ever anything between you two?"
Fiona shakes her head vehemently. "No... No... Not at all. We've always been just friends," she insists, then she tilts her head and looks up at the sky. "Well...." she begins to say, "...there was one night when we almost..." She stops herself. "Wait! What am I doing! Ugh! No, no, not really."
Ava gives Fiona a confused and somewhat worried look, so Fiona continues with a heavy sigh. "It was graduation night, and everyone was plastered. Someone brought water balloons for the end of the night because..." She shrugs. "...of course, that's what you do at a big graduation night party held at a ridiculously fancy country club, right?"
Fiona chuckles to herself. "Anyway, Farid and I were hiding out on the golf course, waiting for our foes to make their way to that side of the club, but it was taking forever, and Farid was getting impatient. So suddenly he decided it was every man for himself and before I knew it, we were lobbing water balloons at each other. We were laughing our asses off. It was nuts!" She shakes her head again, relishing the memory. "And when I found myself with the final water balloon, Farid tried to wrestle it from me, and I'm really ticklish, and let's just say things got a little crazy, and before you know it we wereâ" Fiona's voice fades. Unable to continue, she looks at Ava, her brows slowly rising in the hopes Ava gets where this story is going.
But instead, she's met with a long pause, and then suddenly Ava's mouth forms a giant "O" as she leans back, her eyes wide with understanding.
"Yeah..." Fiona drawls. Then she shoots Ava a desperately earnest look. "But in the end, we didn't! We didn't do it! I promise," She shakes her head, waving her hands frantically before her. "I mean we got close, but we didn't," she rushes to add. "Because all of a sudden the sprinklers went off, and the water was freezing, and I somehow got water up my nose, and of course Farid thought that was just hilarious." She rolls her eyes for emphasis. "And I was so angry I threw a shoe at his head, and then he tripped over a sprinkler, and then Sebastian, having not seen us for ages, decided to incite a rebellion and led the entire faction down the hill, crashing upon us and before you know it, the whole thing â as far as Farid and me were concerned â was over before any of it got out of hand."
Ava continues to stare at Fiona in shock, not sure exactly how to process the story she's hearing.
"And, truth be told," Fiona adds. "For the next few days after that, I was a bit confused about where we stood, and honestly, Farid didn't handle the situation well, not well at all!" She sighs. "So, I guess by the time I got to the Academy I was really pissed at him and that's why I've been acting the way I have. Look, the more important point is, if I have a beef with Farid, I need to take it up with him, not..." she looks at Ava earnestly, "...take it out on you."
Ava nods and sits in a solemn silence for a very long time, and as she senses Fiona begin to fidget in discomfort, she comes to a decision. "I'm really glad you told me about you and Farid. That's really cool of you," she says. "And look, if it's going to be an issue between us, I could justâ"
"Nope! Nope! Don't even think about it!" Fiona objects. But having kept it together for as long as she could, she suddenly pops off the bench. "Please don't consider me a factor, at all, in whatever it is..." she gestures awkwardly before her "...you and Farid want to do."
Ava stands, rolling her eyes, laughing. "Well, I doubt we'll be doing much of anything, but thanks."
She turns to face Fiona and her smile is warm and genuine. "I'm really, really glad we had this talk."
Fiona smiles back. "Yeah, me too."
Ava cocks her head as a relieved smile spreads across her face. "Oh, my gosh! This is so awesome! I feel like we should hug or something!"
She throws her arms open and leans in to give Fiona a big, fat hug. But when she feels Fiona stiffen, she pulls back and grimaces. "Ooooh... too soon?"
Fiona scrunches her nose up and slowly nods. "Yeah... A little bit."
And with that, they both laugh and head back inside to get a good night's sleep before their mission.
**********
A/N - I hope you guys were giving Fiona the benefit of the doubt and some room to make some mistakes when it came to Ava!
Honestly, this scene was partially based on a situation I'd experienced in college and let's just say Fiona was far more honorable and gracious than I was in the end.
And just to be clear, I wasn't mean or anything! I promise! ð
I just sort of pretended the other girl didn't exist, even though we were all in the same friend group.
Honestly, that's the best I could do at the time, but Iook back at the fact that I immediately took the bad boy back when he broke up with her and have to say, "Oy!" ð¤¦ð½ââï¸
This is one of the reasons boys get away with so much. That and, honestly, your brain just isn't working nearly as effectively as you think it is at that age. ð
Anyway, just know, it does get better.
See you this weekend!
~ Paula â¤ï¸