Chapter nineteen
Ryleigh carefully reached for the office door after making sure Anika wouldn't slip off and fall. In all honesty, he was surprised that she had even let him touch her never mind believe that he had no interest in continuing on with their battles.
"Maybe you should put me down so it doesn't seem that bad." Anika whispered by his ear.
"And risk you collapsing to the floor. I don't think so. Anyway, with you up there it wouldn't make sense if I pushed you and then helped you out." Ryleigh stepped through the door and kicked it shut with his foot.
"Ryleigh how are the flower beds coming-" Gelsey broke off as she looked up from the papers on her desk. "What happened?"
"I was pushed off the bridge." Anika grumbled, feeling the lighter mood Ryleigh surprised her with quickly fade away.
"By who?" the two delinquents didn't miss Gelsey hesitantly shifting her gaze to Ryleigh. A small frown creased his forehead.
"Victoria. We had this system going on. I would plant the flowers and he would go back and forth with the cart and place them everywhere. He left to go get more and I finished the spot I was planting them in and went to go look for him. That's when she and two other girls pushed me over the railing." Anika explained. "Oh, and she thought you were my boyfriend and I was playing hard to get." she chuckled. To Gelsey's surprise, Ryleigh smiled with her.
"So you two have turned a new leaf over?"
"I guess so. It takes too much energy to come up with pranks." Anika sighed and unconsciously rested her chin on Ryleigh's shoulder, surprising them both.
"Well that's good." Gelsey smiled proudly.
"But what's not so good is the fact that she can't walk." Ryleigh spoke up.
"I can walk," Anika caught Ryleigh's doubtful look and added quietly, hating the feeling of being helpless, "Just in a lot of pain."
"You can't walk? How far did you fall?"
"You know the bridge on the way to the fields. Where the stream is less than a foot deep. There." Ryleigh explained with a certain anger in his voice that confused Anika.
"Okay, thank you Ryleigh for bringing her here. The infirmary is down the hall on your left. I'll be back." Gelsey said with a frown as she grabbed her key ring and left the office.
Ryleigh followed her directions and walked into a white walled and disinfectant smelling room.
"I heard what happened. Just set her down on that bed right there." an older women said as she pulled the first aid kit out of the cabinet. Ryleigh slowly backed up against the bed in the corner of the small room and gently lowered Anika down.
"Thanks Rye." Anika shivered at the loss of his warm back against her front.
"Rye?" Ryleigh raised a brow at her and took a seat close by the bed.
Anika shrugged. "It just kind of came out. Plus I think I've only called you Ryleigh when I'm annoyed at you... among other things."
"Good to know. Does this mean I can call you... Anne, no, Nick. Yeah, Nick fits well."
"That's a boy name." Anika crinkled her nose at his nickname for her.
"Not my fault you said you were more manlier than me." Ryleigh raised his hands in a shrugging manner.
The nurse turned around with a square of gauze in one hand. She shook her head at the two teens but smiled nonetheless. Anika turned around on the bed so she could take her soaked tank top off. She didn't mind Ryleigh seeing her in her bikini top. A new sense of trust was forming between them and she hoped they would become closer. For some reason, Anika could see herself eventually telling Ryleigh things she had never intended to tell anybody.
"Need help?" Ryleigh asked but was already out of his seat and helping Anika with lifting her tank top off. He made sure to stay clear of the 'off limit areas' as he did so.
"Thanks." heat rose to Anika's cheeks as she caught his smile.
"No problem." he half shrugged and sat back in his seat.
"Well, the skin isn't broken so that's good. However you do have a fair amount of bruising all over from your shoulders to your hips which explains why you can't walk without discomfort or lift your arms straight up." the nurse's hands gently hovered over Anika's back. She listened to her heart and breathing with her stethoscope before dismissing Anika and Ryleigh with permission for her to skip out on activities and sending her away after Anika swallowed down a pain pill.
"Need a ride?" Ryleigh offered his backside to Anika as they exited the office building.
"Can I try walking? I hate feeling like you have to help me." Anika frowned.
"Alright, but I'm walking you back to your cabin." Ryleigh insisted. Oh, this should be interesting. Anika thought. As they neared her cabin, Anika could make out Mel's voice and saw her sitting on the edge of Keira's bed through the screen door flap.
"Man, you're ugly." Mel wrinkled her nose up at the stormy looking bruise blemishing Keira's cheek.
"Shut up. You're one to talk." Keira shot back and rolled out of bed with a groan.
"She got a good hit on you, but I promise she looks a lot worse." Ivy said from her spot on Anika's bed where she sat crossed legged.
"Yeah she does." Anika grumbled and all eyes swung towards her as she stepped into the room.
"Hey, are you limping?" Mel asked sending a glare to Ryleigh's supportive hand on her waist as he stood awkwardly in the doorway.
"I can walk fine. I made it from the office to here this time." Anika lifted her chin a little.
"This time?" Kiera frowned from where she was leaning against her bed.
"Um... yeah." Anika rubbed her neck and glanced at Ryleigh by the door who looked as unsure as she felt.
"What's he doing here?" Ivy asked pointing a finger at Ryleigh.
"What did you do?" Mel stormed up to his chest and gave him a shove but he held onto the doorframe to keep from falling down the few steps.
"It wasn't him. He actually helped me." Anika defended Ryleigh who at the moment was looking at Mel as if she was a crazy woman. Which she was.
"Anika, why are you all wet?" Keira asked.
"Well, here's the short version." Anika winced as she lowered herself onto her cot.
"I met up with Victoria this morning and she was taking a walk with two of her minions. They didn't think the whole egg thing was as funny as we thought it was."
"What did they do?" Ivy asked with widening eyes.
"We met up on one of the bridges." Anika shifted under the intensity of everyone's gazes.
"They pushed her over the rail and she fell into the stream." Once again, everyone's attention returned to Ryleigh who only met Anika's cool, grey eyes.
"So what do you have anything to do with this?" Mel asked folding her arms across her chest and taking a step back.
"He carried me out of the stream and when I couldn't walk he gave me a piggy back ride to the infirmary." Anika admitted and braced herself for the surprised looks her friends wore.
"He did?" Kiera asked in a tone where it was clear she didn't believe what Anika had said.
"Yes." Anika nodded and locked eyes with Ryleigh. "And we kind of made a truce."
"A truce? Like you guys won't try to prank each other?" Mel asked while moving to sit on her bed again.
"Yeah. Gelsey kind of mentioned having a limit to our feud and apparently we're more alike than it seems so we're starting to put things in the past." Anika said after it was clear Ryleigh wasn't going to say anything.
No one said anything for a while, but their eyes looked between Anika and Ryleigh, who stood in the doorway staring down at his feet.
"I'm just going to go, um... put the tools back in the supply shed." Ryleigh briefly lifted his eyes to Anika's before turning on his heel and stepped out of the cabin.
"What...?" Keira breathed as she stared at the place Ryleigh once stood.
"Is he sick or something?" Ivy asked.
"I don't think so." Anika felt relieved that now she wasn't the only one that seemed so confused by his behavior.
"Do you believe him? I mean with the whole war ending with you getting in the last 'say' so to speak." Mel asked, fingering her bed sheets.
"It seemed genuine. He said he was thinking about stopping because it was making him look like a jerk and... he couldn't prank a cripple." Anika, despite her slight annoyance at the diss, cracked a smile.
"Well, that's... nice?" Keira searched for a fitting word. "It just seems so weird seeing him like that." she gestured wildly to the doorway.
"When he's not off hating the world he's actually pretty easy to talk to." Anika admitted with a light shrug.
"So, are you guys friends now since you aren't enemies?" Ivy asked with her head tilted to the side a little. A soft sigh left Anika's lips.
"I don't know."