4 hours and 30 minutes till they arrived at Selena’s house. It wasn’t anything extravagant, a simple double-story house with a reasonably spacious yard. The jeep pulled up into their yard and the house door opened up before they could get down. Two large build man was already walking towards them with a wide grin.
Selena ran head over heels towards the first man, who was already waiting for her with open arms. She grabbed his neck and jumped up to wrap her legs around his waist, shrinking into a small girl in his tribal tattoo-covered arms. He gave her a long, hard kiss on her cheeks before she lay her cheek on his shoulders
“I miss you, dad…” it came as a muffle.
” I missed you too, baby Bambi…” she chuckled.
“Oi…” another man said with discontent from behind and Selena slides down from her dad.
“Hey bro…” she extended her hand for a shake but that man, with an irritated look, pulled her hand into a hug as he carried her off ground
“I thought you said no more hugging” her voice came restrained due to the forceful hug.
“Except when you go missing for a week without any contact,” he said with a laugh. He placed her down and wrapped his hand across her shoulder, hiding half of her body with his.
Zaden felt so jealous of their interaction, how freely they can show their affection to her or call her by a nickname or being able to say ‘I miss you’ without getting a weird look from her. She turned around to see Zaden already close to them with a smile on his face.
“Dad…Zaden Black, Grandpa Kai. Zaden, Grandpa Kai, my dad Leonardo and my dear brother, Aaron” they shook their hands and introduced themselves. Leonardo’s first question after that was ‘where are her friends’. She ‘froze for a minute
‘Shit I didn’t think of that’
“They are on their way in another jeep” Selena’s eye snapped at Zaden. It must be a lie to stale the current situation but she played along and invited them to their house.
Selena offered her room for them to freshen up and get ready to go meet Grandma Genesis while she used another room to freshen up and rest. Zaden didn’t understand why does she have to give away her room to guests and use the other room, which he presumed to be a guest room but he shrugged it off.
Selena’s room was simple. White walls with black wooden framed windows and an extremely soft queen size bed. The walls were filled with photos of from her memories lane, mostly with her mother. A row of friend’s photos arranged chronologically, from when they were somewhere around 5 up to today.
‘No wonder why she cared so much about them, they have been together practically their whole life.’
Zaden’s eyes trailed to portrait photos of a baby, pouting her lips as a drop of tears rolled down her eye and the moon mark was just a dot, back then. A weird photo of her in teenage, sleeping in a fetal pose on top of a car flinched him a tad. Another photo of her wearing an oversized sunglass, oversized heel, a handbag, and a red lip, wearing nothing but panties, finally made Zaden huff a laugh. The thought of having a baby just like that tingled blush on his cheeks.
She seemed to be the type that lives her life to the fullest, every day counts, as can be seen from the photos. She had been to gun shooting, horse riding, diving and there was one picture that caught his attention the most. A picture was taken from her back, in greyscale. Her head turned sideways, revealing a part of her face and the moon mark is clearly visible at that age. Her hair flowing down her back, swept slightly by the blowing wind and she was actually sitting on a cliff edge where the sun is setting down. It was mesmerizing with only one flaw. She didn’t smile–blunt–depressed–– lonely–brimming with sorrow.
Zaden goes around her room, checking her items when he found a small blanket with rabbit prints on them. Her scent invaded him as he brought the blanket closer to his nose–the same scent he fell for that day at the mountain foot–the scent that was capable to distract him–the scent that he indulged, the very next day at the waterfall. His lips curled slightly upwards as he froze at the blanket.
“She is lovely, isn’t she? Oh, how I wish to be young!!! I would sweep her off her feet and marry her” Grandpa Kai, as he tried to balance himself with the walking stick
“Wow, slow down, tiger” Zaden supported him by his arm and gently helped him to lie down.
“I’m going to take a bath, you stay here. Don’t go snooping around.” He said sternly and left to take a bath.
Selena walked out of her ‘guest’ room and meet Zaden’s chocolaty eye at the end of the corridor. He is wearing a white t-shirt and light blue jeans which reminds her of her dream crush. Deep down, she does miss him but at the same time, it is unhealthy and weird. Hence, she rarely wore the turquoise neckpiece anymore. Still, her chest tightens every time she realize that she is giving up her first crush.
They walked towards each other and when they were close enough, she peeped to the back, looking for Grandpa Kai.
“He will be out in 10 or 15 minutes,” he said and she nodded. Selena made coffee for all of them as Zaden was busy talking to Leonardo and Aaron. They seem to bond well with all sorts of manly discussions that could never interest Selena.
After the coffee break, they headed out, aiming towards Grandma Genesis’s place which was across the town. Her hand had just wrapped around the jeep’s handle when another jeep, similar to theirs, pulled up to their yard. Her friends got out of it. Selena shrieked and ran towards them. So did they, and hugged each other in the mid-way. They were touching Selena everywhere and Jewel turned her round and round. Orion stepped out of the car and paced behind them
“Are you ok? ” Jeffry asked
“I’m fine. How did you guys get here?”
“Orion said we can go home, and he drove us here but we thought you are still at the mountains!!!” they must have left the mountains within hours after Zaden did or else they couldn’t have made it here this fast. Zaden wasn’t lying earlier. She turned to face Zaden and smiled at him which spells thank you all over it. He nodded in response.
“Hey there, pumpkin. I haven’t seen you in a long time too. Don’t I deserve a hug?” Orion, already splayed open his arm ready to receive her. She hugged him gently and said thank you. After being depressed for 2 days due to Zaden’s restriction, he finally felt relief.
Orion joined them towards Grandma Genesis’s house. Zaden couldn’t contain the doubt lingering at the tip of his tongue.
” Why did you sleep on the car roof?” and earned a confused look from her.
“The photo wall?!?! There was a picture of you sleeping on top of a yellow car roof” he explained and she rolled her eyes away to face the road before sighing deep.
“That was on my 16th birthday. Apparently, I have a low tolerance for alcohol. My dad looked for me everywhere and I was found sleeping on top of a car roof.” Grandpa Kai and Orion let out a hearty laugh while Zaden tried his best to restrain himself.