What her feelings truly are

The rays of sunlight passed through the mass of leaves. Hearing the sound from the surging water made me feel bliss and relaxed. As the light met my eyes, I squinted.

“So where the heck are we?"

Looking back from yesterday, Marco planned to go to the beach with us. Unfortunately, most of the beach areas were close since it's out of season. Still, he badly wants to swim that was why we ended up on the vacation house in the middle of nowhere.

Trees... trees, all I could see were trees as though we were in the middle of the forest. Well, we were in the middle of the forest.

“A-are you okay?" Chloe asked as she sat next to me and stretched her arms onto the river in front of us, swaying it on the water.

“Yeah, I guess..." hugging both of my knees and burying my face in it.

In the meantime, we were in the penthouse of Marco's relative, and here I thought he was just a filthy peasant like me. Mikael and Ericka were inside preparing for our lunch, while Marco on the other side, was nowhere to be found.

After we arrived here, he excitedly ran through the forest holding a stick that I had no idea where he got and left us. Damn that Marco, I knew he just escaping from the house works.

As I continued to enjoy—or rather, kill my time swaying my feet on the water, I felt a heavy footstep stop at my back. Without a word, a foot imprinted on my back, pushing me to the river.

Before I utterly fell into the water, I saw the face of the one who pushed me. It was Mikael who wasn't wearing his upper clothes, still, his feet in the mid-air with a sly grin on his face, beside him was Ericka with her long brown cardigan.

Panicking underwater, I swam upwards trying to catch some air.

“Damn you, Mikael! come here I'll murder you!" I said as I flapped my feet towards them, my head over the water.

The river was not that deep but I could say that it exceeded my height. Gladly, I was a good swimmer back in elementary and obviously, even now. It wasn't something that could be easy to forget, you know.

I stopped as I saw them making a weird stance, hands in front of them while their body bent forward. In a flash, Marco and Mikael ran in my direction and hopped over me, making my face drain its blood as I saw them above me slowly falling in my exact position.

“Guh!!"

Once more, my face fell into the water, watching the bubbles dancing upwards, and felt dizzy.

*

Our little fun continued, or their little fun continued. I couldn't remember what happens next.

As I opened my eyes I was no longer at the river instead, I was lying on one of the sofas in the penthouse. Gradually pushing my hands onto the leather surface, I held my head in an instant as a strong headache struck my head.

Reminiscing what happened earlier made my head more painful than it originally was. The pain made me unaware that there was a bandage on the right part of my head.

I tried to touch it but ended up winced because of the pain. Probably it wasn't the headache but an injury, I thought as I contemplated what part of my head was hurt.

For a short while, a looked at the interior of the penthouse, wooden walls, and wooden floor covered with brown rug. To be honest, it was a bit cozy, especially with the placement of flower vases at the window, there were also sofas and wooden tables along with wooden shelves and cabinets. At the right end, there was a spiral wooden stair probably headed to the second floor of the penthouse where our rooms were.

It made me want to live in such a place like this...

After a moment, I heard a few steps walking towards me—probably since the steps made louder and louder each time. I jolted as a hard object poked my back, I glance at it and saw Ericka standing at my back, holding a tray with a wooden bowl and utensils on it.

She looked at me dubiously unlike her usual facial expression, but I felt that she was thinking ‘Why are you so surprised?' probably just for me, she was thinking that.

She bent her knees and put the tray on the small wooden table on my side, and say “Don't think that I'll feed you..." with her monotone voice. No, I'm not!

I expected that she would walk away and leave me alone but I was wrong instead, I felt a heaviness in the vacant space of the sofa where I was sitting.

“Ummm... Ericka?" I asked as I felt the awkwardness between us, I wasn't looking at her since she was sitting at my back. “What's wrong?"

In a brief moment, she fell in silence, quietly sat on the free part of the sofa without making any noises, and then finally opened her mouth.

“I have a request to ask..."

My brows curved after I heard what she said, it was the first time she'd asked me something so I should hear it.

“What is it? make sure that it was in the capability of a human," I joked, just to decrease the awkwardness surrounding us.

Instead of being on the point and telling me what she wants me to do, she told me a story, no... it was her story.

“I apologize if I was kinda rude to you sometimes, it wasn't intentional... as you see, at school, the only person who was talking to me before was Mikael... He's still being kind to me even I said bad words to him. Back in my previous class, no one dares to talk to me. I felt like being shunned by my classmates, it felt like I'm out of place... but thanks to Mikael, I survive those days without trying to transfer to another class or school." she exclaimed, toying her index fingers to each other.

“So, you were saying?" I turned my head and looked at her.

She paused, and the next thing that happened surprised me, made me feel glad, and...for some reason, made my chest heavy. She made her sweetest smile, looking at her there something shimmered on the sides of her eyes, and I realized that it was a tear of happiness.

“I love him... I love Mikael, I want to be always by his side watching him doing stupid things, laughing at his own mistakes, giving his best even in the smallest details, and loving what he does. I love him, at first, I thought I'm just lonely and wanted someone to treat specially of me. At first, I thought I only love him as a brother or a guardian but it turns out I love him for who he really is. Mikael, I love him... every fiber of my body wants to be with him..." her tears fell on her lap but she hadn't cared to wipe it “That's why..." she looked at me with her eyes glinted, held the back of my palm and said—

“Can you help me to be with Mikael?"