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It's mid-day and Oona still hasn’t gotten out of bed, she even called off work using the excuse that she felt unwell. She doubted Sully or their moms believed her but they knew well enough not to push. Ramona was back in town, Annie hadn't stopped talking about her return since she finally agreed to come back to Sterling Point about a month ago. She was supposed to come earlier but something would always come up. Oona’s pretty sure she was the “something” but she couldn’t exactly blame her. She had broken Ramona’s heart, If she was her she wouldn't wanna see herself either. So that’s why she stays here alone on her boat, Ramona deserves to see her friends and not have it be ruined by her presence Oona thinks.
Oona’s moping is interrupted when Maple walks in the door.
“Still pretending to be sick,” she says.
“Being cheeky now are we? I’m not pretending” Oona says, crossing her arms.
“What do you have then? A bad case of avoiding Ramona-itis”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You are good at a lot of things Oona, but lying isn’t one of them... I’ve been reading this self help book and the current chapter is all about avoidants. I really think it would do you well to read-”
“I’M GENUINELY NOT FEELING WELL, MAPLE!” Oona cuts her off. “Just leave me alone please.”
She wasn’t exactly lying, her stomach did hurt and she sorta felt like she was gonna throw up. She wasn’t sure if it was excitement or dread. But I guess either of those emotions feel quite similar in high volumes. Both are sickly.
Maple stares at her, Oona tries not to make eye contact. It’s easier to pretend everything is fine when she doesn’t have to look into her eyes.
“She’s gonna be here for a month Oona, you two are bound to cross paths sooner or later. You have all the same friends. The longer you avoid it the worse it will get.”
Maple then walks to her room and closes the door. She is right, she is always right. Oona hates how smart she is. She shouldn’t be getting love advice from her thirteen year old sister but here she is.
-
A couple hours later Sully arrives to check in on Oona. They know Oona’s coping mechanisms the best and know that this “sickness” she has isn’t actually a sickness. Oona has always had a habit of avoiding her feelings, it hadn’t always been this way but since her mom left she’s found it increasingly more difficult to feel too much of anything, or at least show it that is. She doesn’t have time to be upset, all that would do is worry Maple and that’s the last thing she wants to do. So she decided to “take one for the team”, to act like she doesn’t care and hope that if she does it for long enough maybe she’ll actually start to feel that way. It’s been years and it still hasn’t really worked, all it does is make her feel like she’s carrying more weight. You don’t realize how much energy it takes to be dying and trying to act like you aren’t.
“Let’s go” Sully says as they take her hand and begin to drag her out of bed.
“Go where?” Oona replies as she makes her body go limp so Sully has a harder time.
“I don’t know, but I do know that I’m not gonna let you just sit here and mope. You know I don’t like it when you bottle stuff in” They reply, still attempting to yank Oona out of bed, who resists less now.
“Fine, but I just can’t see her yet…. I’m not ready”
Sully gives her an empathic look and temporarily pauses their attempts to yank her out of bed.
“Okay. But I do think you should try seeing her at some point. I know things ended weirdly between you two but I don’t think it’s fair to punish yourself for it. Maybe having a conversation with her will make you feel better, I mean you still wanna have her in your life do you not?”
“Of course I still want her in my life. I just don’t know how to do that” she can feel her eyes start to sting and tears fight to fall.
“I can’t even bring myself to see her let alone have a relationship with her…. And at this point I don’t even know what I’d want that relationship to be, or if she’d want what I want.”
“Well I think being around her would be a good way to figure that out babes” sully wipes a tear from Oona face.
“But we don’t have to worry about that right now, let’s just go for a walk.”
Oona finally stops resisting and gets out of bed. She throws on her platform crocs and leaves the boat with Sully. It’s beautiful outside, most summer days in Sterling Point are gorgeous but today is especially nice she thinks to herself.
She and Sully make their way down to the docks and that’s when she spots her. A short figure sporting long blonde hair dressed head to toe in clothes that could only be worn by a lesbian or 12 year old boy in the year 2000. It stops her dead in her tracks and she yanks Sully down to hide behind a boat.
“What the hell are you doi-“
Oona cuts them off before they can finish their sentence.
“Ramona is over there” she says in a tone of voice that is both annoyed and terrified.
“Really? Cause I didn’t even see he-“ Sully says as he slowly stands back up to try to peak in the direction he assumes Ramona might be.
“Get down, Jesus!” Oona whispers aggressively as she pulls them again.
“Girl I know you’re scared but this seems a bit excessive.”
“Shut up!”
Their hiding wasn’t exactly the best because before Oona knew it, Ramona and Annie were calling Sully’s name over yonder.
“Sully! Is that you?” Ramona calls out.
Oona deflates in annoyance, “You’re so dumb. Like actually the dumbest.”
“What do you mean?” Sully replies offended.
The two aggressively whisper underneath their breaths. Beginning to argue over the situation without realizing Ramona and Annie are both now in front of them.
“The hell are you guys doing?” Annie asks.
Oona and Sully shoot up from behind a boat, trying to act nonchalant.
“Oh, just cleaning, y’know.” Oona replies awkwardly.
“With no cleaning supplies?”
“Yeah, we were just figuring out a game plan before actually cleaning. This boat is actually going to be quite difficult to tackle. It’s like so dirty.”
Sully gives Oona a weird look.
“Right.” Ramona and Annie say in unison.
The four of them stand there awkwardly. Oona and Ramona haven’t seen each other for a full year and this is not how she imagined their reunion.
Oona breaks the silence, “Welp! We better go get those cleaning supplies.” Oona takes Sully’s hand, yanking them away before things could get more awkward than they already are.
“Okay? Have fun.” Annie says confused while the two walk away.
“Oona, what the hell are you doing?” Sully whispers.
“I don’t know. I couldn’t stand there any longer.” Oona whispers back.
“Are we actually getting cleaning supplies?”
“No? You think i’d clean a boat for free?”
“Where are we going?”
“To a big cliff so I can jump off of it and kill myself.”
“To be completely honest with you, I think you just made things way more awkward between you guys.”
“I know that Sully!”
“You didn’t even greet her.”
“I KNOW!”
The two make their way back to her boat and Oona immediately face plants into her bed and groans.
“Maybe they will pretend like this never happened?” Sully tries to suggest it in an attempt to comfort her.
Oona can hear them talking but can’t really process anything they say. All she can think of is how badly she ruined her reunion with Ramona. She hasn’t seen the girl in a year and doesn’t even say Hi and she blows her off to go “clean” a boat. There’s a zero percent chance Ramona doesn’t think she’s bullshitting, which she is. She’s got to find a way to fix this and regain some dignity, because this was just pathetic.