Ariel woke up from her sleep after feeling a rumbling in her stomach.
"Mmh!" She held her stomach and winced. Ariel was feeling extrely hungry since she had emptied her stomach a while ago.
She slowly sat up on her bed. The motion sickness that she was feeling had subsided to so extent.
"I better ask Osanna to get sothing to eat," Ariel thought to herself and slipped out of her bed.
She strode towards the door in a hurry.
"Ow!" But she ended up stumbling on sothing invisible and falling to the ground with a thud.
Her eyes widened in shock and her heartbeat escalated because she could feel sothing with her leg, or rather, she could feel soone.
"Ariel? What happened?" Ariel heard Niylah's voice before she could think of anything.
Ariel turned her head to the wall on her left and answered, "Oh, nothing. I'm okay."
Ariel felt that invisible being that she was stepping on trying to wriggle away from her. She swiftly dove her hand down on the floor and happened to catch what felt like an arm.
"Are you sure? Do you need to co over?" Niylah asked in a worried voice.
Ariel tightened her hold on that arm and answered again, "I was just hungry, Ny. Don't worry. I'm fine now."
She then flicked her palm and turned the room into a soundproof one.
She glared down at the invisible arm she was holding and asked in a threatening tone, "Who the hell are you? Show yourself before I kill you."
Ariel was already in battle mode. She was not going to let anyone ruin her not-so-enjoyable voyage or hurt anyone on the ship.
She was expecting to et one of her relatives from her father's side.
But when the invisibility spell slowly lifted, Ariel was stunned to her core.
A man with reddish-brown hair and a sowhat familiar face structure was lying down on the floor with a guilty expression on his face.
Ariel glanced at the wrists of that man just to reconfirm. Her eyes landed on the familiar pieces of jewelry.
"It was indeed him…" she thought to herself.
She then shakily took a deep breath in and let go of her hold on that man's arm. Ariel's chest felt heavy. Her heart was filled with all kinds of emotions at once – happiness, sadness, anger, shock.
She was unable to process all those emotions and she just kept on staring at the man in front of her with eyes full of tears.
Damien sat up while facing Ariel. He was in no better condition. First of all, he hadn't thought that he would be caught like this. And though he had a lot of things in his mind to say to Ariel, he went blank when those glistening amber eyes stared back at him with silence.
After about a full minute, Damien took a deep breath in and finally mustered up the courage to speak up.
"Ariel. Hey. Umm… How… how have you been?"
"How have I been?"
Ariel snickered at Damien. Sothing snapped inside Ariel's head when she heard that question from him.
She knitted her brows and gave a tight slap across his face.
"I'm sorry that–"
Ariel clenched her jaw and slapped him on the other cheek again.
Ariel hit him with so much force that not just his head but even his body was jerked to the side.
But he still looked at her with even more guilt on his face. And he tried to speak again, "I'm sorry for not contacting you for so long, Ariel."
Drops of tears rolled down Ariel's cheeks. She was happy to see him again, no matter after how many years. But she was mad that he took so long to co back.
She gave him a tight slap again and yelled at him, "Do you even have the faintest idea what you put through, you arse! Do you have any idea how much I yearned to see your stupid face again? Do you have any idea how much you hurt by denying to see ?"
Damien looked down and said in a whisper, "I'm sorry, Ariel. I really am. I cannot–"
"Sorry is not going to take us back to our childhood now, is it? And it definitely isn't going to magically nd our friendship… that is if that's why you are back." Ariel wiped her eyes and got back up on her feet.
And she shouted at him again, "Why are you here now, Damien? Didn't you say 'I hope we never et again' before leaving stranded there in Mihir? So, why are you here?"
"Of course, I am here for you, Ariel. I do want to nd our friendship. That is why I am here." Damien watched Ariel turn her back on him and walk to the furthest corner of her room.
He got up on his feet and took a few steps towards her. And he continued to speak what was in his mind, "I was a dumb kid back then, Ariel. I know, saying sorry after all these years won't repair the strain in our friendship like so magic wand."
Damien went and stood in front of Ariel. He looked her in the eyes and then said in desperation, "But I would like to restart sowhere."
"Restart?" Ariel mockingly chuckled and asked coldly, "Why do you want to restart now? Why not wait another decade or another century? We have all the ti in the world, right? Aren't you back here on the Earth realm a little too soon?"
Damien looked at Ariel as if he was drowned in self-hatred and despair. He gently held Ariel's hand and lancholically poured out everything that he was keeping in his heart for all these years.
"I know you are greatly mad at . And you have every right to be.
There is no reasonable justification for why I cut you off from my life like that. Now that I think back, every reason seems irrelevant compared to what I lost during those years – you.
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But at that ti, after how I tried to kill you that day, I could not bring myself to face you again. I was ashad of myself. I despised myself and my action. And I was afraid that I would hurt you again. I couldn't forgive myself for what I did that day, Ariel.
And I don't expect you to forgive this instant or let back in your life this instant. But I want to say that I want to do everything in my power to win you over again. I don't want to hide from you anymore."
"See…" Ariel pulled her hand away from Damien and gulped. And she muttered in a broken voice, "This is the difference between you and , Damien. You single-handedly make decisions for both of us. You're doing it even now.
Did you ever think that probably, talking things over with was better than completely avoiding and hurting both of us?
Did it ever occur to you that probably I have already forgiven you? Even now, you are still making it sound as if you don't expect to forgive you at all. You just assu things on your own and create problems that didn't even exist in the first place.
You called your friend and yet you thought so lowly of . Why? Why did you think that I wouldn't understand what you did that day? You were heartbroken and shocked. Even I would have done the sa if I was in your shoe.
Didn't I tell you then and there that everything was okay between and you? Didn't I offer you my hand?"
Ariel broke down into tears again when she whispered painfully, "Everything would have been fine if you had just taken my hand…"
Damien's eyes were also full of tears. He felt a lump in his throat. And his heart ached after everything that they went through played in his mind again.
He swiftly wiped a drop of tear that fell from his eye. He held out his hand towards Ariel and said, "I am willing to take your hand now, Riri."
He gave a look of desperation to Ariel and asked, "Will you pull out from my personal hell that I have been living in for all these years?"
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