Way Back When...

"When I say stay low, you stay low!"

Lila watched, laughing as quietly as she could and clutching her stomach, as Kit held a hand to his head, face scrunched in pain. She laughed harder as his expression slowly changed into one where he tried to stop himself smiling; he failed.

"Why don't we just ask her if we can have the cookies?" Lila said, laughing under her breath.

Kit, who knelt opposite her under the island top, shook his head furiously. "That beats the purpose of stealing!"

"Well, you're not very good at it," she smiled.

He quickly peaked past the counter, to where Bridget was swaying and singing a morbid song loudly as she cooked dinner. Her singing covered Lila's laughs, which were gradually increasing. Kit sent her an amused but slightly panicked look. Despite the fact that stealing cookies was fun, neither of them really wanted to face Bridget's wrath if she saw them. Hastily, he made a dash over to Lila's side, where she was closer to the cookies and hidden behind the ancient bookshelf holding cookbooks and a few kitchen utensils.

He knocked into her as he did so, and knocked a cookbook off the shelf, where it fell and smacked Lila on the head; she burst out laughing.

Kit tried shushing her frantically as Bridget stopped singing, but he found himself laughing too.

"Out!" Bridget exclaimed, and Lila jumped to her feet, grabbing Kit's wrist in her hand, pulling him along with her. She was much faster than him, and he stumbled along beside her; she still hadn't stopped laughing, and as he gazed at her, seeing the pure glee on her face, dark hair flying back as they ran, he felt an emotion he couldn't explain fall on his chest. He looked away when she suddenly yanked them around a corner, and into the parlour.

They could hear Bridget yelling from in there. He collapsed into an armchair by the fire unable to control his breathing and his laughing. Lila sat by him on the sofa, trying to breathe between her dying laughs.

"Her face—" he started.

"I know!" She answered, stretching out along the sofa. "Do we go back? Is there any point now she's seen us?"

"Of course."

And they did return. After Bridget had gone to bed, and they didn't have to sneak around.

Kit hoisted himself up onto the counter beside Lila, who offered him a chocolate digestive. He took it. They had four packets of cookies for the both of them; Lila said they should save some for Livvy and Ty.

"How did you get that?" He asked as he took the cookie. He nodded to the white scar that ran across Lila's knuckles.

She handed him the packet and ran the tip of her finger over it, remembering. "When I was little, Mark used to be my favourite person. So I used to make him give me piggyback rides. He had a dagger in his back pocket one day—he completely forgot it was there, and I took it. When he noticed, I ran—and fell—and as I put my hands out, I brought the dagger down by accident. I can remember it clear as anything."

Kit cringed. "Ouch."

She nodded. "Nothing an iratze couldn't fix, though. Five minutes later I was running around with Mark again."

"C'mon," he said, jumping down from the counter. "Let's go search the place."

"That's only because you want to find valuable things to sell," Lila replied, raising her eyebrows, but followed his lead anyway.

He waited for her by the door before they set off up the steps again and out into the hallway. "Yeah," he said, and Lila smiled.

"I could live here," she said, looking around. "You could make it really homey."

"You'd be able to live without the beach?" He said, throwing her a pointed look.

"Well, that could be an issue," she admitted."But I could learn to live with it."

Kit laughed through his nose. He glanced over her dark waves of hair, reaching her waist, her different coloured eyes—no matter how much she hated them, Kit had to admit he thought they were pretty.

He'd never tell her that, though. He'd keep it a secret locked away forever, because Lila only thought of him as a friend, right?

ORIGINAL PUBLISH DATE: 14/12/2020
EDITED DATE: 30/01/2023