Deciding to Wait

Mia looked at me, she had been crying but still smiled when she saw me and moved her hand so she could hold mine. She looked back to the forest and didn't say anything for while. We sat there in silence for several minutes before she squeezed my hand and sighed.

"Jax kicked me out of the training group because I decided to wait to take the adventurer's trial with you instead of going with everyone else."

I was surprised, not just that Jax would kick her out of the group for such a reason but that she would sacrifice being an adventurer to stay here with me.

"I'm sorry..." I said. "You should go back and tell him you changed your mind, I'll be fine here alone for six months."

"No, it's... I know you would... I don't want to be in the city without you for six months. I can wait."

"Oh." I didn't know what else to say.

We returned to silence. Guilt about betraying Amelia eased its way into my heart, but maybe Amelia had betrayed me as well. Did we ever really have a relationship that could be betrayed, it was like Oliver's mother had said, we were friends. We never took any additional steps... Because Amelia was so focused on becoming the best adventurer she could.

I found myself appreciating that Mia's goal to become an adventurer was worth sacrificing to stay with me. I also found myself grateful I didn't have to guess at the problems she was hiding from me.

"Did you find Amelia last night?"

"Yeah."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"She denied being with Kase and yelled at me when I pushed for answers to what she was hiding. I left her after that and she stood outside her house for a long time."

"Oh. Darx, I don't know that anything is happening with her and Kase, I'm just guessing. I don't want to make you hurt yourself and find out that nothing was happening. I don't want you to hate me for clouding how you felt about Amelia. I shouldn't have said what I did at the cave. I was selfish..."

I shook my head and laughed. This was out of character for Mia who always spoke harsh words about Amelia and only ever hoped those words would sway my heart.

"No, Mia. I didn't do that because of what you said. But thank you for telling me."

"I stayed up all night feeling like I manipulated you. I don't want a relationship with you where I feel like that."

I nodded and we returned to silence once more. She stood and held out her unbroken arm for me and pulled me up.

"What do you say we go train?" she asked.

"Train like yesterday or?" I joked.

"Yes, I want to do that training!" she exclaimed. "But I'm sore from yesterday. And your heart is sore from Amelia. So soon, when we've both recovered a bit?"

"Yeah, sounds good! But with your arm broken, what kind of training can we do?"

"I'm going to teach you some of the tricks that Jax has been teaching us," she said.

We left the village but stayed close enough we could retreat to safety if one of the unusually bold monsters appeared. Mia couldn't help me fight any monsters so I was on my own, luckily they were all weak, and she showed me some useful tips to improve my form. For the first time I started to regret having not trained with Jax, maybe if I had done that I would be stronger... I wouldn't have been hurt by the troll and Amelia...

I shook the thought away.

We trained through the rest of the day, between fights she opened up a bit more about her reasoning for deciding to wait, and I walked Mia back to her house before heading home to mine. I thought more about how I should've had someone with more skill there to teach me. If not Jax, I should've asked my mother join Amelia, Oliver, and I in the forest so we could fight stronger monsters. As I walked up the path to my house I decided that I was going to tell my mom about Jax dropping Mia and see if she would stop training Kase to train us and Oliver instead. Assuming Oliver would want to stay in the party with Amelia gone and Mia taking her place.

I crossed that bend and mine and Amelia's houses came into view. Amelia was sitting outside my house with my mom who stood and went inside.

"Darx!" Amelia called out. "Where have you been? I've been waiting for you all day."