Chapter Eighteen
Heather walked along the banks of Cyrstal Springs, admiring her surroundings. After seventeen years of being cooped up inside a basement with no way out, she still couldn't get enough of the outdoors. After a few rounds around the spring, she finally sat down on the cool grass and looked up at the clouds. They were beautiful, and she could easily find shapes in them.
There's a tree... a boat... a heart... a crocodile... Heather thought to herself, gazing at the puffs of white drifting lazily trough the cyan colored sky. Suddenly, a voice from behind her startled her out of her thoughts.
"Fancy meeting you here!" Heather spun around, and saw Zachary Alvins, whom she'd met a few weeks ago. Heather scrambled up to her feet.
"Hi, Zachary. What are you doing here?"
He sighed. "Getting away from the town, I guess. I come here a lot."
"Why would you want to get away?" Heather asked, puzzled.
"I'm not the most popular person in Sunset Valley, to tell you the truth. Just because my parents aren't married, they treat me like I've got two heads of something like that."
"They're not married? Why?"
"My mom's just afraid of commitment. After they found out she was pregnant with me, he took her here, and proposed to her, but she turned him down. This got my dad really angry, and things were pretty tense between them for a couple weeks. After I was born, mom moved in with some friends, and my dad raised me, although I still saw my mom a lot. My parents still love each other, but they're not ready to get married" He sighed. "And I doubt they ever will be. But almost everyone in town blames me for that, so things are pretty hard for me right now."
Heather patted his shoulder. "Aw, that's rough. Where do your parents live?"
"My mom lives in one of those yellow wood houses by the Lofty Cerulean Blue Pool, and my dad and I live in a really cramped, one bedroom house. How about you?"
"Oh, umm..." Heather didn't want to tell him that she lived in a locked basement. "That red roofed house over there. It;s out in the middle of nowhere, but it's home."
"That's a nice house, I'd like to visit it sometime."
Heather smiled. "Sure!"
For a couple hours, they just sat on a large rock, chatting, while Heather tried to work up the courage to tell Zachary how she felt about him. A comfortable silence settled over them, until Heather finally said "Uhm... Zachary? You're a really awesome friend, and I feel really close to you. But.. I really like you. Do you think we could be... more than... just friends?"
Zachary grinned at her. "Funny, I was about to ask you the same question!"
Heather stuck her tongue out playfully at him. "Well, I beat'cha to it! So is that a yes?''
Rather that answering, Zachary leaned in and kissed her gently on her lips. Heather stiffened in surprise, but then relaxed and returned the kiss. For a while, they just sat in each other's arms, gazing up at the darkening sky. Finally, Heather reluctantly stood up.
"I have to get home, my parents are going to get mad. I'll see you later?"
He smiled. "Sure. I'll walk you home."
Heather shook her head. ''It's not that far away. I'll be okay, I promise." She turned to walk away, but Zachary grabbed her arm.
"Wait!" He took off one of the dog tags around his neck, and put it around Heather's neck. "Here, I want you to have this. That one used to belong to my mother, but she gave it back to him after she turned down his proposal. The other one was my father's. My dad gave them both to me on my birthday."
Heather fingered the wing etched onto the tag. "Are you sure? I mean, they must be really important to you..."
Zachary grinned at her. "Heather, I wouldn't be giving it to you if I wasn't sure. It's yours."
"Ok. Thanks you!" Heather turned and ran down the hill. When she was far away enough, she hid behind a large boulder and pressed "Return Home" on the remote control. As soon as she appeared in the basement, she was nearly hit in the face with a flying pawn.
"Hi, Heather!" Lily called walking over to her. "You're back early! How was your walk?"
"It was fine." She answered. But deep don, she was suspicious. Lily was acting odd, very jumpy and flustered. Finally, she shrugged it off, and asked, "What's going on?"
"Oh, Violet started using the pieces for Daisy's chess set to play doll while Daisy was having lunch."
"I should've figured Violet was involved in this." She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "What are you doing so close to the teleported pad, anyway?"
Lily twisted a wavy brown lock of hair around her finger nervously "Oh, I was... um... getting out of Violets' line of fire?"
Heather continued to look at her suspiciously. "Hmm."
Lily looked down guiltily at her dark pink boots. "What? I was."
Before Heather could respond, Amanda called, "Hi, Heather! Dinner's almost ready, so wash you hands!"
She headed towards the sink, willing to let the subject drop... for now.
Time skip...
Later that night, Heather lay in bed, studying her dog tag. She had found true love, after all these years of waiting and wishing. She loved Zachary. Heather took the dog tag off, and put it under her bed to be safe. Just was she was about to lie down and close her eyes, the room was briefly illuminated by a dim orange glow. Someone was using the teleporter. She sat up with a start, and looked around at the bed's on her right. Amanda and Raymond were still asleep, snuggled up in each other's arms, and Rose was still in bed as well. She located Daisy, hugging her teddy bear to her chest, but Lily's bed was empty. This was why Lily had been acting weird, and hanging around the teleporter pad. This was why her sister had never asked for stories about the outside world, like Daisy and Violet. She had already seen it! Heather jumped out of bed, and quickly pulled on her jeans and a sweater. I have to get Lily back, now!
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Chapter Notes:
* See what I meant by mush? -.-''
* All the romance scenes in this story have been really terrible, and I apologize for that
* Zachary and his parents were made by me in CAS. No way am I pairing Heather up with some random Story Progression made guy!
* In the game, Zachary's parents are married, because CAS wouldn't let me make them Boyfriend/Girlfriend, and have Zachary as their kid.
* Also, I had to make Zachary start out as a teen, age him up with cheats and send Heather to give him a makeover, since CAS wouldn't let me give them a YA son, either. So, yeah, getting Zachary in my game was a total pain in the neck.
* I'll post pictures of Zachary tomorrow. He's really quite handsome! ^^
* Tel me what you think of this chapter! Pwease?~ :3
