Our Day Will Come

*Baby Daya*

Day Five - December 7, Friday

Dear Dad, for most of yesterday, you were the furthest thing from my mind. With so many things going on I didn't have time to focus on you for once. You were replaced by Liv tormenting me and Jay destroying my feelings from the outside.

Plus, I gained and possibly lost a group of friends the same day I met them.

I'm destructive.

For so long I have blamed others for my misfortunes, but maybe it's time to blame myself.

I ruin everything.

One of the various wishes I have is to be able to talk to you again. You always knew what to say and how to say it. But things are different now. You... made my mom cry and you're still doing that from far away. I needed you and you took yourself out of our lives. You took our choices away when you did what you did. I have to blame myself for the decisions and actions that I've made. You must as well.

"Mmmm," I groaned as I was met with sunshine piercing through my window. One eye of mine crept open, and I saw him.

I whispered through my groggy voice, "Dad."

"It's morning, Sunshine," his hands dropped the string that pulled the blinds up. I sunk deeper into my bed and smothered my face with my pillow.

The bed shifted, and I felt the pillow slowly lifting off me. "It's too early to get up. Five more minutes, please."

"We have a big day today, Sunshine." The pillow was switched out by my hands as I said, "No," with a pouty look on my face.

"Your mother is making your favorite breakfast," he said in a sing-song way.

I spread open two of my fingers to peek at him, "Chocolate chip waffles?" He smiled that flashing grin that Mom always told me won her over.

"Yes, with bacon, sausage, and eggs to go with them." I moved both of my hands off my face with a smile so wide it could match the jokers.

"You've convinced me!" He high-fived himself as he said, "Woohoo kiddo." I threw myself over at him and wrapped him into a huge hug. "I love you, Dad," to which he replied, "Dad loves you too."

That happened on a morning like this one a decade ago. Except this time, I awoke to Dennis pulling the blinds up.

"Little Miss, it's time to get up," he said and then proceeded to wince slightly. I pretended that I didn't see it to help with his, this totally doesn't hurt, act.

He said in a sing-song way that was uncharacteristic of him, "Mom is making waffles."

I ran my fingers through my hair, which was still marginally damp in some places, and yawned. "We have the stuff to make waffles?"

My yawn covered a few of my words. "We went to the store yesterday, while you were off with your little friends."

I rolled off the edge of the bed and sat up, "You jealous that you had to stay home with mom while I went out?"

"Hm, you have fun with that," he scoffed.

He came and sat beside me. "She needed someone here. It's getting hard to depend on you." I didn't anticipate how bad that sounded when I said it.

"I didn't mean it that way. I know she needs us, both of us." I paused before I softly placed my hand over his.

"Did she talk about it anymore?" I made my shoulders small and brought all parts of me closer together.

He leaned into my shoulder. "No. Let's double-team her at breakfast."

I smacked his arm lightly, "We can't do that to her. She said this is too overwhelming for her already and you want to bombard her!"

"It worked last time we needed her to tell us something. We deserve to know exactly what happened at that meeting to make her react that way." I knew where he was coming from, but what if we went too far and she freaked out?

"We have to be smart about this Denny. We can't ambush her. Ease her into the conversation and let her talk about one thing at a time, sandwich it." I clapped my hands.

He scrunched his face up and leaned his head back, "Do what?"

I giggled at his facial expression. "Talk about something light, ask her a hard question, and then back to something light."

He didn't look any less confused, "What does that have to do with a sandwich? Is light, light bread?"

I couldn't tell if he was joking or not, "It's an expression," I said through my laughter.

Denny and I walked out into the hallway both feeling a little bit lighter. "Don't start without me," I pointed at him as I walked back towards my room.

He raised his hands up, "I won't. As long as you don't take too long."

I ducked into my room with a little shake in my movement. I pulled out some distressed jeans, a black bandeau top, and an oversized red and black plaid shirt.

"You'll do," I put my clothes on my bed and walked over to where my phone was charging.

'Ok. I'll see you in the morning,' was the first text I saw from Banks.

There were no new messages from Jay, not that I was hoping there would be. I looked back over the texts Banks sent me last night. Piper and Celia both have my number and neither of them texted me to see if I was okay, even after my abrupt exit. They must have still been upset with me. Well, I was upset with myself too.

Brian had also texted to see if I was okay. I felt horrible but I couldn't deny that I was more drawn to Banks than anyone I had met before. I needed to tell Brian something, but I left it alone at that moment.

I texted Banks, 'Good morning. Thanks for checking on me last night.'

Without my knowledge, a smile was on my face as I looked at the silly picture by his name. I put my phone back on my nightstand and continued getting ready.

After I got done in the bathroom, I came back into my room and rushed back over to my phone. It lit up as soon as I walked in. All the nerves in my body were tingling and I tried to shake it off. When I lifted the phone to my face it lit up again and I saw it. My heart dropped when I read the message that could've possibly killed me.

'Morning Sunshine, do you think I could pick you up from school today?' - Dad

The phone slipped out of my hand immediately and hit the side of the bed before landing on the floor. My breathing became frantic as I started panting and the hand that was previously holding the phone started shaking. A knock hit my door, and I screamed like there was a possible murderer at my door.

Denny ran in and bent down in front of me. He put his hand on my forehead to see if I was warm, "Jeez Daya." He looked around my room with his eyes bulging from his head.

"Where is your medicine?" I didn't answer as my tremor spread to both of my hands and my breathing became short.

"Daya," he yelled, "Tell me!"

It took all that I had to be able to point at the bag by my closet. He ran over to it and dumped all my things out of it. As he picked up my prescription anxiety medicine, he looked pissed before he brought it over to me.

I could tell that he was struggling to open the bottle because he could only use one hand. But he managed to. He sat beside me, got one pill out, tilted my head back, and covered my mouth with his hand. The pill fell down my throat, and I started coughing. My breathing normalized as I fell back on my bed.

His non-casted hand slammed into the side of my bed. "What was that, Day?"

"There's always something wrong with you," he said angrily. He paced in front of me with his hand on his hip like he was about to scold me.

I choked out breathlessly, "I need water."

"Right," he helped me get onto my feet and threw my arm over his shoulder with a wince. Together, we drug our bodies into the kitchen. We stumbled a bit, well a lot because he was carrying most of my weight, and I was still shaky.

"God, what's happening?" My mom said as Dennis sat me on the stool by the island. She felt my forehead and my cheeks. My whole face was blood red, and my breathing became jagged with coughs. Denny walked back over with a bottle of water, tilted my head back again, and the icy liquid soothed my throat. He sat the water on the island as I slumped in my seat.

"Honey, please tell me that you're alright," she sounded like she was on the brink of tears for the millionth time this week. I nodded as she leaned our foreheads together.

Denny asked sternly. "When was the last time you took your medicine?"

"What?" I exhaled.

Dennis looked like he cracked the case. "Oh, come on that explains so much. You could barely keep yourself up when I took you to class yesterday. Your episode at school. You were sitting completely still by a window for hours while all of us tried to save your ass! And now this!"

He gestured towards my impaired state, "That explains it. So, when was the last time you took it?"

My heart was still racing as my mom turned my face away from him and towards her. "You can tell me. I promise I won't," I jerked my head away, and she said the last few words speedily, "Be upset with you."

"It's only been a few days, I promise," I said misty-eyed.

"You know the side effects of not taking your medicine. I should've seen it," my mom said looking away from me.

I groaned in frustration. "Yeah, I also know the side effects of taking it. If I rely on it too much, I could get addicted. I wanted to see how long I could last without it. It was dumb, but I'm not trying to be on these for the rest of my life!"

"Why do you have to be so stubborn all the time?" Dennis muttered through gritted teeth.

"Me? Dennis, look at you! There's no way that you can tell me what's right and wrong! You're not my new father figure, so stop trying to be!" I snapped.

With a clenched jaw, his voice rumbled, "You need one! I'm doing my best here, Daya! You don't know how hard you are to deal with every day! I got my own shit going on! I don't need yours too!"

Ding, the waffle maker went off. Mom went over to get it and Denny glared at me disappointingly.

"I'm not asking you to! In fact, here I am telling you to back the F off!" I made sure Mom had her back turned before I gave him the bird.

Fiery anger rushed through him. "Oh, we all feel so bad for you! You aren't the only person who lost him, Daya! Do you think I want to take that role? The last thing I want to do is be stuck taking care of you!"

"Stop it, both of you!" Mom yelled and broke a plate over the island. "You're acting like children so shut up, sit down, and eat the breakfast I made for you ungrateful kids!"

Dennis and I stared at her and saw the walls crumbling down. She was wrangled with anger and I could physically see her muscles tense.

"Mom... Dennis," a tear fell out of my eye, "I'm so sorry."

He shook his head, "I don't want to hear it. You're smart enough to know that randomly not taking your medicine will make your symptoms worse." I knew that, but it didn't matter to me anymore. Maybe I wanted to be worse.

"I'm sorry! I know it wasn't the right move. You have to understand." Dennis wouldn't even look at me anymore.

"It's over with now. I'm going to sit down," he squeezed Mom's arm as he walked by.

"Do you think you can eat?" She spoke with the soft voice I became accustomed to before she walked over to me and pressed the back of her hand into my forehead. "Yes. I am sorry Mom."

She tried to smile at me. "I know, baby. I'm sorry too."

The meal began with silence, for none of us quite knew what to say.

"These... waffles are so delicious. Thanks, Mom," I said trying to combat the tension in the air.

"I know they're your favorite," she said not looking up from her plate. Dennis looked between the two of us with his mouth full and a question in his eyes.

He gulped, "I was thinking over the ten minutes we've been sitting here in silence. You never said why you freaked out this morning. We have way too much we need to speak about, but we can start with this. Did something happen Daya or did withdrawals just finally catch up to you?"

He popped another piece of waffle in his mouth. "I guess it's the latter, nothing happened."

"Daya is doing better now, so let's drop it, son," my mom faked a grin in his direction.

"Fine, my food is great too. So now, you're in the hot seat, Mom. What happened yesterday?" He dropped his fork on the table and leaned back in his chair.

She looked between us perplexed. "You know what happened yesterday. I was feeling emotional and I had a bit of an overreaction."

I looked over at the empty chair near Dennis. "Mom, please don't lie to us," my voice was light, and my green eyes trickled with moisture.

"It's not a lie," she tried to find my eyes that were lost in the wooden specks of the chair. "Your father is the love of my life. He's all I've ever known. This whole situation is terrible for me. It's really over. I'm still trying to grasp that and I'm going to need you two to give me time."

She wheezed out, "In the meeting yesterday, I was made aware that your father is fighting very hard for both of you. And he believes he should get the house because soon I won't be able to afford it. All we have to live on right now is child and spousal support because it's hard for me to go back to nursing since I haven't worked in almost two decades." She closed her eyes and whimpered softly.

"I'm trying... so hard to be strong for the both of you, but this is all so difficult for me. I never, in a million years, expected this to happen. When we met, I wasn't much older than you two, and I have loved him ever since. This isn't just a.... divorce. I'm losing my best friend and the.... the love of my life. This is a loss, and not just for me, but for you two as well. I was overwhelmed by the severity of the situation and... I broke down. I am so, so sorry that you both had to witness that." The fact that she was so upset that we were hurting was a testament to her love.

Tears flooded down her face even though she tried to contain them. I wrapped my arms around her shoulders, "No, I'm sorry." I let her go and held her hand as she sucked in a huge breath of air and shook her shoulders.

"I'm going to excuse myself to the bathroom. You two finish getting ready for school." She got up from the table and presumably went to the bathroom in her room.

Denny scooted his chair back and stood up, "I'm done with this too." So there I was, left alone with three ghosted chairs.

*That was intense. I'm really happy with this part.

Did anyone see that coming? Who do you think is right or wrong here?

Remember to comment, follow, and share! Have a good day y'all!*