33. Ella

Chapter 33

Ella

Ella’s father used to take her on what he called their ice cream dates when he picked her up from Pre-K. He’d collect her from her class with a bag of provisions already in tow, and they would walk together to Central Park, claim a bench, and enjoy their ice cream. Alec always got the same flavor—he never deviated from plain vanilla—but Ella requested to be surprised each time with a different flavor, always a curious child who wanted to experience every part of life and determine for herself what she enjoyed or not.

For today’s ice cream date, he’d gotten her something called space cake ice cream, flavored like cake batter with pieces of red velvet cupcake mixed in. Two scoops sagged within a waffle cone, strips of white and red drizzling down over her fingers as she licked the mound on top.

Ella’s little legs were sprawled out on Alec’s lap. He’d just finished his ice cream, the empty waste discarded on the bench next to him. His frigid fingers from cradling the bottom of the cup now folded around her calves.

Ella had just finished telling him about a kid in her class, Hunter, who earlier in the day had locked her in a box on the playground while the children were in recess. He’d shoved her inside the cupboard of toys and sealed her in by sliding a hockey stick through the door handles. It took her teacher an hour to notice she wasn’t in class before they came searching for her and heard her screaming within the cupboard. When Alec heard the story from her flustering, apologetic teacher at pick-up, he’d turned a shade of red that shouldn’t have been possible for anyone’s skin to turn and threatened to have the school shut down before he whisked Ella into his arms and stormed away.

She’d never seen him get angry like that before, and while she’d never admit it, it scared her a little.

The ice cream had helped to calm her father’s flush. So had her unfurling her legs across his thighs.

“Maybe he likes you,” Alec wondered aloud, giving her ankle a squeeze.

“He locked me in a box!” Ella shrieked, ice cream dripping down her chin. “Is that how people who like each other act?”

“No,” Alec refuted, wiping the ice cream off her chin with his knuckle, then licking away the liquid from his own finger. “That’s not how they should act, but sometimes people have certain feelings and don’t know what to do with them, so they do things they shouldn’t because they’re not sure how to express themselves.”

“Like lock people in a box?” Ella shook her head. “I don’t like that. I’d never do that.”

“Because you’re kind, my beauty.” He tapped her nose to beget a giggle. “Your first instinct is to always treat people well. You embrace everything the world has to offer you. You don’t hold back from what you’re feeling, so you’ll never experience the pain that comes with loving someone and not being able to express it the right way. It’s the worst kind of pain anyone could ever feel.”

Ella lapped at the ice cream teetering off the edge of the cone. Alec raised his eyes to the awning of contorted branches and bourgeoning leaves overhead.

“Do you love Mom?” She was too young to understand the haunted look that swam through his eyes.

“I love that she gave me the gift of you,” he answered, each word he spoke chosen carefully. “I will be forever indebted to her for that.” Ella at the time was satisfied with that answer.

“How do you know you love someone?” Alec beamed.

“Love is really, truly knowing someone and wanting a life that has them in it, not being able to imagine a world where they’re not there. Love is being apart from someone and feeling like there’s something missing, like you’re not whole unless you’re together. Love is thinking about attaching yourself forever to someone and the idea being inviting, not terrifying. Love is doing something you absolutely hate, with someone who absolutely loves it, and loving every second of it because you live to see them happy.”

“Like eating ice cream with me?” Ella smirked at the slow rise of Alec’s brows. She laughed, “I know you don’t like ice cream, Daddy.”

“Do you?” His yellowish-brown eyes radiated with devotion. “How did you figure that out?”

“You make faces the whole time you eat and finish it in two bites.” Alec cackled up at the sky.

“You’re too smart for your own good, my beauty.” He kissed her hair. “I can’t get anything past you, can I?”

“Nope!” Ella shook her head for further emphasis.

“I live to see you happy, Ella. You make my day by simply existing.” She scooted closer to him on the bench to rest her head on his chest. “You want to know how I know I love you, my girl?”

“How, Daddy?”

“Because I spent my life before you so consumed with myself and my own needs. Everything and everyone else was secondary. The moment I met you, you became my center of gravity. The planet I orbit around. I don’t matter anymore.” Alec brushed a kiss between her brows. “You are all that matters, little one. Your needs. Your happiness. Your life. Nothing else.”

“ Noella ,” Kellen’s voice shattered through her dream.

Ella jolted awake with a gasp, flinging back into Kellen’s arms, which arched around her in a protective shield. She touched her cheek and found tracks of tears staining the rough, cracking flesh.

“Baby, you okay?” Kellen swept her hair onto the pillow to keep it from gluing to her face.

“I think so?” The statement echoed like a question, laced with doubt. Kellen kissed the corner of her mouth.

“I woke up to the sound of you whimpering. I got worried. What were you dreaming about?”

“My dad.” A heavy breath hurled out of her. The corners of her eyes prickled. “Always my dad.”

“Tell me about it.” Ella rolled onto her back.

Kellen scooted to the side to give her room, though he didn’t stop touching her, his fingers careening across her stomach like he needed to be connected to her through touch in order to assuage his own concern.

“I was four. He used to pick me up from school and bring me ice cream. There was this kid in my class, Hunter, who picked on me a lot. I always thought it was because I was the smallest in my class and an easy target. He locked me in a box on the playground that day. It took my teacher an hour to realize I wasn’t in class with everyone else and come find me.” Incense spiked Kellen’s breath, smoke wafting from the upward curl of his lip. “Dad suggested that maybe it was because Hunter liked me. It sparked a conversation between us about love. I asked him if he loved my mother, and he said he loved that she gave him the gift of me. It never occurred to me at the time that he didn’t fully answer the question.” She frowned. “I asked him how you know you love someone.”

“What did he say?” Ella twisted her head to meet Kellen’s eyes.

“He had a whole long answer…but it honestly hurts me to think about it.” Tears rolled down the sides of her face. “I don’t understand how he could’ve said all those things and still left us. Left me. He said he loved me so much that nothing else mattered apart from me, that his own needs were secondary to mine, yet he abandoned me on a roof, all by myself, in the middle of the night? How is that love?”

“Noella.” Kellen dragged her into him by hitching his hand around her hip and pulling her across the mattress. Ella shifted her body to snuggle closer to his warmth, throwing her leg over his.

“Don’t get sick of me,” she pleaded, holding him tighter.

“I will never get enough of you, Noella Rose.” Kellen sketched a line of kisses down her forehead. “I’m not your father, sweetheart. I’m not going to leave you in the middle of the night with no explanation. I’m not dangling the carrot of my devotion in front of you just to take it away. Your father told you he loved you so much that his own needs were secondary to you. I’ll tell you how I’m different from your father. I need you so much that my own selfish desire comes before any and everything. My existence is tied to the look on your face. To the breaths you exhale. To the laughs you produce. I cannot exist without you. My needs are your needs, and I fucking care about my needs, because I care about you. Your father fucked up when he thought one needed to outweigh the other, when he looked at those as two separate things.” Ella mewled into his kiss.

“I never want to be parted from you, ever,” she cried.

“Then you and I share the same wish.” His lips wiped away the vestiges of sadness off her cheeks, scrubbing the loneliness from her soul, leaving a scarless surface in his wake. “I know you struggle to believe words. Let me show you with action. You still want a star? I will steal one from the night sky for you.” Kellen wrapped her up in his arms before pressing a kiss to the corner of her jaw.

“No,” she giggled. “Certain things belong in the heavens, and certain things belong down here.”

“You belong everywhere, Noella, for you are divinity in human form.” Ella’s chest tightened. Through the dark, her eyes found Freya inside her crate, her sweet Cavachon having awoken at the sound of her tears. Freya’s nose poked through the bars to check to make sure Ella was stable. “She’s okay,” Kellen assured Freya, holding Ella tighter. “I’ve got her.” Freya pulled her face back to rest it once more on her bed inside the crate, seeming to find comfort in Kellen’s pledge.

“I don’t know how much Freya actually understands,” Ella said. “When I speak to her, I sometimes feel like it goes in one ear and out the other. I love her to pieces, but she’s not the smartest.”

“You’re wrong,” Kellen argued, staring at Freya. “She’s incredibly perceptive and very fucking smart. She pays attention to everything and keeps extensive notes in her head. Trust me, she remembers everything that’s ever been said to her or in front of her.” Ella yanked her head back.

“How the fuck do you know that?”

“Because I’ve spoken to her before. Mind-to-mind.” Ella’s eyes almost tumbled out of her skull.

“You’ve spoken to my dog?”

“Against my will most of the time, but yes. She’s very persistent and very protective of you.” Kellen bumped her nose with his own. “I know the feeling.” Ella pressed a kiss to Kellen’s jaw. “I hate knowing what you’ve been through, Noella. I hate knowing anyone had the pleasure of having you in their life and couldn’t appreciate what a blessing that was. I hate knowing you weren’t loved right.”

“It’s okay, Kellen.” Her fingers trickled down his cheek. They floated over his lips, which puckered into a kiss under her touch. “I have not been without love in my life. I’m certainly not without it now.”

“You never will be again,” he swore. For the first time in her life, she had no trouble believing him.

Kellen fit his mouth over hers.

When she nipped his bottom lip, he rolled on top of her with a heady groan, and they lost themselves to love.

In all his twenty-eight years of life, Kellen had never lost Maccabiah.

Not when he was a student at Delmarth or as a faculty member. He knew this week was primarily for the kids, testing their abilities to the highest extent and seeing what skills still needed to be honed, but that didn’t stop him from taking the competition as seriously as the students. Last year, Headmistress Dyer banned Kellen from attending one of the events because his heckling of the students on the other team took on a life of its own and he’d been accused of trying to manipulate the results. His students often taunted him for his obsession with Maccabiah, since he kept a tally on the whiteboard in his classroom year-round of how many days remained until the event.

If anything, he cared more now about winning than he did back when he was a student, because there was now the added pleasure of Jarion and Laya winning along with him. This was their first year, now that their dragons had finally emerged, that they would get to participate in some of the events. This was also the first year he’d get to experience Maccabiah with Noella, through the eyes of someone who’d never been exposed to anything of this magnitude before. It would be like getting to relive his first year all over again. Noella teased him all morning about his tangible excitement.

“You’ll understand when you experience the first two events today,” Kellen told her, swinging their interlocked fingers between them. He cherished their walk to the teacher’s lounge, wished he could stretch it out into an eternity, because the moment they walked through the door to her office building and joined the rest of the faculty, Noella would drop his hand and fix her mask of professionalism over her face.

For now, her fingers squeezed his through their entanglement. “What events are today?” she asked.

“Chop and rope burn. Chop happens right after the students are assigned their teams and Maccabiah officially begins, or breaks out as we call it. Chop is for the seniors. The seniors on each team get in a long line and one by one must fight an illusion made to look like a statue of iron that’s been brought to life. The only way to win your round is to chop through the metal of your opponent. First team to successfully chop through every iron opponent wins. Second event today will be rope burn. That event is for the Meteoro fire-benders and the dragon-shifters. The teams collect large and small pieces of wood from the Canterna Thicket. Each team designates two feeders, who are always Herculean speed and strength-wielders, and three pit crew members, made up of fire-benders and dragon-shifters, who are referred to as the matches. They’re assigned a faculty member to act as rope burn coach, which I’ll save you the trouble of guessing is always me, no matter what team I’m on.” Noella smirked at his cocky tone. “The feeders pass the matches the wood, and the matches build the fire. Once the teepee of wood is strong enough, the matches ignite. They have to maintain the fire until it burns through a wet rope that has been soaking in water, water that’s also been infused with Headmistress Dyer’s mending abilities to make it harder to break, the entire semester. First team to burn through the rope, and who has the least penalties, wins.”

“How do you get penalties?” Kellen adored how genuinely interested she seemed in the events.

“Penalties can be administered if the wood hits the rope, or if you bump into the poles on the side that keep the rope suspended above the wood.”

“So that’s an event specifically for fire-benders and dragon-shifters. There are events for every type of Primordial and their power?” Kellen nodded. “What was your favorite event as a student?”

“I loved rope burn. I thrived in rope burn as a student. I had the most potent fire out of anyone in the school, so I was always chosen to be a match. I hold the record at Delmarth for fastest time burning through the rope. My second favorite event is the Sword Hunt. Cerebri instructors turn the campus into a battleground illusion that matches the conditions of land in Lavalden, right beside the Middledeen waters where most of our army’s battles against the Sireres occur. Each team is tasked with hiding a sword somewhere in the landscape. In several different rounds over the course of two days, so everyone gets a chance to participate, the teams send out a group with representation from every grade level, starting at sixth grade when the Primordial’s powers begin truly developing and ending with the seniors, along with one instructor. They then go looking for the other team’s sword. You must successfully find the other team’s sword and bring it back to your side of the territory without being captured or imprisoned by the other team.”

“Sounds like capture the flag, but a lot more violent.” Noella rested her chin on his shoulder. His lips hunted for her temple, needing some form of contact with her, and fastened over the soft flesh, peppering kisses down to her cheek. “I love hearing you talk about this stuff. Your eyes light up.”

“I used to look forward to Maccabiah all year. I spent all my time outside of school mastering my powers so I’d triumph over the other team come Maccabiah week. My mother thought I was honing my powers because I cared about being the best Kilic heir, but fuck that. I just cared about winning Maccabiah.” Noella’s gorgeous laughter painted goosebumps across his flesh. “Back then, I used to look at excelling at Maccabiah as the best way to get the Gods’ attention so I could be recruited for Aros’s personal cadre. Ironic that I got exactly that and in the end, I turned it down to go into teaching, of all things.”

Noella grew silent a moment. “Do you ever regret turning Aros down?” Kellen sucked in a deep breath.

“Sometimes I find myself wondering what my life would’ve been if I’d said yes, but I’ve come to really appreciate this job for more than just the opportunity it’s given me to keep an eye on Jare and Laya. I might whine like a bitch sometimes about grading papers and make the odd threat about quitting, but I fucking love my students. I love this school. The work we do here is meaningful towards Aros’s cause, in a different way than actively fighting, but it’s still meaningful. I love being a small part of what shapes these kids into warriors.” He inclined down so the tip of his nose pecked hers. “And if I’d said yes to Aros back then, I never would’ve been here when you came.”

“I’m personally grateful for that,” she said. When they reached the door, Noella began unweaving herself from around Kellen, her fingers slipping out from between his to smooth perspiring palms over her black trousers.

“Why do you seem nervous?” he asked, holding the door open for her. “It’s just a staff meeting.”

“I know,” she mumbled, sinking her finger into the call button for the elevator. Her eyes were glued on her shoes when she prattled in a rush, “But it’s the first one we’re walking into together, actually together, in front of the whole staff.”

“And that makes you nervous?” Noella’s shoulders sunk.

“I know what everyone thinks of me,” she whispered, wrenching at the strings of his heart.

“Sweetheart,” Kellen moaned with sadness. He gave her hands a squeeze. “Those people in there who can’t see how amazing you are? They are so small. Like how I was once small. Their opinions might seem loud, but the part of them that really counts is so fucking tiny. Where they’re little, you’re beautifully massive. Let that part of you fill the room, and they’ll be forced to take a look at their own size.”

“Kell.” Noella touched her hand to her heart, her eyes watering. “You just took my breath away.”

“Well, you take my breath away all the time. I had to return the favor.” He gestured for her to enter the elevator first.

As she passed him, she nuzzled her shoulder against his, a coquettish smile playing with her lips.

The moment the doors closed, Kellen couldn’t maintain the respectful distance between them and pressed her against the elevator wall. Her body automatically tilted closer, her hips raising to meet his. He slid his hand down her thigh, savoring the way his touch made her breath hitch, then hooked it around the inside of her knee and lifted her leg to fold around his waist. “I swear,” Kellen groaned, admiring her silk, blueberry-shaded blouse that complimented the evergreen hue of his button- down, “every day my favorite color changes depending on the shirt you’re wearing.”

“Mine stays the same.” Her thumbs swept over his eyelashes, then trickled down his shirt. “Green. Like emeralds.”

The elevator doors heaved open on their floor. All too soon, before he could pin her against the wall and bruise her lips with a kiss, Noella squirmed out from under him and scuttled into the hallway.

Remind me why we got out of bed this morning? he groaned into her head.

Because it’s Maccabiah! she sang back, reciprocating the gesture of holding the door open for him.

The entire room twisted their heads to Kellen and Noella when they stepped into the teacher’s lounge. Kellen instinctively angled himself slightly in front of her, wishing he could shield her from their hatred with his body. He wasn’t used to his colleagues firing those vile glares at him as well, but the moment they walked in and the Primordials could smell her all over him, and him all over her in return, their loathing of her transferred to him, glowers being pelted at his front and back like corporeal bullets. Kellen had the luxury, though at this moment, it didn’t feel like it, to be able to read everyone in the room’s thoughts, their disapproval slapping his mind.

He simply rolled his shoulders and draped his arm around Noella’s waist in solidarity.

Mine, he echoed into everyone in the room’s minds, including Noella, who sloped her body closer to him in confirmation. He led her over to the windowsill he normally sat by during staff meetings.

Headmistress Dyer breezed to the podium shortly after Kellen and Noella were seated. Her eyes found them first, dropping to Kellen’s hand resting possessively on Noella’s knee. Headmistress Dyer sent him a brief, but unmistakable nod of approval, then swung her focus back over the room.

“I’ll be reading the names for the Gold Team first,” she declared, snagging everyone’s concentration away from Kellen and Noella the moment she began speaking. “Once I’ve read the teams, I’d like everyone to break up into their groups and figure out which staff members will be supervising which events. Everyone has to participate in something. I repeat. Everyone has to participate in something. No staff member will be allowed to sit out, just like no staff member will be allowed to take over everything.”

She’s talking about you with that last one, Noella teased. Kellen gave her leg a sharp squeeze.

His eyes then found Akio’s across the room.

Why are you guys sitting so far away? Kellen asked, noting the way Akio and Josefyn were huddled in the corner. For the past two months, the four of them always banded together during staff meetings.

Ella’s pretty mad at us right now, Akio told him, his tone of voice flat. We wanted to give her space.

Mad about what?

You should ask her. Akio paused, then added, Congrats, man. I’m really happy for you guys.

Kellen offered him a small smile of thanks.

As Headmistress Dyer read the names, Kellen asked Noella, Why are you mad at Akio and Josefyn?

Did Akio tell you that? She rolled her eyes. I’m really more mad at him than I am Josefyn.

But WHY? he pushed.

Because Akio sticks his nose into my business and then tells me he can’t tell me certain things. He’s keeping something from me about a vision he had where Aros spoke to him about me. I think it has something to do with you and me. That’s why he’s been pushing me so hard to be with you, but he refuses to tell me what it is. I feel like I can’t trust him. Kellen’s eyes soared back over to Akio, who’d been watching them closely in a way that suggested he was listening to their internal conversation.

What’re you keeping from my girlfriend? Kellen growled at Akio, all traces of amiability vanished.

If I can’t tell her, I certainly can’t tell you, Akio snapped back, ripping his eyes off Kellen.

Great, now he’s mad at me too, Kellen grumbled to Noella just as Headmistress Dyer read Josefyn’s name for the Gold Team. Noella nuzzled her shoulder against Kellen’s chest to be comforting while not taking her eyes off Headmistress Dyer’s lips, waiting for her name to be called.

Kellen’s gaze surveyed the room and landed on Daniel.

What the fuck, Kell? Daniel hissed. You’re fucking the earthborn? How can you stick your dick in such a disgusting cunt?

Watch what you fucking say, Madix. Fire singed the back of Kellen’s throat. I will turn your tongue into ash so you not only can’t speak another vile word about the woman I love, but you will never be able to SPEAK again. Daniel’s eyes widened to the point of nearing the edge of their sockets.

“Daniel Madix,” Headmistress Dyer called out, then declared, “and that’s the end of the Gold Team. Everyone else is on the Red Team.”

We’re on the same team! Noella squealed, pulling Kellen back into a reality he found much more tolerable than the inside of Daniel Madix’s head. How’d you manage to get us on the same team? I take it you had something to do with it. Kellen smirked.

I might’ve threatened Headmistress Dyer two weeks ago and said if she didn’t put us on the same team, I’d quit.

Of course you did, she laughed in his head while nudging his chest with her elbow.

“Get into your teams,” Headmistress Dyer directed. “You have thirty minutes to decide who’s supervising what events and make a list for me before Maccabiah officially breaks out.” She waved her hand in the air to motion for everyone to move.

Kellen and Noella headed to the back of the room where the rest of the Red Team had begun congregating. They maintained their distance from Akio by electing to stand on the opposite side of the circle, which also kept them away from Oliviana, who unfortunately also happened to be on their team.

“I’m rope burn coach,” Kellen decreed immediately, not even waiting for anyone to argue before he wrote his name down on the piece of paper next to the rope burn event. No one fought him.

“We should write all our names down for Sword Hunt, since we’ll all be in charge of a group,” Akio piped up. Noella recoiled at the sound of his voice like it hurt her somehow. She stepped closer to Kellen.

“Not all of us,” Oliviana spat, glaring at Noella.

“I want to run a group for Sword Hunt,” Noella protested, accepting the pen from Akio to write her name.

“You can’t run a group for Sword Hunt,” Oliviana objected as she snatched the pen out of Noella’s hand. “You have no powers.”

“She can wield a sword,” Kellen piped up in her defense.

“No one fucking asked you, Kilic,” Oliviana snarled, holding her hand up to block his face from her vision.

“No offense, Ella, but you probably shouldn’t run a group alone,” Akio interjected.

“Why not?” Noella barked back. Akio staggered at her aggressive tone. “Because I’m a human? I may not be one of you, but I can handle managing a group of children through a game, no matter how dangerous it might be, because at the end of the day, it’s a game. It’s a game where the students are supposed to be leading anyway. You heard Headmistress Dyer. Everyone participates.”

“I didn’t say you shouldn’t run a group, Ella,” Akio argued, matching her belligerence. “I said you shouldn’t run it alone, because again, no offense, but most of the kids still don’t trust you.”

“Don’t say no offense when you clearly mean offense, Akio. It’s insulting.” If Kellen didn’t intervene, they’d go at it for the next hour and cause all of them to miss the beginning of Maccabiah.

“I’ll lead the group with her,” Kellen decided for them, writing both their names down under the first round of Sword Hunt. He dropped the pen on the chair so he could splay his fingers over Noella’s back.

“You can’t do that!” Oliviana squawked. Kellen was tempted to stick his fingers in his ears to protect his brain from the sound of her voice. He seriously questioned how he ever had sex with her. “One leader per group!”

“Give it a rest, Oliviana,” Kellen snapped. “No one fucking cares if I lead the group with her but you.”

“It’s against the rules,” she asserted.

“So is having a human in Cavale, but Aros let that rule go, didn’t he?” Noella’s lips fought a smile.

“What’re you smiling about?” Oliviana fumed at Noella. “You think you’re hot shit just because you have a dragon who would shit himself to get inside your pants? You’re not special, earthborn. He’s been inside lots of girls’ pants. Including mine.” Noella’s eyes sharpened into raging slits.

“Oh, I remember,” she retorted with a lift of her chin. “I live across the hall. I remember your fight. He may have been fucking you, but it was my name on his tongue when he came.” Every jaw around the circle dropped in unison.

That’s my fucking girl, Kellen marveled to himself. He squeezed the back of Noella’s neck with approval.

Oliviana was silent after that.

The rest of the faculty members claimed the other supervising positions for the various other events, all of which Kellen explained to Noella privately through their mental bond. He described to her what Bucket Brigade was, where the entire team across all grade levels line up in an order that helps the younger kids be surrounded by older students and staff, starting at the dining hall and leading to the Canterna Thicket. The Meteoro water-benders fill up giant buckets with water, and the entire team has to pass the buckets back to the last person at the Canterna Thicket, where the water is dumped into a glass vessel. At the end of the event, Headmistress Dyer measures the amount of water and calculates which team filled their vessel higher. Kellen then explained the Apache event to her, the last event of Maccabiah, where the whole team across all grade levels scatter around campus and are assigned different tasks to complete that exemplify their powers while passing a baton to one another once they’ve successfully completed the mission. The last person to go, always a senior, runs from one end of campus all the way to the gates of Delmarth holding a lit torch.

Whoever reaches the gates first not only wins that event, but wins the honor of being valedictorian.

I take it you were valedictorian, Noella said while the team finalized their list to give to Headmistress Dyer.

You may be shocked to hear this, but no. I wasn’t chosen to run the torch that year. It was Akio.

REALLY? Her eyes swung over to her friend, forgetting her anger for a short moment. When he didn’t meet her eye, her shoulders wilted, her lashes frowning across her cheeks as her gaze dipped to the floor.

“I’ll give Headmistress Dyer the paper,” Oliviana grumbled, stealing the paper with their names on it from off the chair. She trudged across the teacher’s lounge to shove it in the Headmistress’s hand before marching out of the room in a chaotic huff. Josefyn wandered to the back of the room from where the Gold Team had begun dispersing.

“Is everything okay over here?” she asked them, either sensing the tension or having heard their argument.

“Ella, I’m sorry,” Akio said, turning to Noella. “I didn’t mean to upset you. Yesterday and today. Really.”

“I don’t want to fight with you,” Noella murmured with a wearied sigh. “Can we just let it go? Please?”

“I’d love nothing more.” Akio opened his arms for her. Noella sighed, then stepped away from Kellen to enter the embrace. Kellen noted that Noella didn’t fully reciprocate, Akio enveloping his arms around her shoulders and Noella’s arms awkwardly hanging at her sides. When Akio whispered, “I missed you, Rosie,” she finally raised her arms and wrapped them around his waist, giving him a small squeeze.

“Are we ready to battle, Red Team?” Josefyn taunted, waving mock fists under her mate’s nose, then acted out flinging a punch at Noella in slow motion. Noella angled her cheek towards Jo’s fist to join the charade, the cluster of Jo’s fingers very gently brushing her cheek. Noella feigned a dramatic scream and pretended to collapse to the ground in pain, clutching her cheek, the two women erupting into laughter.

Akio and Kellen shared a quiet look of understanding, recognizing that they would forever be deadwood next to Josefyn and Noella’s love. Josefyn offered Noella her hand to yank her back to her feet.

“It’s Maccabiah time!” Noella squealed, lugging Kellen to the door, not that she needed to pull him —he’d follow her anywhere.