Purpose: Whisperer of Night

by Keya Jay

  Chapter thirty: Skylar Royce

  Skylar got up about to start getting ready for work when she realized that she no longer needed to do that, which just succeeded in upsetting her even more. She begrudgingly got out of bed and started her day regardless of whether she had somewhere to go or not. She made herself some coffee before turning towards her mother’s door, the smells that were coming from inside started to ease from underneath her locked door. Skylar was afraid to open the door and see the mess that she knew would be inside; she didn’t bother. Skylar took her cup of coffee and flopped onto the couch, some of the coffee had flown out of the cup and onto her arm burning her immediately but she didn’t care, she just let it sit there. She was pissed at Ryder for lying to her and she was even more pissed at the fact that she thought that he was honestly putting forth an effort with her. She didn’t want to care but she did and because of that she didn’t want to see him but knew that she had promised to meet his mother today and she did NOT want to take her anger out on her, she refused to let Ryder get to her that much.

  Skylar finished her coffee as she stared at absolutely nothing. She looked over at the clock and realized that it was nearly the afternoon so she got up so that she could get dressed; despite the fact the Ryder had unwittingly hurt her she was determined to make a good impression on his mother. Skylar dressed in a Spring Tea dress. The dress had a sleeveless white floral lace print with a badge skirt attached; she paired the dress with a multi strap heel. She did her hair up in curls and let them fall down her back naturally, and then she did something she rarely did and added a bit of make-up. She wasn’t entirely sure who she was dressing up for him or his mother but she pretended not to care.

  By the time Ryder had come back it was nearly two and extra sunny outside, she had to stop herself from throwing on shorts and t-shirt. When she got up to open the door she paid Ryder little to no attention as she turned back around and went back into the kitchen to finish spring cleaning it—she got bored of waiting.

  “Well good morning to you too,” he said as he closed her door and walked over toward her. She still ignored him as she finished her cleaning. “Skylar,” he called softly as he tried to turn her around by the elbows. Once he accomplished getting her to face him she raised an eye brow in question but didn’t bother to open her mouth and actually talk to him. “Are you ok, correct me if I’m wrong but you seem…angry?” he said as he didn’t bother to hide the fact that he was checking her out right now.

  “I’m fine,” she said as tried to turn back around.

  “Yes, I know you are but I want to know if you are ok?” he said trying to look her in the eye. She didn’t bother to answer a second time as she turned back around to finish her cleaning. “Ok so obviously you’re not, do you want to…I don’t know…talk about it?” Skylar wanted to laugh at his attempt but didn’t find any of it funny.

  “No I don’t I want to just finish cleaning though.”

  “Ok, tell me when you’re ready,” he said before turning away from her. Skylar felt bad because she felt as though she was bringing him down with her and she hated the fact that she felt in anyway bad about that, but she did. This seemed supper important to him and she couldn’t understand why but she didn’t want him to regret this in anyway because it was important to her too. She really, really liked him she didn’t know when it started but it did and she wanted his mother to like her. She wasn’t sure if he liked her back but he sure did act like it at times but he never once kissed her or even tried. “I truly am ok,” she said to Ryder in an attempt to calm him down, she could smell his worry over the Pine-Sol she was using to clean the kitchen. “Why are you so nervous?” she asked as she continued to clean the counters.

  “What makes you think I’m nervous?”

  “Ok, fine don’t answer my question,” she said just as she was finishing the kitchen. She turned toward Ryder and began to join him in her living room. He was sprawled out on her living room couch but she didn’t care as long as he didn’t have his feet on her mother’s coffee table, but there wasn’t much space for her so she decided she’d just stand.

  “This seems like very, very important to my mother, and I don’t bring people around to go see her, I mean I barely go and see her myself,” he said as his head hung over the edge of her couch and his eyes remained shut. Skylar didn’t know what to say, she could relate in some way because she didn’t like people seeing her mother either but that never stopped her from going to go see her mother. “I don’t want to put any pressure on you by telling you that this is important and that you have to act a certain way, you know? Just be yourself and I’m sure she’ll love you,” he said finally opening his eyes to look at her. “You look great by the way,” he added and it actually made her blush.

  “Thank you.”

  “Are you ready to go?” he asked as he made no attempts to remove himself from her couch.

  “Are you?” she asked not entirely sure that he was. Ryder took some time before getting up and walking toward her door. She could tell that he was pretty nervous about this, probably more than she was. Skylar followed after him and he opened the door for her, she didn’t even bother to get surprised she was used to it now.

  The ride to his mother’s was quite, which was somewhat unusual but Skylar was ok with it, she knew that there would be a lot of first’s today.