Worthwhile
Vi picked at the sheets, trying not to focus on how the confession made her mouth taste like battery acid.
It really didn’t mix well with the usually comforting taste of her drink.
She didn’t even realise how much time had passed until the door opened again and she realised Vander and her siblings had come for dinner again. It was something that started shortly after Caitlyn was discharged — something that cheered up her cold, lonely nights a little.
“Hey, kiddo,” Vander said. Vi’s head flicked up at the sound of his voice, and she forced a smile.
“Hey,” she said, watching as Claggor slid the door shut and the family walked further into the room.
“Where’s that from?” Mylo asked, nodding toward the drink in her hands.
Vi blinked, trying to clear the memory of Caitlyn’s voice and the weight of her words. Her fingers brushed over the label of her cup — a reminder of how disoriented the conversation had left her.
“Caitlyn,” Vi said at last.
Powder glanced up. “Caitlyn came? Why?”
Vi swallowed nervously, her grip tightening on the cup. “I… dunno. She came to see me, I guess.”
“You okay?” Vander asked, noticing the apparent fragility in her voice. “You look a little…”
Inhaling sharply, Vi forced herself to rearrange her expression and vocal cords. “I’m fine.”
The look in Vander’s eyes told her he knew otherwise.
Vi shook her head subtly. Whatever happened with Caitlyn was just so weird, so unbelievable and somehow a part of Vi was reluctant to accept that. If she was gonna talk, she wasn’t gonna say it in front of her siblings.
Vander narrowed his eyes, a silent agreement passing between him and his adoptive daughter.
“Kids,” he said to Vi’s three siblings, “can you go check when Vi’s dinner is coming? And also, do me a favour and head down to the cafeteria to grab some utensils. The people at the takeout place forgot.”
Powder grumbled unhappily. “The cafeteria’s like fifteen minutes away!”
“Go,” Vander said firmly.
It didn’t take long for them to file out, and Vi didn’t breathe until the door slid shut and Mylo’s voice was out of earshot.
“So,” Vander said, sitting down on the edge of her bed, “wanna talk?”
Vi sighed, pinching at her nose bridge as though it could ward off the migraine climbing up behind her eyes. “Caitlyn said something that… well, it was just really weird.”
A flash of shock and disbelief erupted on Vander’s face, yet somehow Vi didn’t get the impression he was really surprised. “Yeah?”
“She said…” Vi bit her lip nervously, deciding to set down her cup before she squeezed too tight and coffee exploded all over the sheets. “She said that we dated.”
Vander’s reaction didn’t display any surprise or anger. Instead, it was as though the words that came out of Vi’s mouth were somehow predictable.
“And…?” Vander prompted.
“I don’t believe her,” Vi said. “It’s not possible. I wouldn't date a Piltie.”
“I thought you were warming up to her,” Vander said, pulling up his ankle to rest it on the opposite knee.
“Being friends and dating a topsider is totally different.”
Vander shrugged. “Few weeks ago you wouldn’t have thought there was a huge difference.”
“My point is,” Vi said sharply, “she lied to me. Why would she do that?”
With a steady exhale, Vander set his hand on her blanketed knee and looked her in the eye — that gaze that said answer this seriously.
“Do you not believe her?” he said. “Or do you not want to believe her?”
“What difference does it make? There’s no way I dated her.”
“Answer the question, kiddo.”
Vi sighed, her gaze drifting to the coffee with the too-perfect label and too-familiar taste. “I… I don’t know.”
She rubbed her hand across her eyes in frustration, her voice laced with bitterness when she spoke. “I don’t think it makes sense. I mean, so what if she knows all that about me? Doesn’t change the fact that she’s a topsider.”
“You were warming up to her,” Vander pointed out again.
“Not the point,” Vi said, dragging out her words. “She keeps coming back to see me and I feel bad for rejecting her confession and making her cry because she seems like a genuinely nice person but at the same time it just doesn’t make sense for me to date her. I mean, I think it’s really sweet how she came back to visit me and brought me my coffee and all but I… I just…”
She tapered off her rant, faltering.
The pain in Vander’s eyes was noticeable, but Vi pretended to not have seen anything.
“I don’t want to see her anymore,” Vi said, her voice rough but tinged with a little guilt. “It… frustrates me to see her like that. Makes me feel like… I don’t know, like I owe her something.”
Vander nodded. “You don’t have to believe everything she says,” he said, “but don’t force your feelings. You and I both know it won’t work out that way.”
The silence hanging between them was heavy and thick, until Vi broke it.
“What do I do now?” she asked with a heavy sigh.
Vander swallowed, interlacing his fingers in his lap and staring down at his chipped fingernails. “Follow your heart.”
~~~
Caitlyn sat down on her couch across from Jayce, folding one leg beneath her and handing over his tea.
“What’s going on, sprout?” Jayce asked, his voice less chirpy than usual.
After a lot of contemplating in the shower, tea, movies and a few tears, Caitlyn had decided that the only person who could possibly give her a clear insight on the whole Vi situation was Jayce, since he had followed the relationship from the start and was also not going to objectively hand her an answer she didn’t want.
That would explain why the Man of Progress was currently taking up half her couch.
“Um…”
Jayce raised an eyebrow, and Caitlyn chose to wait for him to swallow his tea so he didn’t spit it all over her carpet.
“I told Vi the truth.”
Judging from his expression, Caitlyn deduced that she’d chosen a wise timing to tell him.
“O-kay,” Jayce said slowly, setting down his cup on the table. “I assume it didn’t go down too hot.”
Caitlyn shook her head. “She’s way too stubborn for this. She said she’d never date a Piltie.”
“Ouch.”
“I should have settled for friendship,” Caitlyn said quietly, her gaze focused on the tea. “I already got her to warm up to me a little… and now that’s all gone because I chose to tell her the truth.”
“Hey,” Jayce said, reaching over to rest his hand on her knee. “It’s not your fault.”
“I don’t think I can get her back, Jayce.” Her voice trembled every so slightly hands tightening around her cup.
“Don’t say that,” he muttered softly. “You made it so far with her since the accident. There has to be some part of her that still remembers you and still loves you. You need to believe that.”
Caitlyn shrugged indifferently, fighting against the tears pooling in her eyes. “If that part existed, all I did was push it away.”
“That’s not true.”
“It’s all my fault,” Caitlyn started, and before she knew it, the tears were streaming down her face as they had countless times in the past few weeks. The guilt stabbing in her chest only made it worse as she gasped and struggled to form words.
“The accident, the… rejection… it was all my fault. If not for me none of this would have happened. If not for the fact that I was too immature to know not to run across a busy road, Vi wouldn’t have lost her memory. I wouldn’t have lost any chance of getting her back if I didn’t tell her the truth, Jayce. It’s all my fault and I keep trying to fix it but it’s not working — none of it is. It just keeps getting worse, and… and…”
She felt a sob break out of her.
“I don’t know what to do anymore.”
She felt Jayce’s arms wrapping around her back and pulling her in for a hug. She melted into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder and letting her tears soak through his sleeve.
“It’s not your fault, sprout,” he said quietly, his voice gentler than Caitlyn had ever heard. “It’s not your fault. You can still get her back. You just… have to believe it. And I know it seems impossible now, but… just… go back again and see her. Talk to her, okay? You can do this.”
Caitlyn didn’t answer, instead sniffling and wiping at her tears as she pulled away.
“I don’t know how much longer I can go,” Caitlyn admitted. “I don’t think it’s worth pining for her anymore.”
“Cait…” Jayce swallowed, waiting for Caitlyn’s gaze to meet his. “Healing isn’t linear. It won’t be easy, but you can’t give up on her. Not when she needs you most.
That was the cold reality of it. Even if Vi didn’t think so, she needed Caitlyn. But the truth was that Caitlyn didn’t think it was worth it. She had a chance, and she squandered it. How could she ever get Vi back? The sheer hatred and disbelief and pain in Vi’s eyes had driven out all hope of getting her girlfriend back. Now, Caitlyn was resigned to the fact that friendship was all she could hope for. It would be hard and painful, but it was probably a lot more realistic than vying for a romantic relationship with Vi.
Caitlyn’s own words echoed in her head. I’ll still hope. I’ll still pray. And I’ll still wait for you to come home.
“She’s not coming home,” Caitlyn murmured quietly to herself, “so why should I still wait?”
Her breath hitched as she wiped the last of the tears from her face, her hands trembling slightly. Her thoughts, once a whirlwind of longing for Vi, now felt like a cold, unreachable distance. The truth hit her harder than any rejection ever could: romance was out of reach, but maybe — just maybe — friendship was still possible. But even that came at a cost.
Even just a friendship with Vi would be a double-edged sword. It would be both a curse and a blessing — a substitute for what was once a beautiful love story, but a painful reminder of what she could have had. But the bottom line remained: the chase for friendship was more worthwhile than the case for romance.
“I can’t keep doing this,” Caitlyn whispered, more to herself than to Jayce. “I can’t keep fighting for something that isn’t there. I don’t know how to make her love me, Jayce. I thought… I thought maybe I could win her over, that maybe this could work if I kept pushing. But I can’t keep chasing unrequited love.”
Jayce was quiet, letting her words settle in the air. He knew what Caitlyn was trying to say, but the truth was cruel, and he had no way to soften it.
“So… what now?” he asked, his voice steady but laced with concern. He didn’t want to see her give up, but it was clear that Caitlyn had come to a crossroads.
Caitlyn’s lips quivered slightly as she sighed, her gaze distant, focused on the empty space in front of her. “I’ll still see her. I’ll still be there for her. But not as… not as someone who wants more. I’ll be there as a friend, because that’s all she’ll ever let me be. I don’t think I can ever stop caring about her, but I have to stop expecting anything else. She’s never going to be mine, Jayce.”
The tears didn’t stop. Instead, they came slowly, quietly, the weight of the decision sitting like a stone in her chest. She was giving up hope for more, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. It felt like a slow death of something that never fully bloomed, but she couldn’t live in the grief of it anymore. Not when she had no control over it.
Jayce squeezed her hand gently, not offering empty words, but giving her something solid to hold onto. “I’m so sorry, sprout.”
Caitlyn nodded, pressing her palms to her eyes as though to wipe away not just the tears, but the last remnants of the hope she’d held on to. The friendship, painful as it was, would have to be enough. The heartache that came with it would be her burden to bear.
But at least now, it was her choice.