Mistakenly Eaten

55. No Bonding For Salva

Althea chimed in excitement, as Fiona rushed out of the water, sprinting in her direction, laughing heartily.

“I love it!” she squeaked and Althea also clapped in joy, happy to see the girl jumping up in joy.

Serena gasped, rushing to Fiona’s side, seeing her all wet in that skimpy two piece, leaving nothing to the imagination, which felt like an alarm going off in Serena’s mind, who had brought the girl with the same catholic values under which she grew up and seeing Fiona, opposing those very values and doing things at a one eight degree angle to what she had taught her, felt like a huge blow to Serena’s heart.

“Gosh! Fiona! What are you even wearing?”

She yelled at the girl, who grunted, rolling her eyes hard at the woman, she looked up as her mother but she had always listened to Serena and dressed up however she wanted her to.

To Fiona, the concept of sundresses and even two pieces for swimming, was foreign and for the first time, wearing something so bold, made her feel extra ordinarily spirited.

“Serena! Please, I love what I am wearing.” She told her off, grabbing her robe and wrapped it around her waist simply, still revealing the upper portion of her body.

“There is a way to wear that robe.” Serena daunted the girl, who was a bit startled by Serena’s tone, suddenly scared that her actions might offend the woman, who was like a mother to her.

Serena had trained Fiona, to always act properly, the way any woman would in the medieval ages, since Serena grew up in at an orphanage and that was how she was taught to be. She imparted those same and very values in Fiona as well, after she found the little seven years old girl abandoned outside her house, in the nearby town of Ibiza, from where she actually belonged. Serena brought Fiona on the island with her and ever since then, brought the girl up as her own daughter, since Serena didn’t have any children of her and by the time she had Fiona with her, Nicholas and his siblings that Serena looks after had also grown up and stopped visiting the island, leaving Serena alone to take care of the place.

Fiona also understood that she was abandoned by her poor, hunger-struck mother, who had no option but to leave the child at someone else’s door step and it was a moment of mere luck for Fiona that the woman, turned out to be the most kind-hearted to have ever existed, who gave all of her love to Fiona.

That’s why Fiona always made sure to be a good daughter and always listened to Serena, making sure to never offend the woman.

So, when Fiona noticed that Serena was upset with the way Fiona wore the swimming costume, she decided to immediately cover herself up, wondering if her body wasn’t worth showing or if there was some flaw in her that needs to be hidden.

“I…” Fiona started untying the robe, ready to wear it the right way but Althea interrupted.

“What? Let the girl be! She has a beautiful body and who is here that would be offended by her looking like so? Everyone here is barely wearing anything at all.”

Serena felt flustered and annoyed by Althea’s fuel that she charged Fiona with, who also stopped untying her robe and stood still, looking the same unholy and uncovered in front of Serena.

“Even if the whole word decides to go topless, the men and women with sense would never follow the footsteps of all.” Serena quoted, making Althea scoff a little.

“Oh, come on, those are all Babylonian sayings. In modern world, as far as I have learnt and I don’t consider myself as someone who had mapped the world through a lot but from what I know, people like to do what they want to do. Nobody cares what the other is doing. Besides, I believe that people’s actions should be irrespective of what others do and want them to do.”

Althea remained calm and actually unaware of the fact that her casual statements were turning in to fire inside Serena’s heart, who saw her as a hell-goer, for being so disrespectful towards regardful teachings.

Serena decided to ignore Althea and her disrespectful mannerism and turned towards Fiona.

“Why is that robe still not on top of your chest?”

Fiona remained still and quiet for a moment, sighing in relief for a second as she mustered up her courage to answer back to Serena.

“I don’t want to and I am happy the way I am.”

With that she stormed inside the house, feeling a bit startled at her own reaction but at the same time, feeling courageous enough to take a stand for herself and her choices.

Serena looked down at Althea, who kept her eyes ahead and waved at Andrew, who played in the water.

Serena certainly awarded Althea with the blame of the disrespectful tone that Fiona had picked up. She knew that Fiona was very obedient and a very curtained girl, who never paraded her body so shamelessly and always listened to Serena, who protected her with delicate love and never let her commit any sin.

Serena’s insides in flared with anger, as she dashed back inside the mansion, pushing past Salva, who was quite surprised with Serena’s sudden dash out.

But he simply ignored her and walked up to Althea, carrying the box of ice cream in his hands.

“Care for it?” he waved it in front of Althea, who chimed in excitement.

“Oh my God! You got it again.” She laughed out loud, clapping her hands in excitement.

She grabbed the box and dug right in to it, slurping the slightly melting cream off the spoon, that she ate with pure bliss and pleasure.

“Gosh! I really miss it. You know back in my home town, I used to make it all the time, especially during summers. It was my favorite thing to do.”

Salva perched down next to Althea, listening to her simply talk about her life, that somehow made his insides melt away like that ice cream did in Althea’s hands. Maybe it was some sort of magic that Althea had in her hands, that made everything melt right away with her single touch.

“My friend Lur, she loves ice cream, so I know I have to make extra and the days when I don’t have enough to make for her, I always hide it, knowing that she will steal mine and…”

As Althea continued explaining her adventures of Gragnano, Salva simply sat and stared. He wasn’t paying any attention to what she was saying and simply enjoyed looking at her talk.

She didn’t have anything applied on her face, yet her face was radiating some sort of glow that Salva had never seen or noticed in any girl ever.

Why was it so normal and so casual for the two to have a conversation with each other?

Why could he always just talk to her in such a normal manner and treat her as if she was his…

Salva immediately shook his head.

No! this can’t be happening!

He screamed on the inside.

No way! I can never be friends with any girl.

With that Salva got up from where he sat and immediately sprinted towards the ocean.

“And then Seb actually yelled at Lur and she started…”

Althea was in the middle of her story when Salva got up abruptly taking Althea by sheer shock.

“Salva…” she tried to call him, with her mouth still full of ice cream but the man decided to not to hear a single word that came out of her mouth, since it felt enchanting to him and he didn’t want to have any sort of emotional dependency to the girl. Not at least in that life time.

Taking off his shirt, still donning his shorts, he directly jumped in the water, joining everybody else, who was taking a swim.

Althea’s nose twitched, making her feel muddled by the boy’s sudden and abrupt action.

She was actually a little hurt by the way Salva left so abruptly, since she considered that he was a good friend to her and felt that the two were bonding quite nicely.

She shrugged, sadly going back to finishing her ice cream but before she could’ve taken Salva’s actions to her heart, she felt someone else slumping down next to her and turned to find Nicholas perched down next to her.

She nodded at him for once and went back to eating the ice cream but just as she lifted and filled the spoon inside her mouth, the spoon left her hands and her mouth, dropping down and back inside the box, as she hands fell to her side and her mouth hung open.

She then again, turned to look at Nicholas and the moment, her eyes landed on Nicholas’s clean slate face, her eyes widened.

Nicholas smirked, rubbing his finger and thumb simultaneously on his jaw, flashing his clean shaved jaw, looking as handsome as he could have ever been.

---------------------------

Thank you for always reading and supporting my work <3