October 17th

Dear Future Me,

Damn, just damn. I wish I could say this, but homecoming was not as great as I thought it would be at ALL. Tell me I'm overreacting, call me sensitive (which I'm not), whatever. Last night sucked, so let me give you a refresher as to why.

To put it simply, Levi won homecoming king, but here's the issue. Nikki, yes, the infamous Nikki, won homecoming queen. Now, what do the king and queen do? They slow dance while everyone else watches. It was literally disgusting. It made me gag, it made my heart feel like it was going to burst. I want to be happy for Levi so bad, but I can't. It's too hard to when I know he can look at Nikki the same way he looks at me.

It had to have been a platonic look, right? I mean, she has a boyfriend. Ugh, stupid Victor. I still hate that guy. Would've been nice if he socked Levi right across the face. Yeah, maybe then I would actually like Victor for once.

But besides last night's disaster, I'm skipping the parade and the game. I don't care. Let him wonder where I am. Yes, I almost went, but now? Screw that. I needed to sleep in anyway.

I know when I go downstairs I'm going to have to explain to my dad what happened last night. I didn't even bother talking to him when I walked into the door, so I just know he has questions.

I'm just gonna have to face the music, Future Me. Whether I like it or not, which I don't.

Sincerely,

Past Me.

•••

Laying on her bed with her notebook close to her chest, Skye dreaded getting out of bed. Her clock read about half-past ten, and she knew that her dad would start knocking on her door wondering if she was dead once the clock went past eleven. She let out a deep sigh, set her notebook on a random spot on the bed, and forced herself up, taking off her bonnet to reveal her bed head. Yeah, it was best that she took a shower before even heading downstairs.

After getting a refreshing shower, Skye slowly walked down the stairs, a creak coming from each step she took, which she wanted to avoid. Seeing there was no one in the kitchen, she tiptoed to the fridge, scanning what she could make herself for breakfast, but someone had to creep on her, that someone being her dad.

"Someone's finally out of the nest."

"Jesus Christ!" Skye jumped, quickly slamming the refrigerator door shut.

"Go sit down." Her dad said. "I'll make you some bacon and eggs."

"Uh, you never make bacon." She furrowed her eyebrows. "You claim it's a pain in the you know what."

"Well, I got a pack of it and I can't let it go to waste," Scott replied. Actually, he was doing it to try to make Skye fess up about last night, but obviously, he wasn't going to tell her his plan.

Skye didn't bother fighting the bacon thing any longer, and just shrugged her shoulders and went into the living room to watch whatever was on the TV. Maybe she could watch Netflix or something. "Alright then."

Hearing the bacon sizzle on the pan loudly, Skye scrolled through the TV channels only to find nothing good was on as it was only Saturday morning. She ended up leaving whatever was on and pulled out her phone, seeing all the notifications from Levi and everyone else. Levi, Xavier, Danny, and Hunter's texts mostly consisted of wondering where she was while Nini was just checking up on her. She ended up leaving the guys on read as she couldn't be bothered to reply, then wrote Nini back to tell her that she's been awake for a little bit.

Nini had sent Skye pictures of the parade, captioning it with how she would rather jump off a cliff right now. Skye replied back, saying she was glad she didn't end up going, then Nini wrote that she totally envied her. If it weren't for Danny, she definitely wouldn't have been there, but being the supportive girlfriend she is, Nini made the sacrifice.

While Skye got carried away on her phone, her dad came into the living room with her plate and utensils and set it on the coffee table, making a slightly loud noise as the plate was made of glass. "Made them just how you like it."

"Oh, thanks," Skye said, picking up the plate and setting it in her lap then grabbing the knife and fork.

Skye's dad sat down in his chair (she never dared sitting in it), watching his daughter eat, which made her uncomfortable as she wasn't sure why he was doing it. "Is there a reason you're staring at me?"

"Oh, nothing." He lied, then went in for what he wanted. "I was just waiting to hear about the dance last night."

Skye, who almost choked on her food, looked up at her dad like she wanted to kill him. She should've known, yet she fell for the food bribe every time. To be fair, he was an amazing cook, but damn. "Did you seriously bribe me with bacon?"

"Yup, now I'll wait for you to finish your food." Her dad smirked, leaning back in his chair while he waited.

But Skye wasn't going to let her dad wait. As much as she wanted to avoid explaining, she couldn't hide from her dad forever. He had to know what happened, but he had to know the most important factor first; losing Nikki all the way back in August.

"No, I might as well just tell you." She sighed. "I was going to later anyway."

"Was it bad?" He asked.

"Not at first." Skye shrugged. At first, it felt like a fairytale, but then those storybook pages were ripped away page by page with each minute counting down until everything was ruined for her.

"Pumpkin, you know I'll go to jail for beating the shit out of one of your little friends," Scott said. Yeah, he wasn't lying about that, yet he wonders why Skye's peers feared him.

"Nobody needs to get their butt kicked, dad, at least by you because I don't want you to go to jail." She replied.

"I'll pay a kid, don't tempt me." He threatened like that was any better.

"Dad, no!" Skye exclaimed. No matter what, she didn't want her dad getting involved like that.

"Fine, you wanna tell me what ruined your night?" Her dad asked.

It was impossible to go about this without stating the only positive thing first, aka Levi's win. "Um, Levi won homecoming king."

"What's so wrong about that?" He questioned, just as Skye suspected.

"And Nikki won queen." She said, but her dad still wasn't catching on.

"Good for them." See? He didn't get it, but don't worry, Scott would get it once the pieces started to form together.

"But the king and queen had to slow dance together." Skye continued, which was a start to her dad understanding the situation.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"But it's just Nikki, what's wrong with that?" Scott asked.

Now, Skye had no choice but to admit the truth. "Dad, I haven't been so honest with you."

Skye and her dad went back and forth, Scott asking whether she was on drugs, which she responded no to, then if she was stealing, having sex, pregnant, and basically everything a father of a teenage daughter feared. She said no to every single thing, and that's where he got fed up.

"Skye, what is the issue?" He finally said.

"Nikki and I aren't friends anymore." She admitted. "We haven't been since August."

Taken aback by his daughter's confession, Scott says nothing, but the look on his face said it all. He was pissed, not at his daughter, but he was pissed off for sure. So, Skye provided a little insight into what happened, and then the puzzle was finally complete.

"Um, we had a big fight about Victor taking up all of her time, and then it was decided that I shouldn't have her time at all." Skye looked down. Talking about it made her feel a lump in her throat, like she could cry any second, but she wanted to stay strong in front of her father. She had been so strong in many instances in her life, so why now? Why now feel like a weakling?

But now Scott could see what made his daughter run to her room the moment she walked into the house last night, and now someone had to pay in his eyes. "Oh, now I see why you're upset."

"Am I overreacting about everything?" She asked him.

"No, you're not." He assured her. "Besides, Nikki will come around. I'm sure of it."

"What about Levi? I've kind of been giving him the cold shoulder since last night." Skye questioned. After the "tell the queen I said congratulations bit", she had ignored Levi for the rest of the night, and then by the time he had to take her home, the car ride was just silent, and all she did was shove a twenty dollar bill in his hand for gas then hurried out of the car. It was brutal, even for her, but it felt deserved considering her emotions at the time.

While Scott didn't know those details, he was sure Levi would survive not hearing from Skye for the weekend. "Eh, I'm sure he's gonna be okay."

Here was the thing, Levi was not okay. Looking at how he's doing at the parade, his thoughts were a total wreck. He was sweating like crazy, he was frantically looking around, praying Skye would magically be there in the audience, but most importantly, he was sitting next to Nikki, who he didn't want to be near at all. As much as the dance looked like a match made in heaven to Skye, it was completely awkward for them. Nikki had a boyfriend (as shitty as he is), and Levi was just starting to get somewhere with Skye, but only one of them managed to have a relationship remain intact.

With the parade nearing its end and the game prep getting close, both of them wanted this to be over with. Nikki felt that she looked like an idiot sitting next to a lunatic like Levi, and she just had to knock some sense in him as all the people of Wintersville were watching.

"Hey." She lightly elbowed him. "Get it together and wave. I can't be the only one doing this."

"Oh!" He jumped in his seat. "Right, right."

Levi did as Nikki said and forced a smile on his face then waved to everyone, watching as everyone took pictures as the floats drove down the road. He was almost tempted to bring up her past with Skye, and since he couldn't get her off his mind, he might as well just do it.

"Um, you and Skye were friends, right?" Levi questioned, knowing damn well the answer was yes.

"Why do you care?" Nikki asked coldly. Now that made Levi mad in an instant, and it was going to get a little hostile on that float whether Nikki liked people watching the perfect picture crumble or not.

"Okay, screw this." He said, turning to face her and throwing the whole waving at everyone thing away. "I don't know what Hernandez brainwashed you with, but Skye is amazing, and clearly she had all of the brain cells in the friendship."

Yeah, Levi was going in on her now. He was so pissed from last night that he had to let all of this he let out, but Nikki wasn't liking it one bit no matter how much Levi was right. "Excuse me? I didn't ask to be psychoanalyzed."

"Oh my god, she knows a big word!" Levi exclaimed sarcastically. "I know good ol' Victor didn't teach you that one. If it weren't for his parent's money he would've been kicked off the team for his grades a long time ago."

"You're such an asshole, I hope you know that." Nikki sassed.

"Yeah, I am. I'm an asshole because I ruined the best date of my life because we were forced together as king and queen." He said. "Clearly you don't like to see things as your fault even in the slightest. Maybe you should think shit through before you ruin a friendship over your shitty boyfriend who flirts with any girl that has a pulse."

After that brutal statement, Nikki was left absolutely speechless, and the anger in her face fell and turned to sadness, sadness that he was right on everything. Victor was the worst just as Skye said, but it was too late to take everything back and say she was right. Despite last night's setback, Skye was thriving with her new group of friends, and Nikki felt like she was regressing.

Nikki didn't bother responding and turned away from Levi, only to hide the fact that she felt like she was going to cry. While Levi felt bad, the truth needed to be heard no matter how much it hurt her. He was able to realize the rights and the wrongs in his actions, and now he could see how Skye was upset. It was like if he had to watch one of his best friends be with Megan like that, but Levi wasn't going to let this ruin everything that's been building between them. No, he refused. He wouldn't be like Nikki and fail Skye as a friend.

Leaning his head against the back of the seat and looking out into the crowd, Levi blurted out the last he had to say to Nikki, and he didn't care if she responded or not. "Skye's the best thing that's ever happened to me. It's a shame you threw her away."

As much as Nikki wanted to reply and say Skye was the best thing to ever happen to her too, she couldn't. Why? Because she was too stubborn to admit such as thing, although Levi didn't dare hesitate to say it.

•••

MARIA TALKS!

happy valentine's day 🤪

it's nice to see a little perspective from levi and nikki, isn't it? i felt it would make sense to show how levi was doing whether you guys hated him right now or not, and i'm happy with what i wrote.

little fun fact (that i hope i didn't say already): skye's dad is lowkey based off of my dad. like, my dad deadass said he would go to jail for beating someone up for me. mans is WILD. but skye's relationship with her father is very much based off of my own. and i guess you could imagine where skye's relationship with her mother is based off of 😳

now this is the end of the homecoming content. it's been quite angsty, right? my bio doesn't say ceo of angst for nothing i'll tell you that. plus my friends could probably talk for days about all the pain my stories has caused for them. oops. i love them tho.

anyway here's this beautiful meme i made awhile ago:

my fellow writers are free to snatch it. i feel your pain, i do.

see you next time (i hope)! next chapter we're going to have a tiny flash forward. it's gonna make sense, i promise.

bye <3