Shooting Stars | Lo'ak¹

Chapter 14: New Friends

Italicize - someone's thoughts or a story from the past

Bold - sign language 

It had been a little over two weeks since Lo'ak went beyond the reef, and he had been visiting his new friend Payakan every single day, leaving his friends and family to wonder where he was disappearing to.

He wanted to introduce Ja'lia to Payakan, but he was afraid she would be mad at him if she found out the full story of the day he went missing.

Ja'lia had told him how terrified she was when she found out that he was missing, and it made Lo'ak feel bad for staying with Payakan for so long. But he didn't regret meeting the Tulkun. Payakan had saved his life, and he would forever be grateful for him doing so.

The boy hoped Ja'lia would feel the same if she met the Tulkun.

However, for the time being, Lo'ak decided that it would probably be best to go and see Payakan by himself as the training between the Omatikaya children and the Metkayina children had been put on hold.

Tonowari and Ronal felt it would be best to give everyone a break in hopes that it would diffuse the growing tension between Lo'ak and Ao'nung. Of course, Lo'ak was mad at Ao'nung, but he wasn't going to hold a grudge against him, even though he should've.

No, he understood Ao'nung. Lo'ak knew what it was like to be the disappointment in the family, so if he could take the relief off Ao'nung's shoulders, even for a day or two, he would do it. Because no one deserved to feel that all they would ever be was one big mistake to their family.

And even though Lo'ak felt that way, he was proud of himself for sticking up for Ao'nung, even though he eventually told the truth later that night because Ja'lia had ratted him out. The boy had no idea how she knew he was lying, but after she revealed the truth, he and his parents had a long conversation that he had been trying to get out of his head ever since.

His mother had been heartbroken when she was told the truth, and his father hardly spoke until Neytiri talked with him while Ja'lia healed Lo'ak's wounds.

Jake profusely apologized to his youngest son and promised that he would try to do better. The father promised that he would start acting like how he was before the Sky People returned and that they could do fun things together again.

However, Lo'ak didn't believe him. He would believe it when he saw it, and so far, Jake hadn't made an effort to try and better their relationship.

Instead, he buried himself in more training and avoided Lo'ak at all costs.

And that hurt Lo'ak, but disappointment wasn't a new feeling to him, so he pushed his feelings aside and decided to hang out with Payakan, much to Ja'lia's dismay.

But that was the point, at least in Lo'ak's mind.

He wanted to avoid her no matter what because he was confused by his feelings. After all their years of friendship, why did he suddenly want them to become something more? It didn't make sense to him, and he thought something was seriously wrong.

Besides, it's not like Ja'lia would ever feel the same way.

She deserved someone who could take care of her, love her, and cherish her, and Lo'ak was certain that he couldn't do all of that because of how broken he was. Although, what he didn't know was that he was breaking Ja'lia's heart each time he refused to hang out with her.

Ja'lia thought that she had done something wrong. Something to make him mad.

The girl had spent the entire time since the day after Lo'ak came back raking over her mind to see if she could have said something to upset him, and each time she came up empty-handed. Since the day after Lo'ak came back, he had barely spoken an entire sentence to Ja'lia, and it was like she was going through the five stages of grief.