Wasted potential ★ holes [zigzag x oc]

Six

Trigger warning: mentions of death

It was Rec time at camp green lake. Shark was at the pool table, she had beat barf bag and magnet, and now was playing zigzag, and she was winning. He was glad they were just playing for fun and not for any prizes.

"You ever gonna let up? Just once?" He asked, as she sunk another ball into the hole.

"Zig I can't just let you win. What the hell would that teach you?" She asked.

"Nothing but it would make me feel a bit better.." he answered.

She gave him a fake pout before speaking again. "Just shoot the ball zig." She told him. Just then Mr Pendanski walked in, holding an envelope.

"Jo, mail." He walked up to her, handing her the envelope. Shark took it out of his hand, putting her stick in the pool table to examine the letter. It was from her mother. This was the first time she had revived mail since she'd gotten to camp.

"Thanks mom." She said, still looking at her letter. "Hey squid, fill in for me yeah?" She asked squid. He nodded, grabbing her pool stick and playing for her.

She walked away to the Rec room comfy chair and sat down. She looked at the letter, shocked. She didn't expect her mom to even wanna talk to her after all the trouble she had caused. Part of her didn't even wanna open it. What if her mom was writing to tell her how disappointed she was in her? Or how when she was finally released she wasn't welcome back home? All these thoughts raced through her head.

She finally decided to rip the bandaid off and open the letter. When she opened it she was immediately hit with a wiff of her mothers perfume, almost making her cry. But she held back her tears, for now.

She looked at the letter and started to read.

Dear Josephine,

I'm sorry about not writing you sooner. I guess I just haven't found the words for what I wanna tell you. I miss you. That's all I've felt in the last two months since you've been gone. The house is so quite without you. Franny has been wondering the house looking for you, she even sleeps in your bed at night. Don't worry, I've been feeding her sliced turkey like you always do.
I want you to know that I love you josy, I'm still disappointed in you for what you did. But I hope that when you come home you'll have learned your lesson and will get your life back in track when you get out of there. Please write me and tell me how your doing.

Love, mom.

Once shark finished the letter she booked it out of the rec hall, tears now streaming down her face. She ran back to d tent. She immediately went to her bed, sitting on it clutching the letter to her chest. She missed home. She wanted to go back. She wished she could undo the things she did, but she couldn't.

As tears streamed down her face, she reached under her pillow for her book. She needed to hold it, feel some sort of comfort. But when she reached under, it was no where to be found. She felt a slight lump in her throat. She lifted up the pillow to see nothing.

She got off her bed and looked under it, hoping that it had maybe just fallen off and went under the cot well she was sleeping, but it wasn't there. Just a dusty floor. She started to panic and frantically look through her belongings. She tore apart her entire space in the tent searching for her book.

The boys were walking to the tent when they heard commotion. They quickly went inside to see what was going on. When they walked in they saw shark heavily breathing, hastily throwing her things around. Squid was the first one to go over to her.

"Shark what the hell are you doing?" He walked up to her, questioning her actions. She didn't answer, or even acknowledge his presence. When she didn't answer he grabbed her by the shoulders, making her look at him, her eyes full of tears. "Shark talk to me." He shook her a bit. "What happened?" He asked her.

She felt like she couldn't breath, she tried to catch her breath but even time it just got caught in her throat. All the other boys looked at her concerned, but didn't know what to do.

When she finally managed to speak, she just said. "It's gone." she breathed out. "I can't find it." Her voice cracker at the end of her sentence.

Squid looked at her confused. "What's gone?"

Shark sniffled before answering. "My book, I went to look for it and it's gone." She choked out.

Squid looked at the boys behind him. "Who took it?" He asked them. He didn't know why he was being so defensive, but some sort of instinct was kicking in.

"What makes you think one of us took it? Why would we want some stupid book?" X ray defended.

Sharks heart broke when he called it a 'stupid book' if only they knew how much it meant to her.

"Well who else knew it was here huh?" Squid confronted x ray, shoving him a bit. Which cause x ray to shove him back.

"Hey don't touch me man."  X ray spat. Soon enough the boys were shoving each other, hurling insults and accusations to the other.

Once it was starting to get too intense, magnet grabbed squid, and armpit grabbed x ray, breaking up there fight. "Stop it alright guys!" Magnet shouted at the two.

X ray then went up to shark. "Listen I didn't take the book alright? Non of us did." He told her.

She looked at the other boys, who seemed to be just as confused to where the book went.

"Then where did it go?" She asked, looking at all her stuff that was now on the ground.

"I don't know but who cares? It's just a book. There's like a million more copies of it." He told her. He was truly trying to make her feel better but it just came out wrong, he didn't even know what he was saying.

"It's not just the book." She confessed. "There's a photo of  my brother in there.." she told him. She used an old photo of her brother as a book mark. If she lost that photo she'd be devastated.

"So? Just take a new picture of him when you get home." He said, like it was a simple answer. But it wasn't. It was way more complicated then that.

Something inside shark broke when he said that. The tears started to well in her eyes again. "I can't." She told him.

X ray looked at her confused. "Why not?" He shrugged. "Is He like dead or something?" X ray almost chucked at the end of his sentence.

Sharks jaw tightened. "That's exactly why." She said through gritted teeth, tears freely running down her face.

She had it, she pushed past x ray and the rest of the boys. She left the tent for fresh air, to be away from the boys and have time to herself and think.
She walked away, clutching the letter from her mom, smelling it again. It smelled like home. The last piece she had of it for now.