A:TWOW- Aonung x oc

Chapter 4: life can be shitty

I did learn how to ride an ilu, Tsireya showed me, and I made sure to continue to apologize for slapping her brother.

I cannot believe I let my temper get the best of me like that, what is wrong with me. I was so glad no one told dad or I would have been skinned alive.

I avoided Aonung not caring about his stupidity anymore, as long as he left my family alone I was ok.
-
Tsireya got us all in a circle on a rock to practice breathing.

"Breathe in," she instructed. "Breathe out. Imagine a flickering flame. You must slow down your heart beat."

She reached over and put her hands on Lo'aks chest, "breathe in. Breathe from down here. Breathe out slowly."

Lo'ak followed all her instructions.

"Lo'ak, your heart beat is fast." Tsireya said.

"Sorry," he muttered. I bit my lip to keep my laugh in.

"Try to focus."

I was nearly shaking with laughter and looked at neteyam and caught Rotxo's eye, they were both smirking. Kiri looked at us three and rolled her eyes.

"Let your mind go clear." Tsireya said.

I followed her instructions, closing my eyes, and could feel my heart slow down and my breathing get lower, at some point I felt a warm body move next to mine and opened my eyes to see the sun setting and no one left on the rock but me and Aonung. I frowned at him.

"What do you want?" I asked, not keeping the annoyance out of my voice. He looked at me with a frown.

"I want to say..." he hesitated and looked behind his shoulder. I also turned to see what he was looking at but there was nothing there except the village. "I'm sorry for laughing at you and your family."

I took a moment to respond, not sure what to say. "I'm sorry too," I replied smoothly, "for hitting you."

He gave me an odd look that I would not have been able to read if I didn't see the face in my reflection every day. He was almost serious, determined, confident? Almost.
-
A few days passed quickly and Neteyam, Lo'ak and I would often race on the ilus. I guess the water was starting to grow on me, the whole village was growing on me, I hated to admit it.
Even dad was almost a pro on those skimwings.

Kiri seemed to love it here the most, one time when we were underwater for a while we got shown the gill mantles, they give us breath underwater. While most of us were working, Kiri found these tiny glowing fish and made them move with her. I've never seen anything like it. Kiri was one of a kind, she was amazing.
-
The next morning Kiri and I went to the beach. I didn't know what she planned on doing but a day off from deep waters is always fine with me.

Kiri showed me how she loved to just lay and look at the sand.

"I'll be right back, I want to put my knife away," I told her before jogging off to our house, it was relatively close so I was back on my way to the beach in no time.

From a distance I could see a group of Metkayina boys walking up to Kiri and I saw their amused faces, that made me want to punch them.

I walked faster, making my strides wider and trying to take deep breaths to calm myself.
In the distance I heard Aonungs voice, "Are you some kind of... freak?"

I got to the nearest boy and pushed him aside, roughly.

"What did you call my sister?" I demanded standing in front of Aonung and Rotxo.

Aonung was taller than me but we seemed to be looking straight into each other's eyes, he was amused while I was glaring daggers at him.
Rotxo added, "he asked if you are a freak."