The Starling Saviour

Chapter 76

'Already awake?'

Tommy was stood by the door as he observed the obvious, greeting me while I brushed my hair to the side.

'I thought you'd be fast asleep, with everything that's been happening to you,' Tommy carried on with his comments. 'And, you were so worn out yesterday.'

'I recharged at the hospital,' I informed him, quickly turning to him. 'And today is just another day, as that clichéd saying goes. I've been through worse than being in hospital, Tommy.'

'But you lost your home,' he pointed out, sounding much more concerned than he needed to be. 'It blew up right in front of you.'

'Do you not think I know that?' I remarked coldly, before experiencing brief regret. 'Sorry, it's just, I'm not here for your sympathy, or support, or whatever. I'm here because your dad offered me somewhere to live, before I find a new place to go. Starling isn't the most popular city to live in, I'm sure I'll find an apartment soon enough.'

'You don't have to worry about that, not just yet,' Tommy told me, sounding very sure of himself. 'No matter what you think, you have been through a lot, and you do need to heal. Trying to find an apartment will just make you stressed, and you can't recover when you're stressed. You keep trying to pretend you're okay, but you don't have to pretend around me, Aria.'

'I don't think there would've any point acting like I'm okay around you, because apparently you can see right through me,' I smirked at him, Tommy now sat on the end of my bed and I perched on the dressing table stool opposite from him. 'You know Tommy, you're a really good friend. I don't think I have told you that, not really, but I should have earlier in our relationship, because it's true. We may have fallen out with each other a few times, but we always seem to be able to make up for it. And I have been a real bitch sometimes.'

'Hey, I thought we weren't going to talk about the past,' Tommy rolled his eyes at me comedically, making me laugh. 'But friendship goes both ways, so Aria, you need to cut yourself some slack. You're your world's worst critic, so listen to me when I tell you that you're not that bad.'

'Not that bad?' I repeated him with a snicker. 'Is that all you've got?'

'Oh, you know what I mean,' Tommy shook his head at me this time. 'It turns out that you're my world's worst critic too.'

'Aw, how touching,' I commented, Tommy foolishly grinning at me, just like old times, in the same room I had been in the last time I had lived with the Merlyns.

When Tommy and I were a couple.

'Sorry, I have to... Get my daily caffeine hit, before I go to the club,' I quickly excused myself from Tommy's company, not knowing what to do.

I didn't want to fall for my friend a second time.

'I'll take you to Jitters, if you want?' Tommy offered, but I just declined him with a shaking of the head and leaving the room.

I found myself in the Arrowcave only half an hour later, deep in thought about the last few days. The explosion has consumed my thoughts ever since it had happened, and I had a horrible gut instinct that it hadn't been an accident. Had someone been trying to sabotage mine and Elliot's mission, destroying all the evidence we had on Unidac Industries? I was all for investigating the lab where the Markov Device was being assembled again, but I was too unfit to defend myself after the injuries I had sustained from the blast, Elliot in a much worse condition than I was. I didn't even have my vigilante suit anymore, for I had taken it off shortly before the explosion in the hideout.