Sophitz Forever

Chapter Twenty-One

Sophie braced for the inevitable cries and shouts as Alden and Della came rushing in, hurriedly, with stricken and worried looks on their faces and rather impatient postures.

"Oh my God, Sophie!" Della shrieked. Both of them sat down at the edge of Sophie's bed. "Sophie, my darling. Do you know how long you made us wait?"

Alden sighed. "Not that it truly offends us, seeing as we're just random people and you wanted to see your friends and parents first, but we really wanted to see you!" Alden added, his face scanning Sophie's for any signs of something wrong.

Sophie looked down guiltily. "Sorry guys. My friends all wanted to see me first, and then my parents had to come before they went berserk... well! You're seeing me now!" She smiled brightly but winced in pain at the action.

"Sophie! Oh, Sophie!" Della sobbed. She leaned over and hugged her tightly. Sophie looked over at her, surprise registering as she saw the tears that were running down the woman's face.

"Please. Don't cry, Della! I'm fine!" Sophie said. "I promise I'm okay."

"No, you don't understand. I'm so sorry! I was just so worried about you! I heard what happened from Fitz. My son is in big trouble." Della murmured. Alden nodded along with her almost angrily, the angriest Sophie had seen him in a long time, and added for emphasis,

"BIG trouble." He shook his head and looked as if he were gearing up for battle.

Sophie did her best to argue against them. "No, guys! It wasn't Fitz's fault!" She stopped. She was going to tell the truth. "I mean, maybe it kind of was, but this," she gestured to herself, "this only happened because I've been under a lot of stress and I just couldn't handle everything happening all at once, you know?"

Alden shook his head. "No matter what you say, Sophie, I know the truth. The real cause of all this. That stress was caused by my son and his stupidity in today's actions."

Sophie honestly couldn't argue with that, both because it was true and because she didn't have the physical strength. Ever since Fitz had come out and told her he liked her, she had been so worried and stressed out. She really hadn't expected it to come down to this, though.

Della said, with a lot fewer tears, much to Sophie's relief, "Okay, I've calmed down now. I made Fitz tell us what happened and I just can't believe how strong you are! Wow. Are you sure you're okay?" She seemed unbelieving as if Sophie couldn't possibly be all right after everything that had occurred.

Sophie nodded, "Yes! Della, I'm perfectly fine. Just a little... tired is all." Sophie said in reassurance. Sophie said, "I just want to go to sleep. I promise I'll be okay if I just get a little rest."

Della and Alden nodded in agreement. "Yeah, you do that. A little rest will do you good. And we'll leave you to it. We'd like to go punish our son." They stood up and walked towards the door.

Sophie tried to shake her head at them, telling them that it was unneeded, but she was already slipping away into sleep, slowly...

The last thing she heard was the door shut softly and the soft murmur of voices retreating down the stairs outside.

*****

Sophie woke up groggily with a start. "Ughh," she mumbled. Wow. She was so awake. She stretched her arms and felt no pain. That was strange. That medication must have done its job well. Or maybe it was just the sleep.

Wait, was she still dreaming? Sophie pinched her arm but nothing happened. This meant she was most definitely awake. Besides, you couldn't feel this alive, this alert, in a dream. And this was the most active Sophie had ever felt. Maybe it was the drugs.