Head Above Water

Chapter Twelve

Toby's head emerged from the water as he frantically looked around, "Lilith!"

Lilith popped up seconds later, "I'm okay, I'm right here."  She watched as the boat went on, doing a wide circle back to them. 

"What was it you were you saying?"  Toby swam towards her direction.

She kept a tight grip on her life jacket, kicking with her legs to stay upright.  "I wasn't saying anything."

"Before we fell off, you were saying you knew.  What do you mean you know?"  Lilith was scared that Toby was going to go off on her.  They were both breathing hard, but for potentially different reasons.

She just nodded, "Yeah, I knew."  She was exhausted, physically and mostly mentally.  Lilith just wanted to let this secret off her chest.  She wanted someone to talk about it with.  While this wasn't her ideal situation, it's what she had to work with.

She just wasn't ready for Toby to completely ignore her after she finally admitted the truth.  He didn't listen to her for the entire boat ride, he barely acknowledged her presence except for when one of her siblings brought her name up, and he wouldn't even look at her.  After they finally got off the boat, he excused himself to go to the bathroom, and while Lilith desperately wanted to follow him and get him to say anything to her, she quietly sat around the patio table with the rest of her family.

Lilith sat there, rolling her phone across her lap, keeping mostly to herself.  Her head shot up when she heard Toby's voice.  He sat the furthest away from her that he possibly could, only making her roll her eyes.  She let out an annoyed sigh, keeping quiet as the rest of the family joined and her parents started unwrapping the food.  Everyone started digging in and making small talk all around, but Lilith just felt out of place.  

She only wanted to talk to one person and instead, she felt there was a giant wall blocking her out.  She felt invisible like Beck had probably felt all those years before she showed up.  Just thinking about it made her crave the attention of any kind, she just wanted to talk.  Her family wasn't an option though as they had no idea what was going on.  Toby clearly didn't want to talk.  Beck was her only semi-real option to go to, and that's exactly what she planned to do.

Lilith stood up abruptly, pushing the chair back with a quick screech.  "Can I be excused for a bit?"

Her parents looked to her with concern at how quick she moved.  "Are you okay, sweetie?"  Lilith looked to her mother with a slight nod of the head. 

"I'm fine, I just have to go for a minute.  I'll be back.  You guys enjoy the food, I'm okay."  Lilith didn't wait for any response from her parents before heading for the house.    Her family all exchanged looks, noticing just how weird that seemed but deciding to just go with what Lilith had said and focusing back to their food.  Toby, on the other hand, watched Lilith as she walked away.  

He kept his eyes on her, and when she turned the opposite way of the door and towards the woods, he sat up more in his seat.  He realized no one in her family was watching, and that only made him feel more alert of her safety as if he needed to be there just in case something happened.  Toby waited sometime before excusing himself from the table as well, to try and not draw any more attention to Lilith, but it seemed to do the complete opposite of that.

Lena gave Toby a small smirk, her eyes squinting in his direction as he excused himself to go find Lilith.  He only shook his head, trying his best not to smile before going to find her.

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Lilith had jogged through all the sticks and over the many tree roots, reaching the very familiar river.  She was hoping that Beck would already be sitting there on the edge of the water like they usually did, but unfortunately, it never happened that quickly.