CHAPTER 6: The Beginning of the End
PART 1
Twenty-four hours had passed since the altercation with Anna. Mike remained distant from his friend Andrew and the girl he liked. There had been no news of Anna, and the vacation, which promised to be fun and stress-free, was turning into a mess of tension and unease.
As night began to fall, Diana and Emily decided to go into the sauna before meeting up with the guys at the beach.
"And Anna? I haven’t seen her all day," Diana asked Emily.
"She’s gone back home, or at least I hope so."
"She’s left?"
"Diana, let’s forget about her from now on," Emily replied after a long sigh, as if it was hard for her to speak.
"What happened?"
"I don't want to talk about her," Emily said firmly, slightly irritated, a tone that Diana noticed, and both fell into silence.
"Mike’s been distant with me… ever since we came here, he’s been different. I don’t know what I did."
"You like Mike, don’t you?"
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
"What…?"
"How do I know?" Emily interrupted, seeing her friend blush with a mischievous smile. "Diana, we’ve been friends for more than two years, and you're like a sister to me. I can tell when you're feeling down, when you're happy, when something’s bothering you. And I know you've had a crush on him for months. I don’t really get what you see in him. If he were at least attractive… but he’s got a girly face. No wonder he dressed up as ‘Micaela’ to fool me."
"How do you know Mike is ‘Micaela’?" Diana asked, surprised.
"A little bird told me. The real question is, how do you know?"
"Well... one day… he tripped… and, well…" Diana nervously played with her hair, not quite sure what to say.
"Forget it, just like you can’t lie, you're also horrible at explaining things. Why don’t you tell him how you feel?"
"Because he's dating Andrew."
"Who?"
"Andrew."
"Do you really believe that?" Emily burst out laughing at her friend’s revelation, not quite sure if she was serious. "You’re so naive, Diana. That guy could never be gay. He likes girls way too much."
"But…"
"But nothing," Emily cut her off. "I assure you, Mike and Andrew are just good friends. They could never be together. At most, they could drift apart because of you."
"Because of me?"
"Haven’t you figured it out yet?"
"Figured out what?"
With a contented and motherly expression, Emily approached her friend, wrapping her arms around her in the warmest of hugs.
"This is why I love you so much," she said lovingly before standing up and leaving the sauna. "Don’t be silly, and just confess your feelings to Mike or Andrew. Who knows? You’ve got options."
As Diana watched her friend walk away, she couldn’t stop thinking about Emily’s words. To her, Mike was just too kind to people, and Andrew... Andrew was her childhood friend. At no point, or at least none that she had noticed, had he done anything to suggest he felt something more. Emily must be wrong, as she often was, seeing things where they didn’t exist.