The sun shined like a fireball in the violently blue sky. It was eye-catching, yet your eyes stung when making contact with the glowing sun. Clouds scattered throughout the sky like a hopscotch game, bouncing every other side.

The competition grew slimmer as we reached one-digit contestants and migrated to a new country, Barcelona. However, with a pending knowledge needed from Davina's father, I suggested we take a detour before joining the group. To get used to the jetlag, they gave us an extra week to re-cooperate.

But Davina and I had other plans. Her story was quite shocking, but being a child of abuse, nothing felt impossible. Sour taste clawed at my stomach, knowing Colton left her to deal with this earth-shattering night. If he knew the truth, how could he feel great about himself knowing he destroyed her?

It's never acceptable to validate people's personalities by their past mistakes. They don't define them if they are willing to change afterward. If Davina really caused the accident, injuring her sister, then she didn't need someone to judge her. She had herself for that. It would be my responsibility as a friend to be there, to encourage her through this.

Davina drowned her sorrows in alcohol, but these days it's like she found a new outlet.

Meadow's personal investigator helped us locate Davina's father, who's currently residing in San Francisco. Her investigator informed us of Davina's father's usual schedule; he would go to work from six to four in the evening, spend two hours in the park, then enjoyed a private meal in the comfort of his own home.

It might've been rude for Davina to barge in on him on a random sunny afternoon, but we had to get this shit straightened out.

"Are you done, yet? It hurts my neck to stay in this position for too long," Davina complained, her red-painted lips curling down to a frown.

Since Davina didn't want to seem like a psycho daughter, our coverup was having a picnic date, which would also shut down the rumor of a breakup. Davina sat elegantly on the plain white blanket, her legs spilling from the slit on her Polkadot Chiffon dress. It's like she knew her tan legs were my weakness and easily caused a chain reaction down to my trousers.

It was painful enough to keep my eyes from staring at the boobs being crushed to death from the tight top. She had me second-guessing if I was still an ass guy, that's how intoxicating her breast was.

"I'm just about done with it, honey. Stay still and I'll spoil you with churros," I said, softly draping my pen over the paper.

During my cooking withdrawal, I dabbled in different kinds of media to get over my little hunch. Sketching was one of them. I wasn't the next Van Gogh, but from the comments on my personal artist Instagram; I was fucking great.

"Better be churros, bubble tea, and a free spa session at the hotel," Davina replied, dropping her head a bit, but thankfully her sunhat was the only thing missing in the illustration.

My eyes narrowed, paying extra close attention to her hat. "Stop squirming so I can draw your damn hat."

Her cheeks puffed out. "You try sitting still for an hour without your body shaking."

I laughed. "I was a male model for an art structure class and had to stay still for five hours."

"Are they selling them?" She flashed a quick smile before replacing it with a sigh.

"I got great news, honey... I'm done!" I shouted with glee, cramming my charcoal vine behind my ear.

Davina leaped from the blanket and tackled the sketchbook from my hands. Her eyes skyrocketed when they landed on the paper. Her mouth fell open as her boney fingers traced the outline of herself, tainting them with charcoal.

"Wow, this is fucking amazing bean sprout," Davina said, giving me a monstrous ego boost. "School subjects might've been a task for you but you seriously have skills with those hands."

A chuckle withdrew from my lips.

Pink crept up her cheeks. "I didn't mean for that to sound dirty."

I winked. "I'm sure you didn't."

"Seriously! You even got the complicated pattern on my dress down pat." Her mouth formed an 'o' shape. "I'm mind fucked."

My shoulder stood straight as I accepted the compliments, which went right to my head. "It easy when the model is beautiful to stare at." Heat burned in my face. "Sorry, that's so awkward to say."

Davina stayed silent, her eyes darting all over the page before I got flustered from the rumbling phenomenon in my stomach. My hands reached for the heart-shaped Caprese sandwich Davina cooked up this morning. The creamy mozzarella melted on my tongue, blending in with the juicy tomatoes.

"This is fucking great. You deserved that kid's championship if you were cooking like this since that age." I munched, my voice muffled by the food.

My head jerked up in time to stop the sketchbook from knocking the sandwich out of my hand. Davina wore a grouchy expression, her lips protruding out, and she huffed as she got onto her two legs.

I blinked, completely brain fucked over her one-eighty. "What the hell? Did I say something wrong?"

She shook her head. "No. I didn't mean to throw it... kinda. I-I just." Her face grew redder by the second. "Can I borrow a twenty so I can buy churros for us?"

My eyebrows pinched together. "Sure... It's nothing to get upset about, honey."

"Thanks, I'll be right back," Davina said, running away like in those romantic movie scenes with her dress flowing in the wind.

I stuffed the rest of the sandwich in my mouth and wiped the bread particles off my hands by slamming them together. Curiosity gripped at my thoughts when my eyes drifted over my thrown sketchpad. When grabbing it, I opened the page Davina left the charcoal pencil in, and my stomach rolled with nausea.

The pencil stood on the page of my Lana drawing. Quickly glancing through my book, I counted about a dozen Lana sketches I drew whenever I had free time at Shimmery Harmony. This couldn't be the reason why she was agitated? My paragraphs about Lana never bothered her before...

At least not in this way.

Could she be jealous?

"You should try the fresh spring roll. It's a Davina Dialaurentis special." Her voice startled the book out of my hands.

A small smile graced Davina's lips as the light streamed perfectly on her. "The churro might be a bit too sugary for you. I wiped a bit off since you have that sour tooth problem."

My face scrunched up in superstition as I took the churro from her grasp. "Thanks... I'm suddenly nervous about eating this."

Sitting down next to me, Davina bit her churro as if it was corn on the cob. It was a pretty unusual sight, but it was adorable how her eyebrows crinkled with every bit. I guess she was just hangry. That would explain her one-eight shift more than my reasoning.

"Are you going to eat it or not?" Davina eyed the churro.

I handed it over. "Go ahead, my plan was to spoil you today, anyway."

Her eyes crinkled along with her cute button nose as she bit it like someone would snap celery. She broke a piece, hovering it over my closed lips, and she opened hers as a silent way of telling me to follow her lead.

"You never act this romantic on dates. You always have me doing these things... What's up with you today?" She stuffed the churro in my mouth as I finished my statement.

"Jeez. I act nice for two seconds and it's like I committed a crime. I'm just trying to have photos of me acting all romantic. Our fans think you're in love with me but still question how I really feel, especially with ENews reporting our big blowout fight," Davina said, licking the excess sugar-coated on her fingers.

My eyes peered at my watch. "Should we start searching for your father? He should be somewhere around here since it's a quarter until five."

Fear flashed in her blue-green irises as she nibbled anxiously at her sugary snack. "Maybe this was a bad idea..."

Drawing in a deep breath, I nodded. "D, I'm not going to force you to do anything you don't want to."

Her worried eyes locked with mine. "I'm not afraid to find out the truth." Davina tipped her head to the side. "Okay, maybe a bit... But our relationship is so strained... I'm still so furious at him for ditching my mom, sister, and me like we didn't mean anything. He didn't even bother contacting me before. Why would that suddenly change now?"

My stomach rolled with a horrible feeling.

Maybe I jumped too fast before thinking of everything Davina's gone through with him. I didn't appreciate Milo inviting my parents to the competition a month ago, and today I basically coercion Davina through the same thing.

"Sorry, I didn't realize... Why don't you finish up the churro and we can go catch a movie or rent one of those paddle boats."

Fear disappeared from her eyes. "Paddleboat! Paddleboat! Then I can ditch you halfway like Aquamarine did to Raymond." Her eyes rolled back as a light moan slipped from her mouth. "Goddamn was Raymond so fine! The things I would do to him..."

Sugar stained her bottom lip, and I licked my finger before wiping away the excess from her mouth. Davina turned beetroot red as her eyes darted between my finger and my gaze. She abruptly shot up from her spot, nearly falling in the process.

"I-I'm going to throw this napkin o-out," she stammered, bumping into the tree as she walked backward.

I chuckled. "Alright."

"Oh, shit!" The sound of drink splashing caught my attention, as I turned around, catching Davina using her napkin on the older man's clothing.

I rushed towards her, not wanting her to receive any aggression if this older man turned out to be a dickhead. Their eyes connected and the only noise was the leaves ruffling through the air as wind swept up.

The buzz-cut guy grinned. "Hi, Davina."

"Hi, Dad," she breathed.

My blood ran cold.

Without a warning, the universe swept us into territory we weren't completely certain about entering. But the choice was taken from our grips, and we had no choice to face this head-on.

"Hi, I'm Ambrose." My hand wandered behind the small of her back, hoping she took it as a sign of support. "I've heard a lot about you." She shot a side-eye in my direction.

His crow's feet grew as he grinned wider. "Nice to meet you, Ambrose. You're a great friend of Davina?"

I scoffed. "Huh? I'm sorry but please don't take this the wrong way, but don't you have social media?"

His forehead crinkled. "I'm old school. I only use a flip phone."

Something flashed in her eyes, sadness maybe before she quickly hid it. "Ambrose is my boyfriend. But you wouldn't know much about him... or me."

He sighed, but his smile stayed strong. "I hope you're treating her like a princess and love her."

My jaw slightly twitched. "It's easy because Davina's great. She's one of the best people that I know."

His pearly white shined through kind of looking like a jolly snowman. "Then I'm happy a great person is with her. I never liked that Colton guy. So, what are you doing here, Davina? I thought you lived in New York with your mother."

She chuckled, lowly. "Yeah, I moved out when I was twenty and found an apartment in Los angles."

His green eyes stared lovingly from Davina's head to her toes, cherishing this moment. "It looks like your Mom did an amazing job."

Davina giggled hysterically, a front for the pain and awkwardness she's going through. "Yeah, maybe if you stayed you could have helped, but apparently our family wasn't good enough."

"Hey, Daddy!" A little black-haired girl with pigtails came running towards Davina's father in her overalls with a pile of dirt in her hands. "Teddy threw dirt in my hair so I put dirt in his face and now, he's chasing me."

Another child with the long Cole Sprouse hair came running, his eyes scheming for his next target. "Riley, let me just throw the dirt so we can go play with the doggie!"

"No, Teddy." Her father leaned down, forcing the young boy's hand open. "Don't dirty your sister. Mom is going to have a fit if you guys show up anymore dirty than you're already. Now." He placed Davina's younger sister on the ground and tapped her butt. "Go play with the dog, Daddy is talking with someone right now."

Davina scoffed. "Oh, so I'm just a random somebody now?"

"Davina!" He gritted through his teeth.

"Am I too much of an embarrassment for you that you can't be bothered to introduce me?" Davina spat, anger streaming off her like a heatwave.

"Daddy?" Riley tugged at his baggy pants. "What is she talking about?"

He tore his eyes from Davina and softened as he pecked a kiss on Riley's head. "It's nothing, just big people talk. Go on, and play with the dog."

Davina rolled her eyes, laughing as she stormed off and I rushed after her. Maybe I should've asked the private investigator why her father spent hours in the park. My dumbass thought maybe he appreciated nature. Davina furiously ripped the sunhat from her head and quickly packed our picnic.

"Davina, please stop." Her father chased after us. "They're just kids. It's going to be a mess if I just drop another sibling into their life. I also have to speak with my wife if she's comfortable with you meeting them."

Davina spun around, tears pooling in her eyes. "Do you remember when that horrible thunderstorm when I saw ten? The thunder shook our house and Kasey and I hid under the beds for you guys to come home. I thought the lightning was so bright that the word was on fire."

He shrugged. "Why are you bringing this up?"

"Kasey and I sobbed, afraid to move a single muscle until you barged into the room pretending to be one of those superheroes and talked us into making it a game. You said heros had to dry their tears and wear their capes proudly in order to save everyone."

She wandered closer to her father, pointing her finger at him. "You made that entire night an adventure until the storm passed. We woke up the next morning and it was a sunny day... Don't you remember that?"

He cleared his throat, shifting his foot uncomfortably. "No, Davina. I don't."

Davina dropped her hand. "That's because it never happened. The storm happened. But you didn't. Milo came in. Milo was the one who helped us teleport into a different world and we weren't scared anymore."

"What do you want me to say?" He shook his head. His tongue snaked over his lips. "I regret it. There's not a day that goes by when I don't."

"No, you don't!" Davina whimpered, her voice cracking. "You left me. You left Kasey. And you left Mom. I did every fucking thing you asked of me. All I wanted to do was make you proud of me and you just up and left? What do they have that we didn't? Why can you be a father to them but not me?" she ranted, finally letting the air into her lungs.

He rubbed his mouth. "Davina..."

"I can't do this." Her voice crumbled as she run down the path at a million miles per hour.

Her father groaned, kicking the tree beside him and bumping his head on the brown bark.

"I-I'm going to go after her," I stammered, trying to recall the direction she went.

"Please, if you don't mind, just tell her I'm sorry. If I had known she was going to be here, I wouldn't have brought them," he said, pacing back and forth.

Word vomit took over me. "Don't you see that's the problem? Why is it such a bad thing for her to meet her siblings?" I shook my head. "Nevermind, I'm going."

"Here." He handed over a business card. "If she wants to talk again just tell her to call me. I want to see her again, I want to make up for everything."

I hesitantly took the card. "Alright."

Well... that definitely took a turn for the worst... Do you guys think Davina should hear her father out? Or she has every right to be upset?

Love you guys!! Can't wait to read your comments!!!