CHAPTER SIXTEEN:
DAYDREAMING
(episode five: midsummers)

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HAVEN REALLY DIDN'T WANT to go to Midsummers. After crying on Kie for an hour then watching several sad movies just to sob some more, the last thought on her mind was dressing up in a pretty dress with a face full of makeup just to play nice with some pig-headed kooks. But alas, when Kie had hopefully asked if Haven would be her date, she couldn't say no. She put it down to Kie's puppy eyes. Haven had never been able to resist those.

"My boobs are about to fall out of this dress," she grumbled as she struggled to adjust the puff sleeves of her off-the-shoulder pale pink dress that Kie had bought for her. It turned out that Kie was banking on her saying yes to her invite, for she'd gone ahead and gotten an outfit for the girl earlier in the morning, much to Haven's chagrin. She didn't like owing people, especially her friends. And even if Kie insisted she didn't want the money back, Haven would return every last cent if it was the last thing she did.

"Are you even wearing it right?" Kie chuckled as she made her way over to where Haven was standing in front of her mirror. She was wearing a gorgeous lavender silk dress with a matching flower crown. Haven had her own headpiece already pinning back her curled hair, a strappy pair of silver heels on her feet to match the necklace around her neck and her earrings. The piece to put it all together was the dress, which Kie fortunately fixed so she didn't look so awkward in it.

"Thanks," she muttered as Kie laughed in amusement and wandered off to do her own thing.

Alone, Haven took a moment to really admire herself. A year ago, if someone had asked her to put on a revealing dress that accentuated her curves, Haven would've seen every 'flaw' before she saw her beauty. She would've ridiculed herself for the way that her thighs rubbed together, for how her stomach wasn't completely flat. She'd have spent hours picking apart the term plus-sized instead of appreciating who she was. She most definitely would not have worn it for anyone to see, and yet she found herself almost excited to show it off, despite the fact it was Midsummers of all places.

"I look hot," she commented to herself.

"Damn right you do," Kie smirked. "Just wait until Pope sees you."

Haven blushed, staring at her wide-eyed. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Please. Arden's told me all about Hope and I have to say, I ship it."

"Not you too," she groaned. Kie just laughed.

Not even a second later, there was a knock on the door before Mrs Carrera poked her head inside and smiled at them. About halfway through their second movie, Kie's parents had returned to prepare themselves for the evening. If they noticed Haven's splotchy face, they didn't say so. Instead, they greeted the girl kindly before saying how excited they were that she was accompanying them to Midsummers. What a way to find out.

"Hey, girls," she greeted them, looking absolutely beautiful in her yellow Summer dress. "Haven, you look gorgeous."

She did a spin to showcase the flowy knee-length skirt, beaming happily as Mrs Carrera clapped. "Thank you, thank you."

Kie chuckled at her friend before raising an eyebrow at her mother. "Was there something you wanted?"

She shrugged, though both girls could see there was more to it. "Just to have a chat with my favourite daughter."

"I'm your only daughter," Kie deadpanned while Haven excused herself to the bathroom.

Through the door, she only heard bits and pieces of the conversation, but it was safe to say that her friend was left thoroughly unimpressed. She stormed into the bathroom once her mother left, almost startling Haven as she carefully inserted her contacts into her eyes.

"That sounded like it went well," she drawled as she glanced at the girl through the mirror.

Kie just huffed to herself, nudging Haven over gently so she could put on some mascara and call it a day. "Don't even get me started."

Soon enough, they were both ready and making their way to the event. Of course, it was being held at the Country Club, the place of Haven's nightmares. She didn't say anything, though, not wanting to raise Mr and Mrs Carrera's suspicions any more than she already had. Instead, she followed the family around as they greeted both familiar and unfamiliar faces, bemusedly accepting half-hearted condolences for her father when people eventually remembered her name.

It was going to be a long fucking night.

"Hey, look who it is," Kie cooed as her parents finally left them to entertain themselves. "It's your boyfriend."

Haven frowned before following her gaze over to Pope. Her face dropped into a glare as the girl cackled proudly. "Very funny, Kie."

"I know, right?" she simpered as they excused themselves from a group of people around them to approach the boy in question. "I'm a real comedian. Just watch and see." As they stepped up to the table of food that Mr Heyward had set up as the caterer for the evening, Kie cleared her throat and put on what was possibly the worst posh accent Haven had ever heard. "Excuse me, sir. Do we have to shuck these ourselves? 'Cause it might mess up our costumes."

Pope hadn't realised it was them yet (how, Haven wasn't sure, but she knew it fuelled Kie's ego) and he turned to face them with a sour look on his face. "I don't — Oh."

"Now, Mr Heyward, is that any way to look at your superiors?" Haven huffed, over-accentuating her words as Kie giggled.

"Never call me that again," Pope groaned and playfully glared at her. "I'm not my dad."

"Really?" she gasped in mock surprise. "I could've sworn you two were twins."

"My worst nightmare," he shuddered. "Those accents were awful, by the way."

Kie sighed to herself. "Yeah, we know."

Haven, on the other hand, shrugged nonchalantly. "I don't know, it's kind of growing on me."

The mood was quick to dampen though, as the three just watched people flaunting their money in each other's faces. Haven didn't notice the problem when she was younger. She used to love it when her parents took her to their fancy dinners. It gave her a chance to put on some of her mother's makeup and pretend to be a princess on her way to the royal ball. But the older she got, the more in tune she came with the real world, and the fairy-tale magic that once shrouded her ideologies was quick to fade into dust.

"Look at them," she muttered in disgust as a particularly loud woman cackled into her champagne flute. "Have you ever seen this many kooks in one place?"

"Yeah," Pope sighed. "Last Midsummers."

"We're officially in the lion's den," Kie said.

"You mean Pope and I are," Haven corrected. "You at least can pretend like you belong here."

Kie groaned, though she knew she was right. "It pains me every second, trust me."

They were silent for a moment before Pope spoke again, his eyes downcast as every trace of amusement disappeared from his face. "Hey, have either of you heard from JJ?"

At that, all of Haven's agony came rushing back. Kie reached out to squeeze her hand, shooting Pope a warning look over her head that Haven failed to notice. The girl was yet to open up to Kie on what had caused her so much distress, but she'd picked up on the fact that JJ was a trigger for her sadness. After that, she tried her best to keep mentions of the blonde boy to a minimum, but Pope hadn't known that.

"He'll be right," she said shortly as Haven played with her bracelets anxiously. "He's got the survival instincts of a cockroach."

If JJ Maybank was a cockroach, Luke Maybank was the bug spray designed to kill him.

"It's all my fault."

"No, it's not," Haven immediately protested. "You saw him, Pope, he wasn't going to give in."

"Yeah, and even if he did," Kie added. "Topper almost killed you, remember?"

"Sinking some stupid boat he could probably buy ten times over is nothing compared to that."

Before Pope was able to reply, the crowd cheered as a certain family arrived. Haven scoffed as Sarah Cameron followed Wade and Rose with her siblings on either side of her. She was dressed in a white ankle-length dress with a matching headpiece and her golden hair flowing around her face in loose waves. She looked ethereal, and Haven hated it.

"Here come Lord Capital and the Exploiters," Kie rolled her eyes.

"She's definitely gonna poke somebody's eye out with that," Pope muttered while pointing to the ridiculous spiky headpiece Rose was wearing.

"Can she poke mine out?" Haven said. "They're already bleeding from having to look at her. Just put me out of my misery."

Eventually, Kie was dragged off by her parents to greet more people, leaving Haven to assist Pope in serving hungry guests. She wasn't sure how much time had passed but soon the sun was beginning to set, the sky a soft shade of pink to match her dress.

"Hey, Mr Heyward," she greeted the man in question when she noticed him making his way over to them with an empty food platter in his hands.

"Hi, Haven," he replied with a smile. She was relieved to know he wasn't angry after earlier. She hadn't been the nicest to him when she left. "You look nice tonight."

"Why thank you," she beamed before glancing over at Pope and putting on an exaggerated pout. "Your son said I look like a rat."

"What?" Pope cried in outrage. "I did not."

"Oh, you better not have," his father pointed a finger at him in warning.

"I didn't," he insisted before sending Haven a pleading glare. "Haven, tell him I didn't."

"He didn't. I was just joking," she said through her laughter.

Pope breathed out a sigh of relief as Mr Heyward rolled his eyes at their antics. "Have, that wasn't very nice of you."

"I'm sorry," she hummed, not sounding the least bit apologetic. "My inner Arden Kim took over."

"That explains so much."

Haven playfully swatted at his arm before plastering on a charming smile and turning to where Mr Heyward was reloading the platter with miniature quiche. "Hey, Mr Heyward..."

"What do you want, Haven?" he asked without even looking in her direction.

"Do you think I could steal Pope for a dance?" she grinned and slipped her hand into Pope's. He was shaking his head in protest but she ignored him. "Please? Just one."

With a glance at the hopeful girl then his son, who was looking at the dance floor fearfully like it was a monster ready to attack, Mr Heyward smirked and nodded his head. "I think that's a great idea, Haven."

"Brilliant," she cheered before tugging Pope towards the crowd of people who were starting to sway to a slow song. She recognised it as a Dermot Kennedy song but she couldn't name it. "Come on, Pope, let's show off your dancing skills."

"You mean my lack of dancing skills," he hissed as she put one of his hands on her waist and gripped the other in her own, her other hand resting on his chest. "Have, I don't know about this."

"Oh, relax, would you?" she chuckled as he looked around. "No one cares enough to worry about what you're doing. They're too busy getting drunk off champagne and rubbing their money in each other's faces."

She was right. No one spared them a glance even as Pope stuck out in the crowd with his lack of formal clothing. Slowly but surely, he eased into the dance, even going as far as to spin Haven around before bringing her back closer than before.

"That was smooth," she giggled as both her hands went to his neck and his to her waist. "I didn't take you as a ladies man, Pope Heyward."

He smirked at her. "So does that mean I'm successfully wooing you?" Now, that caught her off guard. She looked away from him, rosy-cheeked as he laughed and held her tighter. "I'm going to take that as a yes."

"Shut up," she mumbled, leaning her head on his shoulder to hide her embarrassment.

He looked down at her fondly, just taking her in. She was always beautiful but underneath the fairy lights the club had strung up on pillars with her pretty pink dress and her hair done delicately, she was stunning. Pope would even go as far as to wonder if she could hear his heart hammering away in his chest as a familiar feeling resurfaced.

There were a few times in the past couple of weeks where Pope Heyward really considered what it would be like to kiss Haven Murphy. That night happened to be one of those times, and boy was the feeling strong.

"Hey, Haven?" he murmured before he could stop himself, swallowing nervously as she moved her head off his shoulder to smile up at him. "Can I kiss you?"

Her smile faltered in surprise but stayed firmly in place. She would be lying to herself if she said that she hadn't thought of them together like this, but never did she think he'd actually feel the same way about her. Was this some sort of fever dream caused by the stress of the last couple of days? She wondered if he could hear how fast her heart was racing.

"I mean," she stammered nervously. "If you want to, that would be cool."

"Us kissing would be cool?" he repeated with a smug smirk. He was starting to realise just how nervous he made her feel.

"Oh, shut up and kiss me already."

Pope smiled, leaning in to connect their lips. Haven would be lying if she said sparks flew, but it was a good kiss, a really good kiss. When they pulled apart, she almost leaned back for more, addicted to the taste of his lips on hers.

Well, this was definitely new.

But both of them found they rather liked it.

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AFTER THEIR MOMENT ON the dance floor, Haven not-so-subtly excused herself to the bathroom and Pope had to help his father out again. Neither of them said anything afterwards, though both wore giddy smiles that were hard not to notice. Finally, after several minutes of staring at herself in the mirror and freaking out at her smudged lipstick, she did her best to fix up her makeup before heading back outside. As she was forcing her way through the crowd, she noticed a familiar head of messy blonde hair standing across from Pope.

"JJ?" she exclaimed as she appeared behind them. He instinctively spun around at the mention of his name, his smile slowly falling as he saw Haven standing there. She gasped at the sight of him, feeling like the air had been knocked out of her lungs as she caught sight of the dark purple bruises lining his jaw and the dried blood on his lip. He looked like he'd had the shit kicked out of him. His dad. "Oh, my god."

He averted his eyes then, patting Pope on the back one last time before muttering, "I've got a mission to complete."

Then, before Haven was able to stop him, he disappeared into the crowd. She stood frozen for a moment, her heart pounding hard, before Pope brought her out of her daze by stepping towards her worriedly.

"Hey, you okay?" he asked softly.

She nodded, though neither of them were convinced. "Never better." What a fucking lie.

Pope hesitantly left her side as his dad called him over, and Haven stood there for another minute before rushing off to find Kie or Arden, the latter she was yet to see for the entire night. JJ's bruised face never once left her mind, nor did the unspoken hurt in his eyes, the disappointment.

All Haven's fault.