Things I Never Said (Part One)

Where can friendship lead? Well, it can either remain as it is, drift away, or lead to something far more intimate. This is the story of childhood friends Zachariah and Dakota.

Zach liked to think back when they were but children. How shy and uncomfortable she was back then. With cheeks that always seemed flushed and curls that did a lively dance when you ran. He knew from the moment he met her that he loved her. The tender curve to her smile, if only she knew how simply taken he was with her. 

He was often over her house when they were kids. It was a place to hide and she knew it, but not once was he ever made to feel unwelcome or hurried out the door. It was a safe haven when the storm invaded his own home, his own space. The school was hell every day and home just rocked back and forth between comfort and harmful. Without her, without the love she gave in that understated way, without the gentleness of her personality, he doesn't know what would have happened. Zach was never stable, not really, shifting from one place to another in his young adult years, but always there was Dakota. Sometimes he ignored her for months, lost in some new crusade, but never once was she mad when he remembered her again. Always easy with honest advice, but carefully phrased not to cause harm. She'd never just been just a good friend to him, she'd always been one of the rocks of his life - an anchor point.

It was that kind of friendship that blooms in the center of a heart - that kind of friendship that grows from the seed basking in the warm soil to a vast tree with many ups and downs, many - but not enough to disguise the enormity or the grandeur of such a tree, the sheer brilliance and beauty of it.

Zach always marveled at how Dakota could stay by his side even though he could be such an arse to her.

Every time he was around Dakota, his head spun faster than a helicopter blade. The person he saw depended on who he was talking to and what he wanted. He could be everything from bad-a*s to vulnerable, albeit with a new story of each new situation. He had an infinite number of childhoods; his parents were happy, divorced, fighting, abusive or dead. His Dad had been a banker, a road digger, a burglar or unemployed. His mother had been a drunk, a politician, a Sally-home-baker or a tart. He was an only child, the last of eight, brought up in a foster home or the heir to a fortune. Part of him wanted to walk away, but she was the only one he could tolerate. Why? Because she never asked to see behind his ever-changing disguise. Inside that body was a kid, a kid locked in at some emotional age far younger than his twenty-something exterior. She'll never know what happened to him, but whatever it was it just stopped his development at that age. It's a one-way friendship, sometimes, she knows that, but he needs someone...

"Dot?" Zach mumbled, catching his friend's attention from where she sits across from him. He had sat at the booth of the undiscovered local coffee shop silent for almost two hours, drinking his coffee and assisting Dakota with her files when needed. Where he was the son of a very rich man who left his son enough money to last him multiple life times, Dakota did not have that luxury. She worked at the FBI and was the woman who gave files to teams for them to investigate depending on how dangerous or important they were.

"What's wrong?" Dakota asks gently, setting down her fountain pen to remove one of Zach's hands from its clasp on his mug so she could hold it.

"Why do you stick around?" he asks. "What in the bloody hell is wrong with you? Why do you stick with me?" he says, tears starting to run down his cheeks even though he's usually an empty void of emotions.

Dakota gives him a strange look while using the pad of her thumb to wipe away the tears, "Why wouldn't I? You've protected me for so long."

"What?" Zach scoffs. "What do you mean?"

She leans back in her seat, her blond curls falling briefly in front of her face. "I was almost ten when I figured out the true cause of bullying in schools, but who's gonna listen to some kid? Anyway, I'll tell you the story, let you decide if I'm right or if I'm a bit cracked in the head. We had the best classroom teacher, she was so awesome. We got our work done and there was still had time to relax and laugh. No-one got bullied, it was more like being part of a big family than a classroom. You were in that class with me, remember? Ms. Rosner's class."

Zach nods, not following where the story is going. She continues.

"Then one day our teacher was sick, we didn't know it, but she would be out for weeks. Her replacement arrived like she'd come to wage war on us. No speaking was tolerated or it was named on the board, minutes standing outside the room and whole class detentions at recess and after school. We lost our appetite for work and kids who had always been sweet to one another, caring for each other like a sibling, turned on a nice kid in the class because she wore old sneakers. The kid was, and still is, my best friend since kindergarten stood up but that was later on. That's when I knew, you put that much pressure into a classroom, where do you expect it to go? They can't take it out on the teachers, so a soft natured kid gets it. The next day you wore the oldest and smelliest sneakers you could find and sat next to me, the buddy of only five years back then. If they wanted a slice of me, they'd have to take you on, too. 

"So that's when I knew, kids aren't naturally mean, they're just kids - but put in a teacher who bullies and puts stress on them and watch them change. Glib slogans are easy, leading by example is hard. You showed me then that no matter how hard you had it, you could be strong. But I could tell from all the times that you came over to my house just to sit there and cry that you weren't strong. Not yet, at least. So, I decided that if I could be strong for you, you would continue to try and be strong for me."

Zach gawked at his friend. I barely remember that time, when they were around nine, maybe ten years old. That was almost 15years in the past! However, the faint memory played in his head, and he clearly remembered explaining to him mother that he was just going to throw the old converse in the trash, but in truth, he was wearing them so he could stand up for Dakota.

"I..." he pauses, not knowing what to say.

Dakota smiles. "You don't have to say anything. As long as you understand that I'm here and I'm not going anywhere. I promise."

What a promise to make if you're not even telling your best friend that you were diagnosed with severe ovarian cancer four weeks earlier.