These would be the good ol' days

Lachlan rolled his eyes at Skye's comment about the sand, and then gave her a small wink before turning his attention to Delilah and Oliver with Skye. "You try saying no to Oliver when he wants something. As soon as he got it in his head he wouldn't have really let me say no." Lachlan said with a laugh. Lachlan wouldn't have said no, anyway. He trusted Delilah and Oliver, and it wasn't worth messing with their plans for the party.

When Delilah asked him to get her another pina colada, he acted offend. "First, that little stunt. Then, you want me to be your glorified pool boy?" Lachlan said, feigning offense. He pushed himself up by the pool ledge, getting out of the pool.

"Can I get anyone else anything?" Lachlan said without turning around, moving to the drink table

---

Oliver shrugged off Lachlan's comment implying that he was stubborn. "Hey, when you have a vision, you have a vision. I couldn't let some narrow-minded guy like you get in the way of that." Oliver teased back. The son of Letus turned his attention to Skye and smiled.

"It was an absolute honor to get to plan you party. Anyway, we had a really good time doing it." Oliver said, smiling at Delilah. Was that too obvious? Gods this overthinking thing was so much work. Oliver could feel the headache starting to form at the front of his head. He really needed to run his plan by Lachlan so that they could get past this. Oliver watched as Lachlan got out of the pool. It was kind of sweet how he was like a brother to Delilah. He got what Delilah was saying more about it.

"Margarita, please." Oliver called after him.

"No, I just want you to be my pool boy. No glorified necessary." Delilah said chuckling a bit to herself at the poorly made joke she had just made. She loved Lachlan and he knew that. He was the brother she never had and she knew he'd always have her back and in return she'd always try to have his when she could. She knew she wasn't as strong mentally or physically to be there for others, but maybe that was all due to her mindset. This is precisely why she needed a drink. Delilah needed to not think about things and to not analyze every thought she had or every word she said or other people said.

"We did have a really good time planning your party. We went to Brunch at Tiffany's and visited the bay area, it was really nice." Delilah commented as she noticed Oliver look over at her and smile and in that moment she was going back into her overthinking stage. What did that mean? Was it what she thought it meant? Or was that just a friendly thing to do? Delilah was so confused in the moment because when she looked back over to Skye she could still feel a little thread there and part of her wanted to tug at the thread, but it had been over a year. If something were to happen wouldn't they have done or said anything of it by now? Then her eyes would shift back to Oliver, and part of her felt crazy for thinking it, but it seemed like there was actually something there. Something mutual, well maybe. She wasn't even sure if she was Oliver's type.

"We could try and poke a small hole in Taileurs floaty and watch the air slowly move out of it, but that feels a little too mean, it'd be destroying part of his property. Not to mention Karen would be on our butts if we did that." Delilah said as she continued to still float in the water waiting for her drink from Lachlan.

Lachlan shuffled over to the drink table with one of those slow-but-looks-like-running jog things. He poured a rum and coke for Skye and one for himself, and a pina colada for Delilah. While Oliver's margarita was in the blender (he had been there one time when Oliver got a margarita on the rocks one time. It was not pretty) he looked back over at his friends.

Sure, Lachlan had a great group of friends, which included Oliver. They were good guys, Steve was even getting married in the winter, but when he looked at them, he didn't feel the way he felt about Skye, Delilah, and Oliver. There was no way in hell he'd be the drink fairy for those guys, but there was no way Lachlan was gonna say no to Delilah.

Once Oliver's margarita was done, he took the drinks back to the group and sat down on the ledge next to Skye as she talked about Tieghlur.

---

Oliver took his cup from Lachlan and sipped it. He loved a good frozen margarita. He grabbed Delilah's for her so she didn't have to swim to the edge too and brought it back to her.

"Isn't it also kind of fun to just watch how he can mess things up for himself?" Oliver turned his head to look at Taieoulur He was still struggling to get comfortable on that ridiculous floatie. "Nevermind you're right. We gotta take him down." He said with a laugh. He took a few more sips of his drink, feeling the alcohol calming him down a little bit more. He was so over the racing heart he had around Delilah. Could she feel it, too?

"We also have to get in a good game of chicken. Me and Delilah versus Skye and Lachlan." He said, looking between Skye and Lachlan.

So no one was going to reply to her comment about messing with tegihlur ? Delilah didn't really know what else they could do, but she was grateful when Oliver passed her the drink Lachlan had gotten for her. "Thank you." She said and began to drink out of the cup enjoying the taste of the pine colada. It was time to do what they came here to do. Party, drink, and have a good time.

"Sooo, plans? Anyone?" Delilah asked as she continued to float there in the pool feeling weightless. "It is fun to watch him do his own thing too, but we have to do something." The daughter of Epione said as she continued to drink out of the cup.

"We could flip his floaty over knocking him into the pool." She said trying to suggest more things, but this really wasn't her area of expertise. She didn't play that many pranks on him. "We can make an announcement to say his car alarm is going off, he'd probably believe it and get out of the pool to go look for his car despite it not being there."

Oliver looked back and forth between the different members of the group, and then to Tieghlur. It was weird being on the inside sometimes. He still was so surprised that these people had chosen him. He looked around at their houses in their pristine legacy neighborhood. It wasn't the place that someone like him belonged. Tieghlur even belonged in this world more than he did. He ran a business, after all. But, they had chosen him and pulled him into their world. He would be forever grateful for that.

Oliver turned his attention back to the prank at hand. "Alright, here is the plan...

---

Several hours later

Oliver, Delilah, and Lachlan had finished cleaning up the backyard about an hour before. It had turned out to be a pretty amazing party. They pulled a killer prank on Tieghlur, got drunk off their asses, played chicken, and broken out Delilah's old karaoke machine. Skye and Delilah even went back to their roots and sang the Jonas Brothers, with a little background vocals from Oliver. Delilah, particularly, had gotten pretty drunk so after they cleaned, Oliver offered to make sure she made it into her house safe.

Lachlan was still riding his buzz out with a beer. He was playing Mortal Kombat and reclined back in the La-Z-Boy.

It was starting to get late and Lachlan was super tired. He had to wake up at the crack of dawn to sign for the sand that Oliver and Delilah had had delivered to his house. He was contemplating going to bed when he was wrapping up a part of his game when he heard a knock on the door. There was 3 people that could be: (1) Drunk Oliver, (2) Drunker Delilah, or, and this was the most likely, (3) Skye Maddox. Lachlan paused the game and put the La-Z-Boy down. As he cleared the chair, he saw exactly who he expected.

"Skye Maddox. I guess it is your birthday still. What can I do for you?" Lachlan leaned against the door frame, but as Skye started talking, he took a step back. The look on her face was not what he was expecting. This was not the same person who he had been expecting to be at his door. Lachlan gestured for Skye to come in.

"Well, hello to you, too." Lachlan shut the door and turned back to her. "How about we sit down and take this from the top?" Lachlan couldn't follow what she was talking about. It had been a long while since he had heard about her mom. Lachlan had met her once when they were young, but she hadn't left much of an impression on him.

As Skye walked past him and sat down on the couch, he knew that this was not the knock on the door that he had been expecting. Lachlan took a second to look Skye over. He had seen her in a lot of different moods, but this was something different. Lachlan turned around and walked into the kitchen. He took two plastic cups out of the cupboard and filled them both with water. He had a feeling that he was going to need a lot more focus for this conversation than he had right now. So, he took the cups to the couch and gave one to Skye and then sat down at the far end of the couch and started drinking from his cup.

"If it makes you feel better, my dad is going on vacation with his girlfriend in Nantucket over my birthday. When I pointed that out he asked how old I was turning." Lachlan hadn't really taken the time to process how that made him feel. He just chalked it up to his dad being forgetful, but honestly it really hurt. Lachlan was lucky because he knew Augustine would come around for his birthday, but it was hard knowing that his dad was picking his new life over him. He looked at Skye.

"I'm sorry. This isn't about me." Lachlan set his hand lightly on her knee. "I know it sucks when parents suck. I wish your mom was better at the whole mom thing because you deserve it." Lachlan thought back to Skye's funeral. Admittedly, that day was a bit hazy because he had spent most of it avoiding his demons and memories of Skye by means of whiskey. He didn't remember thinking that it was weird that Skye's mom wasn't there. Honestly, he didn't even notice. He didn't know if that said something about his perception, or if that had more to say about Skye's mom.

"It must be hard to be her in the sense that she has been on an emotional rollercoaster with you being dead, and all. But we all got through it. Nothing is an excuse to be a bad parent." Lachlan said.

Lachlan was definitely a bit uncomfortable sitting here with Skye like this. They usually only sat and talked to act like they weren't both here for just one thing. In a way, though, it was nice. Him and Skye had had very different lives, but some of it was remarkably similar. It was nice to have someone who got the whole shitty parent thing. They had friends whose parents had done bad things, but when it came to Irene and Sam, they just categorically sucked. It was weird when he realized that him and Skye were sharing something genuine. It was another string that if he tugged, he'd find Skye on the other end.

Lachlan could feel his face get whiter when Skye asked if they would be like their parents. He couldn't even think about that as a possibility. He tried to think of what his dad could have been like when he was his age. As Lachlan thought about it, he realized that he didn't know anything about his dad at 18, except that he was William Lockwood's best friend.

"I don't think we could even be them if we tried. I think they messed us up to much to let ourselves be like that. I guess I don't know, though." Lachlan listened as Skye talked about how much she feared being like her mom. He pushed it down, but he had that fear, too. He put his hand lightly on the side of Skye's face.

"You have your own fate, Skye Maddox, and I have mine. I refuse to be the piece of shit my dad is. I will be there for the people who need me. And I know you won't let yourself be there."

Lachlan thought he knew what it was like to kiss Skye. He had done it an infinite number of times at this point. This time when she leaned in to kiss him, it was something completely different. It was soft and only added to the emotional intimacy that they had just had. Lachlan felt more exposed in front of Skye as she leaned back and looked at him than ever before. It felt warm and comforting, which was absolutely terrifying.

Lachlan watched Skye get up. He didn't know what to expect now, but he watched as she moved to the other side of the room. To an outsider, this could have meant anything. Most likely, it would seem like she was trying to get away from him. In a way, maybe she was. He understood why should want to. They didn't feel things. As she left though, he felt the cold air around him and in a way wanted the warmth back.

As Lachlan looked at Skye on that loveseat, he couldn't resist. So, he too got up and made his way across the room. He sat down on the loveseat and pulled Skye by the waist so that she was over him.

"Much better." Lachlan said, the confidence in his voice waning. He kissed her and as much as he hoped he would, he didn't feel the warmth again. Her body warmth was there, though, and that would have to be enough

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