Moonlight Kisses

when nightfall came

tw: in this chapter there is a brief description of Jo's situation, both from her pov and from what Beau sees at some point. Again I tried to keep it as brief as possible to put more emphasis on how they move forward. if assault or violence may have any trigger to you, I will suggest skipping to the next chapter and it will be discussed briefly in the upcoming chapters

beau.

To say I've been terrible to her for over a week is an incredible understatement. And my sister won't let me forget it.

"The minute you get off this plane, you're going to call her," she demands, her eye mask still covering her tired eyes. Here I thought she'd be sleeping throughout the flight so I'd be able to escape her deserved ridicule. Nope. Sophie hasn't slept a bit since we boarded the plane.

"Fuck, I know," I curse out in a frustrated groan. I know I have no one else to be mad at but myself for going this many days without calling her. And I sure as hell didn't forget. It'd be so much easier to explain to her if I'd just forgotten.

Sophie pulls off the eye mask and sits up straight. "Don't just say I know and then not do it," she orders lowly. Surprisingly wary of the other exhausted passengers around us.

At the start of the flight, she was livid about two things. One being the phone that died on her at the airport so she couldn't access her precious music. And another, the more significant in my opinion, was our flight being delayed for over six hours. It's no secret that it rains constantly in London, but it was pouring rain coincidentally the day we were set to fly home. So because of that we were trapped in the airport waiting for the storm to calm down.

I didn't call Jo to let her know. Believe me, I sure as hell would have if I could have but that fucking storm knocked out the service on all of our phones. Calling her was out of the question.

Besides I doubt she'd want to hear from me anyway. Sophie failed to tell me how worried Jo was until this morning. While I knew Jo would be upset that I haven't called or texted, it was easy to put off because I didn't hear her soft, concerned voice. I didn't face how my absence was eating away at her until Sophie finally told me, going against Jo's request not to. She was afraid that if Sophie told me what was going on with Jo these past few days, I'd only call her out of pity. Not on my own accord. While she was partially right about me needing to call her after hearing how bad off she really was, if I did call her it wasn't going to be out of pity.

I did want to call her. Honest to whatever god is out there pulling the strings, I wanted to fucking call her all the time. But I didn't want to expose the anticipated shit show my trip to London became in only a few days. Hours, even. I couldn't expose her to that and risk scaring her even more.

"Okay, Soph," I say, dismissing her quickly. I feel like shit for leaving her hanging as it is. Sophie serving as a constant reminder of my girl's pain doesn't make the sinking feeling in my stomach any better.

She sighs, sufficed for the time being. She yanks the eye mask over her eyes once more and sits back in her reclined seat. Meanwhile, I look over the small screen in front of me, relieved and terrified all at once to see that we're ten minutes away from landing. I don't know what the fuck I'm afraid of. I did everything I could to stay true to the words I said before me and Jo parted ways. Some times were harder than others, but I still got through those nights with her in mind.

It was those nights that made me never want to go back without Jo by my side.

"I'm surprisingly glad to be back," Sophie murmurs out of the blue. The snaps and crackles of the empty bag in her hand tells me she's fidgeting again. It's always been incredibly hard for her to sit still for a prolonged amount of time. Sitting still during a ten hour flight doesn't really suit Sophie all that well, which is why she takes NyQuil before we board the plane. However, when she took it we still thought the flights would continue running through the rain. So she was knocked out in the airport for a while and Mom didn't let her take another dose. So here she's been finding little things to keep herself occupied.