I Never Imagined ✔️

Chapter 52: Free

(Victoria)

I honestly don't know what people thought about me after prom. Some people must've thought I was a complete coward who didn't deserve all the happiness that I had ever achieved in life. Some people thought that I did the right thing by sparing Sophia and Ray from the humiliation. Considering I could've gone a lot worse when it came to "secrets," a handful of people thought I had done the right thing.

Another handful of people were just plain out confused of what to think. The other remaining people just didn't care about the whole situation in general and they just acted like nothing had happened. I'm sure everyone had thought one of those four things.

Did I care about what they thought about the whole thing? If I'm being honest at all, then I couldn't care less. Why? Well, a lot of people learned something new on prom night. I was no exception. During the time when I was waiting for Ray and Sophia to dance, several thoughts hit me.

I realized that I shouldn't be dwelling on my dislike towards Ray and Sophia. Granted, I always liked Ray, but I always thought that I had disliked Sophia with every fiber in my body. Throughout my entire senior year, I had always wanted to get revenge on Sophia for taking Ray away from me and ruining my life. There was always the running disdain in my veins.

However, when I saw her on the dance floor, dancing with Ray, like there was no end to the world, a switch flipped for me. For the first time in so long, she seemed so genuinely happy. She was lost in Ray, as they held each other, and danced the night away. It was almost total euphoria, and euphoria is insanely hard to achieve.

Even though my happiness had been interrupted by so many people over the course of my life, a thought hit me. Why should I ruin one person's happiness over that? It wasn't worth it to torment Sophia like that.

On top of that, when I saw how Ray and Sophia looked at each other on prom night, I realized something else. If Lisa truly liked me, then she'd look at me like the way Ray looked at Sophia on prom night. Lisa never did that. All she did was blackmail me and trick me into ruining their happiness that they deserved. That's all she was capable of.

She didn't make me feel like how Sophia felt when she was with Ray. When I was plotting with her, I felt like the weak pawn supporting the tyrannical king. I was tired of being a little pawn in her games, so I backed out. Granted, I felt really good when she embarrassed herself on stage, and everyone booed her off. That was a moment that was very satisfying to me.

    Even though I had felt good about getting rid of Lisa from my life, a lingering feeling of guilt just wouldn't leave me. I just couldn't stop feeling guilty about the whole situation. I was wondering what could I have done to spare Sophia from almost losing her composure and lashing out at Lisa.

I shouldn't have helped her leave those fake loves notes. I shouldn't have helped her leave that note that almost destroyed their relationship. Man, that's the one thing that I completely regret throughout this whole process.

    On top of that, the fighting has started up again with my parents. I used to think that their fighting and their marital instability was mostly my fault. Even though they made several mistakes in the duration of their marriage, not everything was my fault. I made some mistakes throughout everything, and I shouldn't have.

But, it took me an eternity to stop blaming me for being the cause of their unstable marriage. I realized that not everything was my fault, as my mom always said. Not everything was the cause of the choices I made. And it's time that I shall stop listening to everything my mom says, and taking it to heart.

    "Okay, Victoria, I don't even know how to react to the whole situation. I don't know whether to be proud of you or to be mad at you. I've never been this conflicted in my life," David says, as I write notes in my notebook.