The It Factor

Chapter 39

That night was horrible. I didn't get a moments rest the whole night, I just kept tossing and turning. Kyle probably didn't get much sleep either, the poor guy. Even though I offered to sleep on the couch, because I had known this would happen, he had insisted on sharing the bed again. It would be the last time for a while, because at the contestant house boys and girls weren't aloud to share rooms.

Finally, at five AM, I just couldn't take it anymore. I got out of bed angrily and paced around the room. My head was throbbing. What was I supposed to do about Mia? She was determined to ruin this for me, I could tell, but I couldn't just sit by and twiddle my thumbs. There had to be some way out of this hell hole.

Not that I thought the whole competition was a hell hole. It was just Mia's particular hole that was extra hell-ish.

"Babe?" Kyle groaned in a sleepy voice, lifting his head ever so slightly off the pillow. I froze. Shit, I had woke him up. "Come here."

"I'm sorry?" I wined, going over to the bed and crawling under the covers he was holding open for me. The warmth surrounded me immediately, and I snuggled into Kyle's bare chest. "I didn't mean to wake you up.

"It's fine," he whispered, but I could still hear the sleep in his voice. A large yawn left his mouth, and silence fell between us. Leaning my head on his chest, I listened to the steady rhythm of his heart, swirling patterns onto his chest with my finger tips. Slowly, he started to run his fingers through my tangled hair, making me shiver. I loved when he played with my hair.

"What are we going to do?" I muttered, pressing my eyes closed. Tears had started welling up, threatening to fall down my cheeks. Laying there like that with him made me remember Mia's threat, and how she was basically making us break up. His body stiffened under my touch as he held his breath, obviously trying to control his temper.

"What do you mean?" He asked, lifting his head off the pillow to look at me curiously.  I frowned and looked at him, confused.  "Is that even a question?" Taken aback, I opened and closed my mouth like a dead fish, searching for an answer that woudn't make me look even more like an idiot. "We're not going to let her push us around!"

"But it's in the rules, Kyle!" I exclaimed hopelessly, pushing myself up from the bed in anger.  "It's either stay together or drop out of the show.  We can't be selfish and ruin this for the boys, you know that."  This whole thing was just way to stressful, maybe I should've just gone back and taken care of my mom.

"Then we'll see each other in secret," He said soothingly, sitting up and cupping my face in his hands. "Not even the boys will know, okay?  I'm not going to loose you because Mia's a bitch."  And with that he kissed me, not giving me time to respond.

At the time I'm not sure what was going through my head.  The plan was so obviously doomed from the beginning, but that didn't stop me from making out with Kyle.  It didn't stop me from lying to my friends, and it didn't stop me from falling even faller for him.  There were a ton of things I should have done, like just end things for now, before it was even more painful for the both of us, but as usual, I made all the wrong decisions.

When we met the boys for breakfast we told them our decision, or at least the story we had stitched together for them.  The story was we had come to a mutual agreement to do the mature thing and end it, at least for the duration of the show, and were still good friends.  They were shocked, naturally, and made quite a scene shouting things like 'this is bull' and 'we thought you were stronger then this!'

I felt like complete crap, but there was nothing else to do.  Deep down I knew I was making wrong decision after wrong decision, and the first one was leaving my mom alone, without any friends or family to take care of her, and coming down her for the competition.  Nothing was more important then family, and I had completely abandoned my own mother to chase impossible dreams.