Gotta Be You (Justin Bieber Love Story)

Chapter 23

okay! here it is! i've worked long and hard on this so dont be too critical please!!!

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“Okay so I went shopping,” Ari told me as Mer and I walked in. I froze. She must be really serious about this, to actually go shopping of her own free will. I remember once when mom, Amanda, Mer and I had to literally drag her into a mall. A security guard had thought we’d kidnapped her. I didn’t help by asking him if he actually was as stupid as he looked. Anyways.

“You did what?” America asked. Ari gave her a dark look that said ‘I- know- it’s- weird- just- shut- up- and- go- with- it’.

“And I bought you a dress,” Ari continued, turning away from us and making her way upstairs with us trailing behind her. “I know it’s weird, but I want him to regret ever doing what he did to you, so…” she opened my bedroom door to portray a royal blue dress. It looked pretty, studded with tiny diamonds, but I’d seen better dresses. I was about to ask why on earth it was so special when Ari gently turned it over to show the fact that, apart from two straps, it was backless. Mer’s jaw fell open, and all I could think was dad will never allow me to wear that.

“Yeah, since y’all have been gaping at the dress for the past five minutes, I’ll just assume you like it.”

“No way,” Dad said immediately, when he came back home that evening. I had been chewing my nails all day, awaiting this moment. Now my stomach dropped slightly, even though I had wanted for him to tell Ari this was preposterous. Ari hopped off the couch, took dad’s hand, and pulled him into the kitchen, where I couldn’t hear them. I could barely hear my dad’s low rumbling, and Ari’s voice, slightly higher than normal, indicating that she was slightly nervous.

I waited.

And I waited.

Would they ever finish?

Finally, when I could take it no more, I got off the couch and started toward the kitchen. However, because I am just extremely lucky, at that moment Ari bounced back into the living room, followed by dad, whose dark, glowering face made me wonder exactly what Ari had told him.

“If you go, you stay next to me for the entire time, unless I give you permission to go somewhere. And that somewhere will only be to the bathroom, where Arielle will accompany you. I do not want you to be alone at any time. Also, you are to have no contact with him, his mother, his manager, nobody who had anything to do with him. Am I understood?” there was no arguing with him when he was like this.

“Yes dad.” I bowed my head.

“Good.”

I had struggled into the daring dress with Ari’s help, and was now helping her into her own dress, a pretty yellow and green one. I felt completely undressed- the cut in the front was lower than I was used to, and whenever a breeze blew, it felt like little shards piercing my skin.

“Ready?” Ari asked me, as we put on our jackets.

“As I’ll ever be,” I replied. Walking to Amanda’s room, where she was on her computer on her bed, talking to some guy over the internet, I kissed her on the cheek and told her that, I’d we were lucky, we’d be back within the hour. Call us terrible family, but Mer and Dylan were coming over to spend the night. I would be texting Mer constantly throughout the night. I had my entire supportive crew, Ari and Mer for emotional support, and dad for . . . physical.

Dad pulled up outside the location for our shindig this evening, a skyscraper in upstate New York. My legs weren’t working properly as I stepped out, making me nearly fall and look completely uncoordinated and unsophisticated. Dad held out one hand, and I grasped it, using it as an anchor to pull myself upright and stay there. I took Arielle’s hand in my other one. together, we went to the front door, where a bellboy, completely flustered and confused bellboy accepted it, and told us to go straight to the top floor. I heard him ask another guest if they know where he could find milk. The elevator ride was silent. In comparison, when the doors slid open.