Strings Attached

12

"That's what I call a Hoe, Hoe, Hoe" Aubrey said teasingly, not threatening to turn her head from the tv screen in front of her.

"Chilll" the blonde responded.

"Here KK, I got you a cake pop." Lana handed the bag to the freshman.

"Oh my god." She clapped. "Guys, this is why Lana Boo is my favorite on the team. She's the only one who's actually nice," KK spoke directly at Ice.

"Girl, shut up. The two of you guys had a full on fistfight about getting the last medium sized warm up yesterday.

Lana sat down on the couch in the frame of the phone listening to KK rant about her latest experience getting crumbl cookies.

The brunette who had been alongside KK and Ice had assumed Aubrey and Paige finished their video game, considering Paige made her way to the couch, sitting down beside Lana and behind the other two girls. As she positioned herself in the frame of the phone, she started rubbing her hands together and biting her bottom lip. You would expect the other girls to be concerned, but after living with Paige for months, her teammates grew accustomed to her unique ways.

"Yo, I thought you didn't want to be in the live today," Ice exposed, giving Paige a questioning eyebrow.

"Whatttt I would never say that, "Paige said, throwing her hands up in defense.

"You are so fake, Bueckers," KK spoke with a tone of joking disappointment.

Lana began moving her head out of the frame as she noticed the amount of new comments asking about the blonde haired girl.

In her defense she had been clipped before in the edits of Paige Bueckers, and she did not want a repeat.

"Aye, where you going?" Paige asked before leaning out of the frame and pulling Lana back by her shoulders. 

"I don't want to be mogged in the background of your edits," Lana said uninterested.

Lana noticed the smirk on Paige's face forming. "You think I mog?"

Smacking her teeth and rolling her eyes, "Girl, shut up," yet Lana couldn't help but try to suppress the smile forming on her lips.

Jackson turned her head to look at the screen on the live. A few comments managing to catch her eye.

Wbbfanacc Paige is literally so fineee
User138192 are we gonna ignore Paige coming in the live just to sit next to Lana. I love them
Girlboo23 KK and Ice's reaction to Paige cozying up with Lana is the funniest thing ever
PAIGEYBOO Paige is the ultimate rizzler🤷‍♀️
PNBuckets Lana and Paige?!?🚢
User3217803 @PNBuckets y'all are so weird about ship comments they are just friends
Katemartinlover Paige is magestic
Izzieballin y'all over here fangirling over Paige but ignoring how beautiful Lana looks?!!
KaylaWilliams Bitches I am coming

Before Lana could even finish reading the comments about her interaction with Paige in the background of the livestream, KK shouted. Pulling the screen way too close to her face and twirling her hair, "Okay Kayla, we expect you to be here in 2 minutes TOPS."

As the night went on and Kayla finally made her way to the girls suite, she was forced to braid Lana's hair.

Lana knew how to braid her hair, but something about getting her hair braided made her feel at a sense of peace. Maybe it was due to all the times her mother would braid her hair for school throughout elementary school or how her mom would give her little pep talks while braiding her hair at her aau tournaments.

Lana and her mother had a relatively strong relationship throughout her childhood. So when she went home for the last time, she was surprised at the lack of support from her mother.

She wanted her mother to take her side and just hug her in that moment. But part of her knew that she never would. Lana found out that her father had been cheating on her mother for the first time at age 15. She had been ordering a pair of new ankle braces on her father's phone when she saw a notification from a dating website.

Today, she wishes that her 15 year old self had never gotten intrigued by the suspicious text. But a notification from a dating website when you have a whole family couldn't help but spark her curiosity.

Clicking the notification, Lana had opened a plethora of different women's pages. Explicit photos a 15 year old girl should never have to see. Messages that made her stomach turn. And genuine hurt that her father could betray not only her mother in such a disgraceful way but also betray their family.

From that point on, Lana had prayed every night that the websites would be deleted from her father's phone and the whole situation was just a nightmare.

Yet, every night when Lana checked her father's phone to see if God answered her prayers, all she was left with was new messages to read and more disappointment.

Lana held the guilt with her for around a year. The basketball player told her sister, but she soon regretted it, realizing her sister began having frequent panic attacks due to the information, leaving Lana with more guilt. Maybe if Lana had never ordered those ankle braces, or never gotten curious, her family wouldn't have been as fucked up.

What Lana felt was worse than her father's betrayal was when she finally decided to bring the truth about her father's cheating to her mother after a year of finding it.

Her mother denied at first, leaving Lana severely confused. That night the entire family sat down in their living room. Tears staining everyone's faces. Her mother advocated for her husband, defending that it would never happen again and it was a mere mistake. Lana was forced to forgive and pretend like the past year had never happened. That was the thing about her mother; for some reason, she always stuck by her father's side, even if it hurt her daughters.

To her surprise, Lana did receive a few texts from her mother after her visit back home. The first few were links to Christian conversion camps, but her more recent texts ranged from asking Lana how she was. Yet, none of them related to an invite for Christmas.

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a/n- lowkey just trauma dumped..

so sad abt kate leaving the aces