Chapter 16
"Hailey?" someone whispers in my ear. I groan in response. "Can you.... I dunno. Get off maybe?"
My body aches all over due to the uncomfortable bed beneath me... the familiar uncomfortable bed beneath me...
My eyes snap open and I leap up quickly, causing groans to erupt all around me.
My hands fly to my mouth as I look at the boys lying on the ground in pain. "I. Am. So. Sorry!"
Dylan clutches his middle, "God, did you have to get up that quickly? I think you've ruptured my spleen."
"I. Could. Barely. Breath." Tristan says between gasps, "You're arm was blocking off my airways."
The twins and Finn sleep peacefully on, unaffected by my strange custom of sleeping in weird positions...
Jake rolls over with his usual grin, "Well I'm not going to complain since I had a more appealing part of Hailey on me."
Wes raises his arms, "I second that. A+ for keeping those legs in shape."
I chuck pillows at Wes and Jake, glaring at them. Especially the latter. Where did that sweet almost likeable guy from last night go?
Finn suddenly sits up, "Mfjkwhere's the fire?" he says groggily.
I shake my head, "There isn't one." I sigh. "I'm so sorry guys... I just have weird... sleeping habits..."
Seth sits up a bit, leaning back on his elbows, his dark hair a mess of cowlicks on top of his head. He yawns, "S'ok. Used to it."
I wipe my hands down my face, "Well, you guys did force me to sleep down here." I mumble, trying to convince myself more than the guys that I'm not the one at fault.
"It's 8:25." Seth yawns again. I stare at him, wide-eyed. He waves his hand in front of my face, "Uh... are you ok? Are you going through some post-trauma reaction thing because of last night?"
I look down at my rumpled pj's and I can feel my hair twisting into knots as we speak. I get up and bolt towards the stairs, "I'm getting picked up in 5 minutes!"
*
"Bye Hale."
I kiss Linc on the cheek before heading into Geography, "Bye Hippo."
He shakes his head at me and I wink at him before making my way over to Mitch who's already slumped on her desk behind her book.
I nudge her with my foot before sitting down, "You awake?"
Mitch groans in response, "Unfortunately yes."
I try to think of something to cheer her up or distract her at the very least, "You're hair looks nice today. Did you straighten it?"
She props her head up with her hand, "Yeah. My cousin did it for me yesterday. It's totes cute, huh?"
I laugh, "Totes cute Mitch."
I get my books out of my satchel as an old man dressed in high-waisted slacks with suspenders over a horrifically colourful top and shiny, old loafers walks in.
I mentally jump for joy when I realise that Mr Hench is absent and we've got a sub for double Geography. As I assess the appearance of our substitute teacher though, I begin to doubt his capability to actually... teach.
He's ancient, as in he's balding, he's wearing glasses that take up half his face and he has about 5 teeth left. He looks way too old to be teaching still. Dying, sure he could probably manage that, but keeping control of a bunch of hormone-crazy teens? This I've got to see.
Mitch follows my gaze. When she sees him she lets out a moan before starting to hit her head on her desk repeatedly.
The old man walks over, "Ashley? Are you alright?"
She lifts her head up, a fake smile plastered across her face, her forehead slowly turning red from its bashing up, "Oh, it's nothing Mr Krill. I'm just so happy to have you as my sub."
He smiles kindly at her, "There's a good girl." He says before shuffling back to his desk up the front, "Now folks, could we all settle down?"
The noise level goes down a bit as if a dial's been twisted and he starts to take attendance.
"Mr Krill?" I whisper to Mitch, "As in 68 year old, Ancient History rave party, always calls you Ashley, Mr Krill?"
Mitch twirls her finger in response, silently mouthing, "Woohoo...."
I laugh and turn towards the front of the class as our sub finishes attendance.
"Well folks." Mr Krill begins, "Your teacher Mr Hench is unfortunately ill today and I'll be taking his class for him. He starts to rummage through his books, "He left a note somewhere..." he mutters to himself.
Everyone starts to talk to each other again but is soon interrupted when he starts waving a green slip in the air, "I've found it! Now folks, let's read what it says."
He squints at the piece of paper for a while before looking up, "All it says is to read page 45-60 on Global Warming and answer the questions on page 62-63."
Groans erupt throughout the room as people start to flick through their books to see just how much work we've been given.
Mitch pushes her desk up against mine, blocking our isle off and looks dully at me, "We might as well get started then."
"Ashley," Mr Krill calls, "Please move your table back to its place. I'll be going through a couple of pages with you first and I want you all to take down some notes."
'Ashley' glares at the back of his head and moves back to her place as he starts to write on the whiteboard with a squeaky marker.
He underlines the words Global Warming and turns around again, "Now folks, what do we know about Global Warming?"
I can practically hear the snores erupting throughout the room already.
A boy with some pretty cool glasses at the front of the class puts his hand up, "It's the accumulation of Carbon Dioxide in our atmosphere?"
Mr Krill nods, "That sounds about correct... Let's just say it is. Anyone else have any ideas on what Global Warming does?"
"It's ruining my tanning time," a girl behind me mutters.
He doesn't seem to hear her though and keeps talking, "If no one else has anything to contribute I think we'll read what it says on the first page. Do we have any volunteers to read folks?"
No one answers but his eyes rest on a guy with lots of piercing who doesn't look like he could read a book to save his life. "Mr Stevens?" The boy looks up smoothly from his phone which he's been texting on under the table.
"Yes Mr Krill?"
My eyebrows shoot up as I realise I know him, That's Teagan. I never realised he was in our class. He looks different without his... skirt...
Mr Krill smiles at him, "I may be getting on in my years but I'm not so clueless when it comes to my students texting in class. I know when you're doing it. No one looks down at their crotch and smiles."
He blushes slightly as our class cracks up.
I glance over at Mitch to find her tallying something in a notebook as Teagan starts to stumble through the first paragraph, his cool exterior rapidly fading., "What are you doing?" I whisper.
"Tallying how many times he says 'folks'. She says simply.
I shake my head and focus back on the Teagan's voice.
When he's done Mr Krill looks up at everyone, "So. From what Mr Stevens has so graciously read to us, what is Global Warming? Ms Evans?
A girl to my right who's painting her nails a hideously bright pink looks up, her Botox lips making an 'O' shape.
She looks hurriedly at her open book and then quickly mumbles something, all the while trying to hide her private beauty shop behind her book.
Mr Krill gives an exasperated sigh, "No Ms Evans, Global Warming isn't 'that thing that happens when ice melts in the sun.' Does anyone know?"
*
Mitch and I head to lunch, half-asleep from Mr Krill's lecture. We grab something to eat and then make our way over to the table where Tish, Charlie and Meghan are sitting.
Linc soon appears and sits himself next to me, he nods at Mitch, "Drug-dealer Giraffe"
She nods stiffly back, "Crane on steroids." Linc winks at her and turns back to me, "How was Geography?"
I take a bite of my vege burger which is actually pretty good, "Well I figured out that Teagan's in my class. He looks so different without his, um, wig..."
Linc laughs and snatches some of my fries, "What did I tell you? He can be pretty over the top."
Maddy hands Linc a scrapbook as she sits herself next to Meghan who's reading as usual. "Tyler got them printed and I just finished sticking them in."
Linc starts to flick through them, a slow grin spreading across his face.
"What is it?" I ask curiously, leaning over so I can see what it is. I let out a little shriek and grab the scrapbook from him, "What the hell? Why're you giving him this?!"
Before I know it Mitch has grabbed the scrapbook off of me. She stands on her chair and starts to flick through it as I make a pathetic attempt to try and get it back, "Wow! These are amazing! Did you ever consider becoming a model Hale?"
I ignore Mitch and glare at Maddy as she suddenly becomes interested in her nails. "Why'd you bring the pictures here? It was embarrassing enough having to model outside."
Mitch continues to look at the pictures for our art project, "Leave her alone she's just-"
"Is that who I think it is?" Charlie interrupts.
We all look at her as she stares at the door into the cafeteria. We all follow her gaze. A girl in flowery maxi dress stands there, holding her lunch looking lost. I've never seen her before and I think I would have remembered her with her short spiky hair and electric blue streaks.
"Emma." I hear Linc whisper.
I look at him curiously, He knows her?
He stands up and waves her over and I feel uneasy. It's not because I feel a pang of jealousy as she grins and practically runs to our table. It's not because she could be a model for Vogue despite her short hair or the fact that she jumps into his arms. It's because I see a flash of something in the back of his grey eyes. It was just a spark... but it's enough to make me feel like something's wrong...
"Linc! It's been so long!" Emma says as she finally let's go. Mitch gets down from her chair.
He grins back at her and she takes a seat opposite him as he sits down, "It has. It's good to see you again."
She see's Mitch and the others and gives them a little wave, "Hey guys, how've you been?"
They all wave and happily reply back.
Her dark brown eyes rest on me, "Hi, I'm Emma." She says with a smile.
Linc puts his hand on my knee, "This is Hailey. My, uh, girlfriend."
"Hi," I smile warmly back at her but I notice her eyes become more assessing than friendly.
"So," Linc says, picking up more of my fries, "You back for good now?"
Her expression turns carefree again and she laughs, "Yep, I'm back and you're not going to get rid of me till graduation."
*
"So who exactly is she?" I ask Meghan as we walk to Maths together.
Meghan glances at me nervously, "Well, she came here when we were freshmen and she and Linc..." She trails off and suddenly begins to walk faster.
"What about her and Linc?" I ask her, trying to keep up with her.
Meghan glances at me again, "I... I don't know much. She didn't really hang out with us. She said hi every now and then and that's it."
We walk into our classroom and sit down, "Come on Meghan. Tell me. I don't care whatever it is. Really."
She starts to take out her books from her bag she doesn't look up at me, "Well, Linc's known Emma for a while... They're childhood friends I think..."
"Is that all?" I shake my head, kicking myself for being so stupid.
Meghan looks at me with unsure eyes, "Well, no...Emma's Linc's ex."
*
"Thanks Linc." I say kissing him on the cheek and getting out of the car.
He grabs my hand, "Hey, are you ok? You seemed to be off with the fairies before."
"Yeah, just tired I guess." I try to give him a convincing smile before shutting the door. I wave, "Um, I'll see you later?"
He nods and reaches out his arm through the open window, "Yeah. Um, I'm sorry about Emma... She's always been a bit... clingy..."
I take his hand and squeeze it, "It's ok. I know you guys haven't seen each other in ages. It's not a big deal."
"Love you."
I wink at him, "Love you more."
He leans over, "How about a proper kiss then."
I ruffle his hair and start to walk towards the McLane's house, "Bye Hippo."
He smooths his blonde hair back into place, pouting.
I laugh and blow him a kiss and he catches it before driving off.
"God that was sappy." Chace says, hanging halfway out the living room window.
I jump back in surprise, nearly tripping down the front porch steps. "Chace!" he grins at me and I compose myself, "When you're in love with someone you'll be doing the same things." I say poking my tongue out at him as I rummage through my bag for my keys, "Can you open the door for me?"
He gets up and shuts the window. I stand patiently in front of the door till he opens it with a thoughtful expression on his face, "Well I guess it was kind of cute."
I raise an eyebrow as I slip off my shoes and walk down to the kitchen, "Kind of?"
He shrugs, "It'll be cuter when I do it."
I shake my head and grab a glass of water.
Chace sits himself on one of the counter stools, "So what's wrong? You seem kind of down."
"How do you know?"
"Gay intuition." He quips.
I shake my head, "I'm fine. Just tired I guess."
Zach walks in and I make some excuse to the twins that I need to get some homework done.
The truth is, I've been feeling weird all afternoon. Ever since Emma made her appearance.
She wasn't unfriendly or anything, she was actually quite sweet. But she's Linc's childhood friend and his ex. She went away for a couple of years because of her mom's work and she decided to break it off with Linc since 'long distance relationships never seem to work.' And she comes back to find that he actually has moved on. With me. Awkward much?
Call me a jealous girlfriend, but I couldn't help but feel a sense of foreboding as he hugged her goodbye when we were leaving school.
I'm so lost in my thoughts that I bump into Jake just as I reach the top of the stairs.
He puts an arm out to steady me, "Whoa. You ok?" I nod and continue to walk past him. He grabs my hand, "Hey, what's wrong?"
I frown at him, my lying switch automatically turning on, "I'm ok. Why would you say I'm not? Why would you think that? Have I got something on my face?" I start to rub vigorously at my cheeks as I continue to ramble on, "Have I got sunburn or something? Is my skin peeling?! Crap, I've got to fix that. Do you like nacho's? I feel like nachos. I'm going to fix up my face and then get me some nachos. Bye Jake." I shake off his hand and hurriedly make my way towards my room.
"Seth was right. You really are the crappiest liar." He says following me through my door.
I start to rummage through my shower bag, looking for some moisturiser. "What do you want Jake?"
I ask, not looking up.
He leans against my open door, thinking for a minute, "There's a party going on at the Corrie's this Friday and there's a private hot tub with my name on it. Strictly no swimsuits, you in?"
I give him an icy smile, "How about I pencil that in for never? Is never good with you?"
I give up on the moisturiser distraction and settle on finding something comfy to change into.
He laughs, "I was kidding Hale."
"Could have fooled me." I mutter to myself.
"How about we go for a drive then?"
I open my closet door and start to search through my clothes for some sweatpants, "Don't feel like it."
"It'll only be 5 minutes."
"Nope."
There's silence for a second. "Fine." I turn in surprise to see him walk out the door.
That was easier than I thought.
I shut the door after him and go back to my closet.
Where are those sweatpants?
After turning my closet inside out I decide on just wearing my fuzzy pink bunny shorts. Sure they're embarrassing and I bought them ages ago as a joke... but they're comfy and it's not like I'm going anywhere fancy. I pull on a tank top and slip my feet into my black ugg boots. I'm ready for a lazy night in.
I lope down the stairs with the intention of finding a book to read with a nice, warm cup of cocoa to take my mind off of today's escapades. It soon becomes apparent though that none of this will happen when someone grabs me from behind, slings me over their shoulder and dashes out the door with a, "We're just going for a drive!" thrown over his shoulder.
I start to beat my fists on his back and kick my legs out, "JAKE! LET ME DOWN RIGHT NOW!" but it looks like all 48 kilos of me isn't strong enough to buck me off the psycho hormonal teenager kidnapping me.
Before I know it, I'm thrown into a car and we're speeding off down the road to God knows where.
I hurriedly buckle my seatbelt in my horizontal position across the seat before I slam into the dashboard.
"JAKE!" I scream as he swerves around the corner and I end up plastered against him despite my seatbelt, "FRIGGIN SLOW DOWN ALREADY!"
We zoom down a quiet suburban street and soon enough we're on some sort of highway...
I clutch at the door and my seat, "Oh God, you're going to kill me, aren't you? You're going to turn off at some random deserted place and you're going to kill me and leave me there." I look around me wildly, "Where's the baseball bat?!"
Jake starts to slow down until we're cruising down another road, slowing leaving civilization behind. He laughs, "Just wanted to show you something."
"Chyeah, where I'm going to be buried." I scoff.
He shakes his head, laughing as I pull my legs up onto the seat getting a bit more comfortable now that we aren't going at 100 miles an hour around street lights and mailboxes, "You seemed a bit out of it when you came home." He says, "I thought I might take your mind off it." I look at him, not saying anything for a bit, surprised that he even noticed. "Is everything ok at school?" He closes his mouth, thinking for a while, "Is Trent giving you trouble or something?"
I cross my arms and look out the window, "No..."
He coughs, "Um, is it something to do with Linc?" I see him tense out of the corner of my eye, waiting for me to tell him off. I look back at him, a sense of wonder consuming me as I see this new side of Jake.
He reads my silence as an agreement and changes the subject. "Where do you want to go?"
I look back at the road in front of us, grateful that he's not prying, "I thought you wanted to take me somewhere. Anyways, I'm in my pj's I look like I came from a pre-schoolers sleepover party. "
He laughs and ruffles my hair, "Where do you want to go Hailey? I haven't taken you anywhere special yet."
I slap his hand away and put my feet up on the dashboard just to annoy him, "Can we go anywhere I want?"
He nods as he eyes my feet, "Anywhere."
I push my seat back a bit, "Then take me somewhere expensive." I close my eyes as if it's my final decision and make myself more comfortable.
A few minutes later I feel the car turn left, "Where here. The most expensive place I know." Jake announces.
My eyes fly open and I sit upright. I hadn't thought he'd actually listen to me.
I hit him across the head as soon as I realise where we are. A gas station.
"Hilarious Jake. You're just too funny." I say in a monotone voice.
Jake just laughs again, "Well it's putting a massive dent in my pocket, it's got to count as an expensive place."
He gets out to fill up and I cross my arms, feeling a bit put off that he's still teasing me.
When he goes off to pay, a particular crowd of rowdy guys all piled into an open top jeep pull up. A mess of ripped denim, steroid muscles, an abundance of piercings and some pretty racy tattoos. Add in the bottles of beer and what looks like a 16 year old guy smoking pot and I can fairly say that they look like trouble. I pull my legs down and look for a jacket or something to cover up my embarrassing shorts.
To my dismay one of the guys spots me and he nudges his friends, grinning like the idiot that he is.
I'm suddenly aware of the amount of clothing I'm wearing. Or should I say the amount of clothing I'm not wearing... I look around for something to throw. Something that'll help me.
Dammit. Where's a phone when you actually need it?!
I settle on subtly locking the doors.
Jake! Where the hell are you? Come on! TURN ON YOUR FRIGGIN PSYCHIC POWERS FOR ONCE!
A great big hulking guy with tattoos covering his arms and two more of his friends start to walk over. I panic. I reach over and press the car horn a couple of times. Like magic Jake appears, and walks back over to the car with a plastic bag not seeming to notice the wannabe thugs watching me. They stop their advance though and I breathe a sigh of relief.
"I hate you so much." I grumble as soon as we're on the road again.
He looks at me in surprise, "What did I do?"
I glare out the window, "Hmmm, I don't know. Maybe you kidnapped me and you're taking me on some road trip from hell across America and you didn't even bother to let me change. Add on the psycho's from the gas station and I think that should explain it perfectly."
"There were psycho's at the gas station?"
I slump against my seat, closing my eyes and groaning out loud. "This is the worst afternoon ever."
I hear the rustle of plastic and suddenly something cool is resting against my cheek. I open my eyes and take the ice-cream from Jake.
"Forgive me?" he asks, smiling gently at me.
All of my anger disappears as I look at Jake in surprise. "Um... yeah. Ok." He turns his head back to the road, a big dopey grin plastered across his face.
I rip the cover of my Cornetto off in a daze, my heart thumping in my chest. I don't know. Something stopped my snappy comeback short then. It must have been the setting sun shining through his sandy hair or his blue whirlpool eyes. I have no idea what it was, but for a second there, Jake McLane took up all of my thoughts and feelings. All I saw was him.
I shake my head, What the hell are you talking about Hailey? Stop it! You're being weird!
I defiantly bite into my ice-cream, crunching through the wafer cone, wincing as pain shoots through my sensitive teeth.
"So..." I manage to say despite the pain, "Are we going home now?"
He shrugs, "I thought we might stop somewhere and watch the sun set. Is that ok? I promise I'll take you home afterwards. I just really wanted... never mind."
I look at him for a bit as his hands clench the steering wheel. He seems to deflate as he reads my silence as a 'no' to his question.
I sigh, "Do you want me to open your ice-cream for you?" he looks at me quizzically, "Even if this place you're taking me to is nearby your ice-cream's going to melt."
He beams at me like I've just said that I have a chocolate tree stashed in the boot of the car. "I promise you, you won't regret this!"
I open his ice-cream and hold it near his mouth. Instead of taking it he starts to eat it right there, "Are you going to eat it yourself?" I ask him.
"Nope." He says cheerfully, taking another bite of his chocolate ice-cream.
I sigh again but don't smoosh his ice-cream in his face.
We turn off the highway and down onto a worn, beaten track that doesn't even look like it's a proper road. Trees start to appear, lining the track, getting thicker and thicker.
I finish off my ice-cream and take Jake's ice-cream away from his face as the road becomes bumpy. As funny as it would be to see ice-cream mashed into his face, I'd still rather not have him veer off the road and into a tree in surprise.
"Are we there yet?" I ask, eyeing his cone as the ice-cream slowly starts to make tracks towards my hand.
"We're here." He replies, pulling out of the trees and into a secluded sandy clearing. A small private beach you could say.
I look at the ocean in surprise, the vast expanse of water rolling out before us, a lone park bench nestled in the sand lining the water.
I hand Jake his ice-cream and get out of the car without taking my eyes off the beautiful landscape in front of me. I stand there, behind the open the door, and close my eyes, letting the cool sea breeze brush past my face and whip through my hair.
I open my eyes again as Jake takes my hand. He leads me over to the park bench and we sit down together.
"So what do you think?" he ask quietly, quickly finishing off his cone.
"I love it." I breathe. The sun sets over the horizon, swirls of orange and yellow mixing together like paint on a pallet, turning the clouds from their fluffy white to a soft, warm, pink glow.
"I'm glad." Jake replies letting go of my hand but keeping it next to mine. We sit there in companionable silence, watching the sun slowly shrinking, the light fading away.
The wind picks up and I shiver in my pj's. Jake takes off his jacket and puts it around me despite the fact that he's only wearing a thin long sleeved top underneath. I hold it around me gratefully, trying not to stare at his well-toned body, obvious underneath his hugging top.
He looks ahead at the dying sun, his arm now resting on the back of the park bench, "Do you want to talk about it?"
I follow his gaze, "It's nothing." I murmur, "I was just in a crappy mood before..."
"Are you seriously telling me that I dragged you out here, bought you ice-cream and chocolate just so you can tell me that 'it's nothing'?!" he exclaims, pulling away to look down at me in disbelief.
I look up at him in surprise but then roll my eyes when I see his old cocky grin and his teasing blue eyes. "I don't see any chocolate McLane." I say dryly.
His grin widens as he pulls some reeces pieces out of the pocket of his jeans.
I gasp and lunge for them but he pulls his arm back and I land half sprawled across his lap.
"Whoa there. Eager to get it on, aren't we? That hot tub offer's still open you know."
I glare at him as I try to get up as gracefully as possible. "You're such a tool."
He hands me the chocolates with a wink and pulls out his phone to check the time. "We should probably be heading back." He says as I start to munch on my chocolate.
I give a non-committed grunt and get up.
Once we're back on the highway and heading back towards civilisation, Jake turns on the radio. 'Hey Soul Sister' by Train is playing and I find myself unconsciously humming the harmony to it.
"You're pretty good." Jake comments.
I smirk, "Jealous?"
He winks back, "Very. Do you want to do MS with me? We could do a duet together and that way we won't get too nervous."
"Wait. I have to do it too?"
Jake grins, "Of course. Mom's not going to let you go that easily. You used to sing all the time when we were kids."
I blush, "Yeah, before I realised that I actually don't sound like Beyoncé when I try to hit a high note."
He chuckles, "How could I forget the day that my eardrums burst?"
I punch his arm, "I won't do a duet with you if you're going to be like that."
"So you will?" His expression turns hopeful.
I nod my head, I'm probably going to regret this.
"Yeah. I will. But only if you promise to be nice. No laughing about my singing, no bringing up the time I tried to sing 'Last Day On Earth' and definitely no remarks about hot tubs."
"You cut a tough bargain babe." Jake muses, "But I'll take it."
"And no calling me babe."
"I'll try."
We drive on in silence, nothing but the soft rumble of the car and the quiet strains of the radio filling our ears.
Despite Jake's stupid comments, he's really cheered me up. I know I shouldn't be cut up about what happened today with Linc and Emma. I mean, they're just old friends. I couldn't help but feel slightly anxious and maybe even a little bit jealous when I saw them getting along so well today...
I shake my head, trying to clear my mind of my weird emotions. Linc's a great guy, it's not like he'd dump me for her.
"Earth to Hale. You there?" Jake waves a hand in front of my face and I slap it away.
"Keep both hands on the wheel McLane." I snap.
"I was calling your name for 5 minutes, I think I have the obligation to be worried." He grumbles back.
His expression turns sulky and I can't help but feel a little bad, he's kist been trying to help me out, "Um... Thanks Jake. For taking me out. It was nice of you."
"Do I get a thank you kiss?"
I glare at him again, all sympathy gone, "No."
We sit in silence again until we pull up into the McLane driveway and get out.
As we stand on the front porch and Jake tries to find the house key out of the 30 or so that he has in his pocket, I decide that I will thank him. If it wasn't for him I'd be sitting at home overthinking things...
I step forward and wrap my arms around his middle. He tenses in surprise but then hesitantly puts his arms around me too.
I can feel my heartbeat quickening for some reason, "I won't give you a thank you kiss. But... a hug's ok." I look up at him, "Thank you Jake. Really. Thank you."
He looks down at me, a familiar emotion swirling in his eyes that I can't quite put my finger on. Before I can figure out what it is, he pulls away quickly, laughing, of all things, "It's ok. But it'd be even better if you just accepted my hot tub offer."
I stare at him for a moment. And then I step on his foot.
As he hops around clutching his toes I knock fiercely on the door.
He hasn't got a single serious bone in his body.
"You know I'm there for you when you need help, right?"
I look up at him again, frowning. He's seriously got some whiplash moods.
I sigh though, "Yeah. I know."
Wes opens the door and smirks at me, "Nice shorts."
I roll my eyes at him and push past him and down the hall where I can hear the clatter of cutlery and smell Claire's famous roast.
"Sorry we're late!" Jake says loping into the room behind me with Wes. I sit down next to Dylan and Claire starts to heap food onto my plate, "Hailey threw up on the way back and we had to stop."
Everyone stares at me as I look at Jake in disbelief, "I did not!"
Jake grins and takes a seat next to me, "I know, I just wanted to shock everyone." He steals a baby potato off of my plate and starts to munch on it happily.
Everyone shakes their heads, smiling, and continue eating like this is a normal occurrence. Which it probably is.
I roll my eyes and start to eat as well. Jake picks up my plate and takes all of my peas and gives me his carrots.
"What are you doing?" I ask, raising my eyebrow.
"You hate peas and I hate carrots. We used to swap all the time when we were kids, remember?"
I laugh, "I do. Wow, I guess we haven't changed."
"I guess we haven't."
"So," John says to Jake, putting down his knife and fork, "What exactly was so urgently in need of being done that you had to drag Hailey out in her pyjamas?"
"Hailey needed a new bra." Jake replies nonchalantly.
John goes pale and Claire tries to hide a smile.
Dylan, Wes and the twins crack up.
Tristan shakes his head, smiling.
Seth and Finn roll their eyes.
I kick Jake as hard I can under the table.
Sam looks around in confusion, "What's a bra?"
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