CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE !
[ real life ]
❝ LIKE DOGS ❞
📂﹖﹕𓂃𐩐💻
ʳᵉᵃˡ ˡⁱᶠᵉ
the entire group sits spread around the living room as matt, chris, elijah, and kingston play a game on the xbox. matt sits on the edge of the bigger couch, auroras head resting on his lap as she scrolls through tiktok on her phone while her legs rest on nicks lap next to her. matt has one of his arms rested over her chest so he can hold the controller away from her face. nick keeps shoving her legs off every ten minutes and tells her to just 'sit up like a normal person' but she is far too comfortable for that.
nick is just watching the video game as elijah is sat next to him, slightly slouched down further into the couch. it still makes aurora raise her eyebrows every time they interact because she's not quite sure when they actually started talking, but she's happy for them nonetheless. she just has to get used to the fact that yeah, sometimes things really do just work out.
on the other couch is chris, kingston, and makayla. chris and kingston are both completely captured in the game while makayla is cozied into her boyfriends side, a blanket over her lap as she goes through her phone. raven and venus both sit on the floor in front of the coffee table, venus taking her time to paint her girlfriends nails a light peach color.
they've been here for about an hour since leaving the dance, everyone changed and dry from rain. the atmosphere is a cozy one and everyone agreed three rounds of games ago that they would make pasta. they still haven't stopped to do so though.
aurora is mindlessly watching one of those absurd carpet cleaning videos on tiktok and doesn't really pay attention when chris groans and sits up in his seat. "shit, i've gotta use the bathroom."
kingston doesn't even spare a glance, keeping his eyes on the tv even though the boys sitting right next to him. "you're gonna get killed, bro."
"bro, i know," chris groans, quickly scanning his eyes around the room before focusing on aurora and standing up from his seat. he walks over to the other couch and ignores elijah's groan when he blocks the tv. "rory, rory, rory!" he exclaims anxiously, making her drop her phone and notice him standing there. "can you please play for me?"
aurora blinks. "yeah, sure i guess," she answers as he practically shoves the controller into her hands. she rolls her eyes as he then turns on his heels to go to the bathroom.
she sits up slightly and turns her head to focus on the screen. she moves her character around to realize where on the map she is and then glances over the boys' split up screens. she notices matt not that far away and chuckles quietly. she's totally going to kill matt.
he hears her quiet laughter and spares a quick glance over to her to see her with the controller and a silent grin on her lips. "why are you giggling, rory?" he questions as his eyes go back to the screen.
"no reason," she answers quickly although it's clearly a lie from her amused tone.
he's about to question her further when his character begins getting shot at, that being it's own answer. he immediately scoffs in offense and moves around his character until he finds aurora being the one to shoot at him. "rory, what the fuck!" he exclaims. "we're on the same team, you dumbass."
"what?" her jaw drops and matt glances over to her to watch the sight. "so i can't kill you?" she questions, looking up to him as he gives a short and obvious nod. she instantly looks away and groans, sinking further against him. "that's so boring, what the fuck?"
matt rolls his eyes and looks back to the screen. "why is your first instinct to kill me?" he questions teasingly.
"because it just is, matthew," she emphasizes his full name as she moves her character in a new direction, matt's character right behind her.
"the full name? again?" he groans under his breath as aurora just hums.
"wow! when you're the first one on her kill list," kingston says in a girlish voice, instantly having aurora roll her eyes as nick and elijah laugh. "so romantic. truly, guys."
matt laughs next to her as she huffs, "shut the fuck up, kingston. where are you even at? i'm gonna kill your ass."
right as kingston begins to laugh in response to her, her character gets headshotted and instantly killed. her jaw immediately drops. "WHAT THE FUCK?" she exclaims loudly, having matt and kingston glance to her screen to see what it is and then bursting out laughing.
"you've never been able to pay attention to games for shit, rory," elijah speaks up, chuckling to himself just as aurora notices that it was his character that killed her. nick giggles from next to him, him having been the one who watched his screen the entire time.
aurora narrows her eyes at her brother. "i want you dead, eli," she speaks dramatically, causing him to roll his eyes.
"woahhh there, rory," kingston chuckles quietly as the round of the game ends.
chris begins walking back into the room as everyone sets their controllers down slightly, the stats from the game coming to appear on the screen. "rory totally got you killed while you were gone, chris," nick immediately rats her out before the tv even has a chance to tell him that.
chris' jaw drops and aurora instantly moves her leg to kick nick in his leg. he looks back over to her like it's her fault she did it. she just huffs and glances over to chris as he crosses his arms. "aurora, what the fuck!"
aurora opens her mouth to respond but her boy next to her does so before she can. "that was like your fifteenth time dying chris," matt deadpans.
chris scoffs in offense and aurora grins. "HA!" she laughs.
"you know what? i was sick of this game anyway!" he defends, earning blank looks from them all. "can we go make pasta now or whatever the fuck?
"i've actually been waiting for that for like five minutes now," venus suddenly speaks up as she puts a nail polish brush back in its bottle. "you guys said we would like an hour ago."
"okay well, we can now!" nick exclaims, suddenly pushing auroras legs off of him aggressively.
she instantly scoffs in offense. "okay fuck you then," she rolls her eyes, him just sticking his middle finger up as he gets up from the couch. elijah glances between the two before sighing and putting his controller down, going to follow after nick.
chris also turns from where he stands to go into the kitchen. "are we gonna vlog it for wednesday or what?" he calls out as nick walks past him.
aurora glances over at kingston and makayla murmuring something to each other, then beginning to get up. she sighs, feeling comfortable but knowing she should also get up when venus and raven stand up as well. she begins to sit up but matt doesn't move his arm from where it's still resting on her so she looks up to him, a questionable look on her face. "wait," he mumbles once she looks at him.
she raises her eyebrows and matt removes his arm, instead resting it on the back of the couch as she sits up and turns around to face him with a sigh. she scoots slightly closer to him and faces him as she raises her hand to mess with the hair tie currently on his wrist. it's her hair tie from when she put it up once they got into the car, only for her to take it out once they got home. she almost left it behind on a table but matt grabbed it before she could. "what is it?" she asks.
"uh..." he trails off for a moment, waiting for everyone to completely disappear from the living room before continuing. "do you like.. remember earlier tonight?"
aurora blinks. "no," she deadpans before tilting her head at him with a slight laugh. "yes, matt, i remember earlier tonight."
he rolls his eyes at her sarcasm before sighing and leaning his head further back into the cushion behind him. "i mean like..." he stops for a moment, unsure of how he wants to bring this up before deciding to just go for it. "when we were yelling and shit, you kept saying you needed me and well, you were a lot angrier than i first expected you to be. did something happen or...?"
auroras face instantly falters, being brought back to the original reason she needed to talk to matt, or to just be around him. her hand must subconsciously stop toying with the hair tie on his wrist because he glances over to it, noticing somethings up. he then looks back to her and she awkwardly clears her throat, moving her hand down to rest on her lap. "nope," she answers, lying.
his eyes narrow slightly, clearly not believing her but also not wanting to make it obvious. "really?" he questions. he sighs once aurora nods in response and continues, "i know you called me twice last night and you hate calling people."
"yeah," she responds shortly. "i was just bored."
"rory," he sighs, reaching his hand out to grab the one she sat on her lap and trying to look to her with a sense of security. "you can talk to me. you know that, right?"
a slight feeling of guilt washes over aurora from how cautious and nice he's being. she just doesn't know if she has the capability to talk about it with him anymore, maybe she did right after it happened and when she tried to call, but now? she just doesn't know. "i know," she gives a small smile, trying to seem believable. "we can talk later tonight, matt."
nick, from the small area between the kitchen and the living room, mumbles, "what do you think they're talking about?"
he just pulled out the camera and was vlogging kingston and chris but now he's switched to obnoxiously zooming in on matt and aurora talking on the couch. chris and kingston are right next to him as he does so, both chuckling.
"oh he just grabbed her hand," chris narrates, nudging kingston to make sure he's paying attention. "he's definitely like 'oh rory, i love you so much. i can't belive i ever hated you, omg!'"
kingston bursts out laughing, placing his hand on chris' shoulder as he chuckles. "oh shit, now he's got her smiling," he points out amusedly as they watch the pair. "bros lowkey got rizz."
"matt? no way," chris laughs before his eyes widen and he instantly coughs, turning around as kingston does the same. "they're getting up. move the camera, move the camera," chris murmurs between coughs for nick to hear.
nick immediately does so, turning straight around. kingston and chris both eventually stop their obviously fake coughs and walk into the kitchen together, then bursting out laughing again when they share a look. nick rolls his eyes amusedly and walks into the room as well.
aurora is standing in front of the stove, stirring boiling pasta noodles as she huffs. her and matt are the only two actually watching the food while everyone else has moved to sit at the kitchen table. they're going through their spare board games, looking for something to play to pass the time.
she glances over at the table as they seemingly settle for 'go fish' because kingston shouts it out and chris and elijah start laughing like it's the best idea in the world. nick has put the camera aside now, not finding board games interesting enough for a vlog.
she looks back to matt next to her and sighs, stepping away from the stove and grabbing her phone. "this is so boring," she groans as matt takes her place, him stirring the noodles instead.
"right?" he agrees easily, shaking his head and raising his voice so the people at the table will hear when he says, "i cant believe they're playing 'go fish' without us."
"matt, we will ALL play again after we eat, you dramatic fuck," nick immediately exclaims loudly, turning in his seat to glance at matt rolling his eyes and then turning back around.
"wait," aurora speaks up after lingering on an instagram notification on her phone. "we should go live or something to kill time."
matt shrugs. "yeah, sure. haven't got anything better to do while we wait for this to cook."
"okay." she smiles slightly, clicking on her instagram and swiping over to the story part where you can go live. she turns and sets her phone down on the island counter, a place across from the stove, so that they're in the cameras view. she then presses the live option and clicks start, taking a step back afterwards.
matt steps forward, peeking his head into view from the side as people start to join. "hellooo people," he speaks.
aurora grins momentarily at the way only half of his face is in the camera before leaning forward to read some of the chat.
user MATT MATT MATT
user MATT??????
user WHAT US MATT DOINH HERE
user HELLO?3?3????
user MATT AND AURORA ARE OKAY THE WORLD IS AT PEACE EVERYONE CALM DOWN
user hey matt🤗🤗🤗🤗
user *instantly sighs of relief*
she chuckles slightly, almost forgetting this is the way the chat always is. matt notices as well, speaking again, "yeah, hey."
aurora turns around to continue stirring the noodles and matt turns, noticing her doing so. he then turns back to the camera and explains to the audience, "we're cooking pasta while everyone else plays 'go fish' like losers."
user WE'RE???? 😏😏😏😏
user awww ur making pasta together that's so bf and gf moment goals
user matt i thought we had something and WE were gonna make pasta together :///
matt rolls his eyes at the comments amusedly, turning back to watch aurora. "make sure you stir the sauce too, rory," he says carelessly, unaware of how the chat goes absolutely ballistic over the username.
user RORY?3?4????:???
user WHEN HE CALLS HER RORY😭😭😭😭
user cant believe we were stressing over matt not being in her comments and now we get to see them cook together on live😭😭😭😭😭😭i love being alive
user do u guys ever think of how easier it would be to point out funny comments if the author did user1 user2 user3 instead of just user
user @user all the time, user, all the time
"make sure you stir the sauce too, rory," she repeats him in a mocking manner, deepening her voice to sound like him. then, she turns around and looks at him dubiously. "of course, matt, i'm not an idiot."
he lets out a dramatic sigh and looks back to the live. "she's sooo mean to me," he tells the audience jokingly, making aurora roll her eyes as she turns back to the noodles and sauce.
user shut the fuck up matt we all know ur in love buddy
user she lowk is... guess u gotta be with me instead🤗🤗🤗
user444 ok but when are you gonna ask her out come on now
user woahhh the author gave that user a number it must be a special one😨😨😨
matt eyes glance over a specific comment, tilting his head slightly. "you're so behind, user444," he speaks up in a knowing tone. he knows he'll probably send the viewers into a frenzy but oh well, he just can't resist.
"matt," aurora calls, catching his attention before he can see the results of his nonchalant comment. "can you come see if this noodle tastes right? i can't tell if they're done or not."
"yeah sure," he answers easily, walking over to her as she picks a noodle out of the bowl with the wooden spoon. she sets it on a paper-towel and matt instantly reaches for it. she looks at him like he's crazy as he immediately hisses in pain and retracts his hand. "are you fucking stupid? you have to wait for it to cool down. there's still boiling hot water on it, you dumbass," she scolds him, picking up his same hand.
she glances over it and matt rolls his eyes amusedly. "i'm not gonna get burned from a noodle, rory," he tells her obviously, still finding the way she made sure endearing.
she sighs, putting his hand down and instead reaching for the paper-towel she put the noodle on. she extends it between them. "here," she says. "eat it now. it should be fine."
matt picks it up from the paper-towel and puts it in his mouth. he chews on it for just a second before nodding. "yeah, tastes done to me," he tells her once he swallows the noodle.
"okay great," she says, putting the paper-towel down and taking the bowl of noodles off of the burner so she can drain the water in a strainer.
matt sighs and walks back, going to grab her phone on the counter. he picks it up and sighs, "well, this was a short live," he says mindlessly. he glances over at aurora as she begins straining the noodles and then reads over the chat once more. "oh wait this is a fun question," he giggles to himself before he even reads it. "are you and aurora dating?"
aurora instantly looks over to him, her eyes widening comically. he watches as she does so and instantly laughs, looking back to the camera and making a suspicious face before ending it without answering the question. aurora instantly speaks up once he sets the phone down, "now matt, what the fuck?"
aurora walks out of the bathroom after taking off her makeup and brushing her teeth with the spare toothbrush she has here. a whiles passed now and everyone's heading to go to bed. naturally, she heads for matt's room.
once she makes it to his room, he's sat up on his bed with her laptop in front of him. she originally packed it for ravens but they stopped to grab some stuff before everyone came here for the night. she closes the door behind her once she steps inside and matt instantly glances up at her.
she walks over to the bed and lets out a dramatic breath of air, matt chuckling and opening his arms out for her as she climbs in. she graciously accepts his open arms and falls into place with him, wrapping her arms around his side as she lays down. matt rests an arm around her shoulders and the other one on her side, pulling her slightly closer to him. "i'm so fucking tired," she murmurs quietly.
"me too," he agrees easily, sitting up just slightly to grab her laptop further on the bed. "what do you want to put on?"
"just whatever," she answers lazily, knowing whatever it is doesn't really matter since it'll practically only be background noise with how tired she is.
"gravity falls it is," he decides for her, beginning to pull up hulu as the girl scoots further down on the bed so she can nuzzle her face further into his side. he doesn't even attempt to hide his smile as she makes herself cozy against him. it's actually fucking crazy how they somehow ended up here, perfectly fine. it makes all that they've been through worth it.
he eventually gets the show playing and aurora sighs contently against him, her face practically engulfed in his hoodie, when he suddenly remembers their conversation from earlier. he doesn't want to ruin her half-asleep state but he can't help himself. "hey, rory?" he whispers hesitantly.
"yeah?" she whispers back, far quieter than him as sleep is clearly almost taking over her.
"i know you're exhausted but," he pauses for a moment, looking down at her as she raises her head to return the eye contact. "could we talk really, really quickly?"
she blinks in surprise, very tired but wanting to do what he asks. "yeah, sure," she murmurs. "what is it?"
"uh, what you said we could talk later about," he answers.
he instantly feels how she tenses up slightly against him, his mind telling him something is clearly wrong. her body language when he's brought it up is so foreign to how she usually is. he knows something must've happened because he knows aurora like the back of his hand. he only has to take one look at her to know if somethings up.
"um," she mumbles quietly, matt almost wishing he doesn't notice the sudden change in her tone of voice because it makes it even more obvious there's something she's not telling him. "could we just talk about it in the morning?"
matt falters slightly but he manages to nod, understanding whatever it is must be difficult to talk about and that she's very tired. "of course."
she instantly rests her face against his hoodie once more and just as matt refocuses his attention back on gravity falls, his fucking door opens. matt raises his head and immediately feels aurora groan in frustration next to him.
"holy shit bro, why is your room so fucking dark? it's like a dungeon in here."
"kingston?" matt blinks repeatedly in surprise, noticing kingston and makayla behind him. "what are you doing in here? no... why are you shutting the door behind you two? bro, i—"
"group sleepover time!" kingston cuts him off in an exclaim, now making aurora instantly raise her head. kingston notices from the light of the laptop and awkwardly stands beside makayla. "oh were you guys going to bed and shit? that's our bad."
"we still are," matt deadpans. "why are you bringing a group sleepover up here? group sleepovers can be done from different rooms, bro."
"yeah, i know," kingston crosses his arms as he begins to walk over to his bed, makayla trailing behind him. "but we just wanted to come up here, duh."
makayla blinks. "vee and raven took the living room and chris was taking up the entirety of his bed when we checked in there," she explains better than her boyfriend.
kingstons jaw drops in offense from her actual explanation. "wow, mak."
she rolls her eyes amusedly at him as he sits on the edge of matt's bed, matt clearly holding in a groan as he sets down the laptop he was watching. "sorry guys, we're like literally stuck here," she tells them, taking a better approach than kingston.
"what about eli?" aurora questions, still nuzzled into matt's side but now sitting up a tad.
kingston giggles. "nicks room."
matt and aurora both gasp and look to each other. they share the same face of surprise before looking back to kingston and makayla. "no shit?" matt questions, earning a nod from makayla which makes it a lot more true than when it came from kingston. "wow, they must've been talking a lot longer than we realized, what the fuck?"
"i know right, bro?" kingston agrees with a chuckle before glancing around and realizing what's playing on the laptop. "oh shit, we're watching gravity falls?"
matt blinks. he looks down to aurora and then sighs, looking back to kingston. "yes but like.. how are we all supposed to fit on my bed? like how is this supposed to work?"
"dunno," kingston shrugs. "figured me and mak could sleep at the end of the bed like dogs or something," he says honestly, makayla instantly looking to him with raised eyebrows.
"literally what the fuck?" she questions. "speak for yourself," she pats her boyfriend on the shoulder before looking over to matt and aurora. "i can like.. sleep sitting up or something? i don't know. it's only four people. we'll be totally fine."
matt just sighs, it now being auroras turn to speak up. "i don't know, mak," she chuckles slightly, feeling a little less tired by her friends presence. "i'm kinda feeling like kingstons dog idea is the best route."
matt and kingston both immediately chuckle at that, makayla giving her a hopeless look before just sighing and accepting her fate. kingston watches her amusedly and reaches a hand out to her, scooting further back onto the bed. "it's totally cool, mak. we'll just be dogs together."
"alright, bro," matt rubs at his eyes. "you're starting to sound like furries."
makayla and aurora instantly burst out laughing, aurora's head vibrating against matts chest as she leans into him. makayla laughs outwardly as she climbs onto the bed, kingston just looking at them like they're crazy. "the fuck are furries, bro?" he asks questionably.
they all pause, slowly looking at him to look for any signs of him just joking. when they find none, and realize that he actually has not clue, they just laugh harder.
💌
this is lowk just a filler chapter where you get to see their friendships more and shit because i feel like i haven't showed enough of their bonds and it was fun to write 🤗🤗🤗
u were also supposed to get to read rory telling matt ab her step dad but it's 5am and i haven't slept and i am tired and have to proof read this real quick so u will have to wait until next chapter 💔💔
i also got airpod pros for christmas and i fucking lost them when going to take a shit deadass (I DIDNT FLUSH THEM DONT EVEN) and this is the most heartbreaking experience of my life like i've flipped my entire house upside down and they're GONE😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
also sorry if i made any furries mad this chap that is my bad and i am sorry 💔💔💔💔💔💔
<3
jaden