We were setting everything up, and Sara and Natalie came to help with it.
I was struggling to hang up this string of letters that said, 'Boy or Girl'. Harley comes up behind me and lifts me by the hips. My weight caused his fingertips to dig into my skin roughly, I hiss slightly but quickly tape the ribbon to the post. He sits me down and I rub at my hips still feeling his fingertips digging into my skin. "Did I hurt you?" He asks as he pulls the end of my shirt up to get a better look at the damage.
He hadn't hurt me but feeling his hands on my skin hurt my insides, causing them to burn a trail of arousal deep into my stomach. "Shit." He bends down to get a better look and I sucked in air as he runs his fingers over the forming bruise.
"Do you have to use such vulgar vocabulary?" I scold him, he knows I hate it when he cusses.
"I didn't mean to hurt you." He says pulling my shirt down just before Sara walks up to look at the banner.
"You two did a really good job, planning." She looks around at everything finally set up and smiles. "They are going to love it."
I hoped they did. I have been avoiding Finnic as much as possible, and Liz as well. They can always read through my lies, and this was one I wasn't ready for them to see through yet. I haven't even told them about me moving in with Harley yet. I wish I could lie about that forever, but I knew eventually the truth would come out and I would rather it come from me than anyone else. I didn't know how Finnic would take it, Liz would swear we were a couple or sleeping together.
"You two are so cute," Sara whispers in my ear and winks at me. "Top tear relationship goals."
"Just friends." I remind her with a head shake. I don't know why she and Liz are insistent on me dating Harley, if they knew the inside dynamic of our relationship, they would tell me to run far away.
"Friends with benefits?" She asks jokingly.
"Just friends."
"Just friends always end up as more than friends." She says in a matter-of-fact voice.
"Not this time." I deny her statement because girls and guys could be friends.
"Oh, definitely this time." She giggles and goes to help Natalie keep the napkins from flying away. I stare at them with amusement in my eyes as they jump up trying to catch the last few before they sit something heavier on top of the remaining ones.
My smile fades when I realize I probably won't ever be as carefree as them again. I'll always be tied to that night of abuse, tied to that court case, where all of my deepest darkest secrets were kept in file folders in a drawer somewhere.
A piece of me had died that night, and some when he got released, every time he had someone break into my place. I wonder how much more of my soul was left in there. What I wouldn't do to forget for ten minutes.
His presence in my life again has taken a toll on my sleep and I could practically feel the bags under my eyes forming.
The guest slowly starts to show up along with Finnic and Liz. When I see them, my finger starts to twist together subconsciously.
Finnic wraps me up in a hug. "I missed you." I hug him back.
"I missed you too." I meant those words. What I wouldn't do to tell Finnic everything that has happened over the week he has been gone but I couldn't it would just stress him out when there was absolutely nothing he could do. Plus, this weird feeling to protect Harley's image stopped me from telling them. I didn't want them to know that he was a part of a gang, I didn't want them to look at him like he was a different person because he had done it for me.
He didn't deserve the judgment that Liz and Finnic would give him.
"It's beautiful," Liz comments as she gazes at the decoration.
"I stopped by your place. Going to show you the pictures we took, but your car wasn't there. Is there still a problem with the apartment?" She eyes me skeptically, and this grabs Finnic's attention. My heart stops beating for a minute. I thought I would have a couple of more days to think of excuses for me moving in with Harley.
"She moved in with me," Harley says as he steps beside me, our pinky fingers brushing up against each other. "There was never anything wrong with her apartment. We just didn't want to tell you yet." He grabs my hand and pulls it to his mouth. Kissing the back of it.
Holy ...
What is he doing? I didn't sign up for this kind of lie to my brother.
Finnic narrows his eyebrows at Harley skeptically, when he doesn't see what he's looking for he looks down at me and I nearly bite my lip, but I know it's my telltale sign when I'm nervous or lying so I just smile awkwardly.
"Well, shit." He smiles and grabs Harley by the neck in a bear hug. "Welcome to the family."
I roll my eyes at their antics as they start to tussle in the yard. Liz is still staring at me though; she is seeing through all the bull crap. "What's going on?" She grabs my arm and pulls me away from the two-man children.
"I know you. You wouldn't just move in with Harley that quickly, and a week ago you were constantly arguing that you were just friends. So, what's going on?" She gives me those, you better tell the truth, eyes.
"Promise not to tell Finnic?" I ask. She seems to be contemplating her odds, but curiosity gets the better of her.
"Promise." She doesn't keep secrets from Finnic unless it's for his benefit which this is. The stress that this would cause isn't worth it. Why worry about something no one can change?
"Vickers is causing problems. He was released about a month or two ago." I explain quickly before she can freak out about how I need to call the law. "Harley is handling it, He just doesn't think it's safe for me to live alone."
Liz nods as she puts the pieces together. "So y'all aren't together?" She asks looking between me and Harley.
"No." She smacks her teeth together.
"Dang it!" I chuckle at her and am glad that she isn't freaking out on me about things I wasn't even sure how to deal with. "Thank you for planning the gender reveal it turned out wonderful."
I glance around at my and Harley's handy work and am satisfied by how it turned out. "I'm so excited." She grabs my hands and jumps a little.
"I'm excited for you." As the words leave my mouth, I see a woman that I have been missing deep in my bones but have been hurting something awful knowing that she was laid up at her house with a man that was one of the sole reasons I have some problems excepting help.
"Should I make her leave?" I ask when Liz notices her coming up through the gates entrance of the football field. She shakes her head and smiles at my mother waving her over.
"We invited her." I glance at Liz with shock evident on my face, I was sure that this feud between Finnic and my mother would last years, or until she turned Gander away. Had that happened and no one let me know? Was Gander gone from her life again?
The question was answered when he soon followed behind her, he smiled a sad smile towards my brother. Finnic's jaw tightened and I could tell he was uncomfortable just as I was.
My mother comes towards us, blocking my view of Gander. She throws her arms around me and pulls me close to her. "It's been too long. I've been dying on the inside without you and your brother."
Not enough if she couldn't get rid of the father that didn't raise us. What made Finnic change his mind?
I eye him a few yards away and try to read his intentions, but I can't. There is no reason for his change of heart unless he caved because he missed our mom. It just isn't in his nature to give up without some kind of truce or compromise.
I hug her back half-heartedly. Don't get me wrong I missed my mother, a lot but I was distracted by the looming presence behind her. He held so many mysteries I had about myself. Was I like him in any way? Could he sing? Did he enjoy reading? Did any of those things matter if he could just so easily walk away from it all?
"Missed you too," I whisper before excusing myself as my mother gushes over Liz's big belly. It was too much I needed a breather; I had been so caught up in the drama of my life that I hadn't had time to come to terms with the fact that Gander was back regardless of whether or not I wanted him to be.
I step under the bleachers finding a dark corner to hide in, while I ponder over everything. It doesn't take Harley long to find his way to me, he doesn't let me get far out of his vision. I understand his worry and protectiveness because The Forefathers aren't going to hesitate in cutting my head off, it was just smothering.
I felt like a child again that needed around-the-clock monitoring. "Want to talk about it?"
His voice was rough and a memory of a more intimate moment involving him under these bleachers comes to mind. I remember my small little heart being crushed because even though I knew it was wrong and he was too old for me then, I still had a crush on Harley. I tried to lie to myself for years about it, saying that it was just stupidity. I knew though that it wasn't because when I saw him screwing Lily grey that night, I felt like I had drowned and couldn't find not one will in my body to swim to the surface.
"Was it this bleacher or the next one?" I asked with a lazy smile on my face.
"Oh, definitely the next one." He jokes back and I wish I could be carefree and nag him some more, but the thought of that night hurt me a lot more than I was willing to admit.
"You know you broke my heart that night," I say willing the words to leave my mouth, I've told him the darkest secret of my life making the small ones a lot easier to talk about, because in the grand scheme of things this didn't matter.
"What? How?" Harley seems genuinely confused as he comes to sit down beside me. He was ten times more attractive now than he was back then, not that he was bad-looking, but adulthood suits him.
"Well, see thirteen-year-old Madeline Hansel had a very irrational, scandalous crush on a certain boy. Screwing the daylights out of Lily Grey." I chuckle towards the end of the sentence feeling completely stupid for my feelings back then.
"No." He says scrunching his eyebrows up in concentration. "Maddie, I was like seventeen back then. You were a kid." He scolds me and I look at him still chuckling to myself.
"The heart wanted what the heart wanted." I point my finger at his chest and gently push him back. "I was a very misguided kid, Harley," I explain myself the best I can, Gander being back bringing up old wounds I hid in myself so no one else could see. I never felt like anyone wanted me back then, and Harley was always there picking up the pieces. Kind of like he is now, it's a good thing I've healed a good bit of that trauma, or I would have already given in and dove headfirst into his lake, sure to hurt myself.
He starts to laugh a little, "God, I had no idea. I would have broken your heart sooner, sweets."
"Oh, gee thanks," I say, as I roll my eyes at his words.
"What? That was completely unhealthy. It would have been the right thing to do. Maybe it's a good thing I took your innocents while screwing Lily that night. Set you back on a good path." Just the phrase 'took your innocents' coming out of his handsome mouth made me bite my lip. The thought of it being me all those years ago instead of Lily lighting a wildfire in me that couldn't be contained.
"So much good it's done."
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