Chapter Thirty-Five…
Tapping my fingers nervously against my chin, I glanced up at my house. Both Harry and my mum’s cars were on the driveway and they would be inside waiting for me. Did they have any idea of what had gone on today yet? I hoped not, because they hadn’t even tried to call me.
Jord grabbed the hand which wasn’t fidgeting uneasily and massaged it soothingly with his own. “It’ll be okay, Jess.” He assured me gently.
I shook my head. “I don’t know what I’ll say to them. You don’t think I can hide it from them, do you?” I inquired hopefully. Although the Zack thing hadn’t stayed as hidden as I’d have liked, maybe I’d have more luck this time.
“No.” Jord stated bluntly. “Just tell them the truth, they’ll take it fine. You’re mum won’t blame herself, I’m sure.”
I don’t know how he figured out what was worrying me so much, but I was grateful he had without me having to actually tell him. “But what if she does? What if it pushes her too far and then she takes the drugs again anyway? I don’t want to have told her and lead her to doing that.”
Jord sighed and I knew my explanation had been a rational one. It was very likely that that would be the case, and Jord knew it.
“I’ll come with you.” He offered. “I’ll help you tell them what happened.”
Instantly, I knew what he was planning on doing. “Don’t tell them it was your fault.” I ordered.
“But it will stop your mum blaming herself,” he pointed out. “Plus, it is partly my fau-”
“Don’t say it.” I interrupted him. “It is not your fault.” I gazed at him with certainty. The urge to kiss him, reassure him in more than just eye contact, was overwhelming, but I wasn’t sure if we’d reached that stage yet and I didn’t want to appear too forthcoming.
“Come on,” he hurried me along. “Lets just get this over and done with. I’m sure they’ll be fine when you’ve explained it, just really worried about you.” He reiterated, opening his door and expecting me to do the same.
“Okay.” I agreed. “It will all be fine.” I repeated his sentiments, trying to convince myself, despite the ominous feeling that had wormed its way up my spine.
Following him up the driveway, I cut in front of him when we reached the doorway, opening it myself.
Instantly, an odd smell hit me, one that I’d never encountered before. It simply increased my ill-omened feeling and I grimaced. What was going on now? Surely, my life couldn’t get any more stressful? I’d hoped that with the capturing of Arthur, that everything would become normal, so to speak, again. That I’d at least lessen the strain somewhat.
When I glanced at Jord, his face was contorted with recognition and disgust. Raising an eyebrow, and starting to move forward when he refused to give me any clues, he held me back gently by the arm.
“I think that maybe it would be a good idea to leave it another couple of days before explaining things to your parents.” He had a sudden change of heart.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Why, what’s going on?” I demanded, knowing that he knew exactly what that smell was and that he didn’t want me to find out. “What’s that smell?”
He tried to look innocent. “What smell?”
I glared. “Don’t be an idiot.” I scolded, slapping him on the arm with the free hand that I had. “Tell me what the big deal is and I’ll leave with you.” I compromised.
“I don’t think you want to know.”
“Now I definitely want to know.”
He sighed, but still kept his mouth clamped shut. Rolling my eyes, I removed my arm from his grasp, continuing down the hallway and wrinkling my nose as the smell intensified. It wasn’t something pleasant, that was for certain.
Jord was close behind me, and I knew that if it really was something that bad, then he would have made much more of an effort to get me out of the house. It was obviously something he was trying to shield me from, rather than it being something that might put me in danger.
When I reached the living room, the sight in front of me took me aback. Littered everywhere were various drugs; pills, syringes and powder.
It was then that I realised what the smell must be. “It’s weed.” I stated confidently. “That smell is cannabis.”
Jord sighed and nodded. “Yes, it is.” He admitted. “Do you think we should come back when your parents are more…sober?” He suggested, looking hopeful. I could tell that after yesterday’s events he didn’t want another confrontation and I had to say that I agreed with him, but my automatic reactions, did not.
The anger within me grew to an unbelievably high level and I found myself nearly shaking with fury. Only yesterday, I had been at the hands of my father, trying to kidnap me, take me to god-knows-where, whilst my parents were high as a kite on illegal substances, probably not even noticing that I hadn’t come home last night.
Jord, having not received a reply from me, placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Jess, calm down.”
I shook my head stubbornly. “No way, there’s no way I’m going to calm down when they’re doing this!” I exclaimed, outraged.
Jord got close then, so that his forehead was nearly touching mine. “Calm down.” He repeated soothingly.
Once again, I couldn’t quite stop myself shaking my head. This was not a situation where I could just stop myself being so mad. I was still unbelievably furious at them for being so thoughtless.
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
A soft peck on the lips came then, as Jord tried extreme methods to make me even slightly more composed. Still, I was irate though, anger burning through my veins.
Sighing, Jord realised that he wasn’t really getting anywhere, so, he tried again, only this time, harder.
Capturing my lips in his own much more passionately this time, he got me to respond, so that I focused my emotions on him rather than my parents. This wasn’t hard though, because Jord was definitely easy to focus on.
Although I doubted he’d meant for the kiss to become so heated, I soon found my back against the wall as he pushed himself hard against me.
The urge that had been building inside us for so long took over and rationality seemed to be thrown out of the window as we continued our passionate kiss.
When I pulled away to breath and we weren’t making out anymore, realisation seemed to come over Jord again and although he didn’t pull away, he didn’t make any move to kiss me again.
“God, I’ve wanted to do that for so long.” He muttered, his lips still dangerously close to my own.
“Well, that didn’t do a lot to calm me down.” I replied, a cheeky grin colouring my expression.
We both chuckled, before the full reality hit us again. We’d been kissing, very openly, in my living room, whilst my parents were somewhere else in the house, more than likely in the next room along, smoking weed and doing several types of drugs.
How stupid could we get?
I was starting to realise why we’d always refrained from getting into this in the first place.
Jord stepped away from me and ran a hand through his hair. “I still think we should just leave now and come back tomorrow.” He retold his original thoughts as I tried to ignore my still tingling lips.
I shook my head, still unwilling to just leave this. Whilst I wasn’t quite as angry as before, I could guess I would be when I confronted my parents again. So, I might as well get it over and done with, whilst I had the proof in front of me.
“No.” I objected. “I’m doing this now, whether you like it or not.”
He let out an audible sigh, but nodded nonetheless, following through to where the kitchen door was tightly shut.
Taking a deep breath, I opened it, not knowing what to expect. What I hadn’t premeditated, however, was it being empty.
Confused, I glanced around the empty room, smelling the now much stronger weed that polluted the air around me, the smoke making it a slightly muggy atmosphere.
“Where are they?” I asked Jord, knowing that he wouldn’t really know the answer.
Taking another sweeping glance of the room, his eyebrows furrowed. “I…don’t know.” He admitted, confused. “They must be upstairs.”
After searching the house for a couple of minutes and coming up short, I couldn’t keep the baffled look from my face. Upstairs, the smell of cannabis wasn’t as strong, which had pretty much told me they weren’t there before we even ventured up there, but I still had to try.
“I don’t get it,” I paused at the top of the stairs, before we started down them. “Where are they?”
Jord shared my look of bewilderment and repeated what he had said the last time I asked him that same question. “I don’t know.”
Trudging back down the stairs, half of me relieved and half of me annoyed, I couldn’t work out whether their absence was a positive or negative thing.
Either way, they definitely weren’t here.
“Looks like you got your way after all,” I commented, making one last sweep through the downstairs rooms and pulling a disgusted face as the smell of weed surrounded me. There was something fishy about this, and I knew it, in the back of my mind.
For starters, I had no idea why my parents would bring all of these drugs back to the house in the first place. When I’d first discovered their addiction, it had been because I’d rifled through their closet. They’d never actually put drugs on display like that before - it was rather unnerving.
The second point that confused me, was why they would leave in the first place. Surely, if they were having some kind of drugged up party, throwing themselves into it now that they knew they could, why would they abandon it half way through.
Also, there cars were still parked on the front driveway. They weren’t likely to be walking anywhere far in the state the amount of drugs suggested they were in.
None of it made any sense.
“I think we should just go home. We’ll come back tomorrow and question them then, but right now? You need to relax.” Jord informed me seriously. I could tell he was just worried about me and he was right, I did need to relax, because I was currently stressed as hell.
“Good plan.” I agreed, following him back out to his car.
When we arrived back at his house, I found myself collapsing onto the sofa, absolutely shattered. I’d barely slept a wink all night, talking to Mel and reassuring her that everything would be okay. Her parents had been surprisingly civil, working together to make her feel better.
So now, even though it was quite early in the morning, I was in desperate need of sleep.
Jord had had the same amount as me, so I wasn’t surprised when he joined me, slouching down and resting his head on the back of the couch.
“Can we go to bed?” He asked, his voice distorted because he was speaking whilst yawning.
I nodded as enthusiastically as I could manage. “Definitely.”
Our plans were soon interrupted, however, when the apartment door burst open. For a second, I was irrationally terrified that Arthur was back, coming to take me away again and I clung to Jord. Instantly, he wrapped his own arm around my shoulder protectively.
It turned out to be something much less scary though.
Matt stood in front of us, out of breath and panting heavily. When I raised an amused eyebrow at him, he held his hands up in a gesture to wait a minute.
In that moment, I realised that my fist was encasing Jord’s t-shirt and I let it go sheepishly, sending him an apologetic look. He just smiled at me, but removed his arm from my shoulder nonetheless, creating a bit more space between us again.
“I just found out what happened.” Matt announced, still slightly breathless. “Are you okay Jessica?”
I smiled at his concern and nodded. “Yeah, I’m okay.” I assured him. “I’m not the one who got shot.”
Matt’s face dimmed. “Yeah, Grace said that Mel had been shot, but I thought I’d come and see how you were before I ventured to the hospital.” He explained briefly.
“Grace?” I asked, bewildered.
Matt pulled a face, obviously wondering why I was veering away from the main issue. “Yes, she text me.” He clarified, wanting to move on.
I blinked. Grace had text Matt? Since when did they speak? I decided not to question it though and just shook my head, amazed.
“So, what happened? Grace said it was pretty dramatic, so I decided to come and get the full tale.” He took a seat on the other side of me, waiting expectantly.
Before I could start, however, the door had opened once again. I raised and eyebrow and Matt sighed, waving it off. “It’s just Lydia, now can we please get on with the epic retelling?”
I chuckled as Lydia sauntered in. Her face showed her concern for the situation, but she wasn’t as riled up as Matt had been. “Did you really have to run the whole way up here?” She inquired incredulously. “I’m sure the lift wouldn’t have been that slow. You didn’t have to take the stairs.” She advised him.
Matt rolled his eyes. “I was anxious, there didn’t see any point in waiting for was of those infernally slow elevators when I could jump the stairs much quicker.” He reasoned, before turning back to me, still intent on finding out the story.
Lydia interrupted again though, grinning at me when she knew she was annoying Matt. It made me want to laugh how they were with each other. He face turned sober when she actually spoke to me, though. “Are you okay Jessica?” She inquired genuinely, using exactly the same words Matt had, only furthering the connection between them.
I nodded reassuringly. “Yeah, I’m fine.” I gave her the same response.
“Well, now we’ve got that settled, can we move onto the dramatic parts?” Matt butted his way in again, looking at me pleadingly.
Even though he had been sincere in asking me if I was alright, he was still a sucker for some action and so he listened intently whilst I recapped yesterday’s events to him.
Missing out some of the vital things, obviously.
Such as how Jord and I had confessed our love for each other.
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So, I know quite a few people wanted me to carry on with the story, and I've come up with a twist in the plot that can assure a few more chapters without it getting too fluffy and boring! I'm not quite sure how people will take it yet, but it's worth a shot to keep this going! If people aren't impressed with it, then I'm sure I can cut it short :D
But, the parents thing, I'm sure you've guessed it's to do with that, how many people can work out where they are? I'm sure it's pretty obvious!
Thanks for the support, A Year Full Of Surprises had over 80,000 reads! WOW! And this has over 45,000! I'm baffled everytime that I see it's gone up! Amazing! I love reading your guesses for the story, so don't hesitate to post them, and constructive critism is welcome! I'm not quite sure how good this chapter is, it took a bit of effort writing it, which generally means I've done it badly -_-
Regardless, hope you enjoy it! Vote and Comment!
Oh yeah, and they finally kissed properly again ;D I think that deserves a vote ;D
Also, I nearly have 1000 votes on this! Only 20 something left! Please get it there!