Turned out I didn't even need to ring Sophie when I got home.
Because she was standing in the kitchen with my dad, peeling potatoes and chatting away like there was no tomorrow.
And if I hadn't been so eager to just drag her upstairs and tell her what happened, I probably would have laughed at the picture in front of me. Dad couldn't cook that well, and Sophie wasn't much better, so it made the whole situation even weirder, them looking all domesticated and knowing in the kitchen.
"Oh, hey Harls!" Dad called out cheerfully as I walked into the room, the air fainting smelly of curry. I didn't even want to know what Sophie was stirring in the big pot as she turned to wave at me.
"Hey...guys, what are you doing?"
"We're making dinner, you hungry?" Sophie asked, looking at me questionally.
"Uh, yeah. But can I talk to you first, upstairs?"
"Sure," Sophie handed the spoon over to my dad, who resumed stirring the liquid in the pot as she followed me out of the kitchen. "I won't be long, Gordon!"
When we reached the stairs, I sent her a weird look. "After all this time I thought you would have learnt that my dads name is Alex."
Sophie rolled her eyes, padding up the carpeted stairs in her socks. "I know what his name is, he's really bossy in the kitchen, so I started calling him Gordon, after Gordon Ramsey."
I laughed. "I bet he loves that."
"Almost as much as he loves you and Marley." Sophie said in a bright, sarcastic voice. I laughed even more at her tone, walking through the open door into my room with her right behind me. "Is this going to be one of those conversations where I should shut the door?"
"Probably."
"Okay," Sophie nodded, letting the door swing back to close behind her. When we heard the click of the latch catching, I climbed onto my bed and lay face down in the pillows, my head still swimming with what had happened today.
Maybe it was because I wasn't used to so many good things happening all at once. Maybe that's why I couldn't quite wrap my head around the fact that Flynn and I, although still unspoken, had started something.
Something more then good. Something amazing.
I wasn't used to amazing.
"Okay, stop groaning and talk to me." The bed dipped beside me, Sophie's elbow hitting me in the side on her way down to the bed. I grunted when it dug into my ribcage, not letting up, and then I realised she was trying to roll me over onto my back.
Well, there were better ways then using your body parts, Soph. Like asking.
I finally rolled over when she drove her bony elbow into my side again, causing me to wince as I glared at her. "Stop that."
"Stop groaning."
"Stop being annoying."
"Stop being dramatic and tell me what you need to tell me, I have a curry downstairs that I left in your dads hands and I'm not liking what the outcome might be."
"Stop rushing me."
"Stop saying stop!" Sophie yelled in exasperation, throwing her hands up wildly. "If I hear that word come from your mouth one more time-"
"Okay, okay, sorry." I mumbled, sitting up so my back was against my pillows and head board. "So I went to Flynn's today."
"Go on," Sophie schooled, like the real Dr. Phil. All she needed was a bald cap and a goatee.
"We talked about what happened with Spencer and stuff, and he told me that he hadn't been expecting her at all, and that they'd dated for eight months back in their old town, but they both called it off because they were more like friends to each other. He hadn't heard from her pretty much since he moved here."
"So you sorted out the ex-girlfriend dilemma, but something tells me that wasn't why you dragged me up here." Sophie's eyes started to get that light in them when she caught onto something. It was a light I dreaded, because normally, we either got into trouble with it, or she would suddenly do something I'd regret.
Note that I said I'd regret. Sophie didn't know what the word meant.
Regret, in her mind, could be a goldfish food, or a type of lawnmower.
"Well, we may havemadeoutalittle."
"Can you please say that again?"
"We kissed. A bit."
"I think I actually heard 'made out'."
"Why would you want me to repeat it if you heard me the first time?"
"Oh for gods sake, Harlow, for dramatic effect!" Sophie sighed, shaking her head in disappointment. "You've always been really bad at these girl talks. You know that, right?"
"I know I'm regretting ever becoming your friend right now." I grumbled in defense, not entirely comfortable with laying all what happened out on the table, even though it was Sophie I was talking to and she knew everything there was to know about me.
Every little nook and cranny.
I stood and took my coat off, hanging it on the back of my desk chair as silence filled the room. Sophie normally had every single comeback in the book, so I frowned, turning towards her.
To see a look of stunned surprise on her face.
And then it turned to glee.
"You're wearing guys clothes." A statement, not a question.
Oh.
OH.
Shit.
"Ah..." I trailed off, looking down at Flynn's black shirt and boxers, a fiery blush taking over my cheeks. "I got wet."
Her eyebrows shot up to her hairline. "God, I would have gone for him if he was that good in bed-"
"Oh my god no Sophie!" I cried out suddenly, the blush deepening. "Not that sort of wet!"
"Are you sure?" She was enjoying this way to much. Way to freaking much.
What colour red was I now?
"Look, the rain was heavy and I parked a little way from the door and got soaked running to his apartment complex and then he let me borrow a pair of clothes while he washed mine and dried my coat." I took a deep breath as I paused. Sophie started to laugh.
Really hard.
"And we made out. A fucking lot. Happy?" I half yelled at her as Sophie clutched one of my pillows and continued to laugh. "Oh great. I'm so glad that you find so much amusement in my love life. Bitch."
"Hey," Sophie said through chortles. "It's not that I find it funny," pause for another snicker. "It's that I find you completely adorable and confused right now. And it makes me happy."
I shook my head at her slowly, watching as her laughter died down before I spoke again. "Now what?"
"What do you mean, now what?" Sophie frowned, rolling over onto her stomach and cupping her face with her hands. "You and Flynn are obviously going to date."
"But what if we're not? What if I read him wrong and he's regretting it now-"
Sophie was in front of me in a flash. "Harlow. Calm down." Her hands gripped the sides of my arms gently. "The other shoes not going to drop. You're not going to come crashing back to reality any time soon. This is reality. Your reality. You and Flynn are happening and you just need to calm down and let it."
"I'm not used to things going right." I murmured as Sophie smiled at me understandingly. "First with mum, and then Marley, nothings gone 'right' for me in a long time. It's just...this is new to me."
It was the truth. Letting Flynn in was scary. I wanted to, yeah, but the last person I trusted on that sort of level was my mother, and looked what happened there.
She ran away with everything, even a part of me.
And I was terrified Flynn would do the same.
"You're not going to shy away from possibly the best thing that has happened to you because you're scared. I won't let you." Sophie said, her voice growing more serious the more she talked. "If anyone deserves this, Harls, it's you."
I stared at her for a few seconds, feeling like I suddenly needed a box of tissues.
Wrapping my arms around Sophie, I hugged her, laughing a little. "What would I do without you?"
"I don't know. Seriously."
When I pulled away, Sophie looked down at Flynn's clothes again and laughed. "I picked him for a briefs sort of guy, you know?"
"Trust me. He's both."
Sophie just waggled her eyebrows, earning an eyeroll from me. "You better go help dad before he breaks the kitchen or something." I sighed, looking at my laptop screen, which was still on, and read the time. "Hey, have you seen Marley?"
"He left a little while ago with Jag." Sophie shrugged, throwing a pair of blue sweat pants that were lying on the floor in my direction. I quickly stripped out of Flynn's boxers, pulling on the sweat pants and searched for my favourite grey zip up hoodie. Once I'd thrown Flynn's shirt on my bed and zipped up my hoodie, Sophie was about to open my bedroom door.
And then we heard several pairs of footsteps bounding up the stairs in a hurry.
Like, a stampede actually racing up the carpeted stairs.
"What the hell?" I muttered, walking over to where Sophie was as she pulled open the door, and we peered out into the hallway.
To see three stumbling, hurried boys rushing for Marley's room.
One was blood related, another had a dare devil smirk pasted all over his face, and the third?
He was shirtless, blonde, and bleeding.
"Marley?" I called out in disbelief, watching as they all froze on the spot, turning towards Sophie and I in unison. It looked almost comical, save for the kid bleeding from his face and chest. "What the fuc-"
"I'll explain later." He said in one breath, pushing the shirtless blonde towards his room. "Oh, this is Archer by the way."
The blonde paused to look over his shoulder and waved at us, his lip busted and his eye welling. "Nice to meet you."
"Ah...likewise," I said questionally, sharing a glance with Sophie. "Can I ask why you're bleeding? And half naked?"
"Well that would require a lengthly explanation." Jag spoke up, that smirk still on his face. "And we'd really love to sit around and chat, but-"
"We kind of have to go and get him cleaned up." Marley finished, his identical eyes sliding over to meet mine.
And then they disappeared into Marley's room, the door slamming with a finality that had Sophie and I staring at the wood stupidly for several long seconds.
"What in the world just happened?"
"I have no idea." I muttered, shaking my head slowly. Why didn't dad freak when he saw - was it Archer? - coming into the house?
When I sniffed, I found the answer.
"Hey, Soph. Can you smell burning curry?"
She stilled, lifting her nose into the air like a dog hunting a scent. And then she was running down the stairs, disappearing into the kitchen in seconds. "What are you doing Gordon? I said stir the curry! Not set it on fire!"
Today has just been too weird.
But you gotta love family, right?
* * * *
:) I liked writing this chapter. It's not the best written one, or the most dramatic/intense or anything, it's more of a filler, but it was fun anyway.
I hope you like! Lemme know what you think :)
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