Dylan said he was not sleeping in Landon's bed, and definitely not in his own, where Kaitlyn went to sleep, so I offered him my room, since there were no other options left. I stayed with Landon, meaning in the same room as a pissed Kaitlyn. She's sleeping with her back facing us.
We all went to sleep really quick, the reason being it's been a long day. Really long. Too long, almost. It doesn't necessarily mean it's bad though. I've had a good time.
I did go to sleep, yes, but I didn't sleep. I spent my time looking at Kaitlyn's back, wondering what she thought when she found out. Wondering how she feels.
When she starts moving and then sits up, I quickly shut my eyes. Her silent steps are heard before the door opens and then closes again. I open my eyes again and start shifting in order to get up without waking Landon up. That doesn't go as planned.
"I'll be back," I say before he can question anything.
He nods, and I step up and head out, just to hear the door to my room open. In the speed of light I step back inside the room and close the door until just a small gap is what separates me from the outside world, and see her and Dylan walk towards the stairs, his hand pressed against her back.
Okay seriously, when did they get friends? Please. For how long has she been here?
I follow them, since that's exactly what anyone else would do if they'd see Kaitlyn Turner and Dylan Prescott walk down those stairs like that.
I see them sitting on the couch. She's leaning forward, and his hand is once more on her back, but what catches my attention is how she's leaned her head on his shoulder. They've turned on the small light beside the couch, making it possible for me to from the foot of the stairs see the few tears that are flowing down her cheeks and Dylan's look somewhere in the distance with his lip rolled inside his mouth. She's fidgeting with her hands; she's frustrated.
"It's fine," he tells her, his voice sounding as if he can't even spell to sarcasm and jokes. It's lower than usual, sounding almost like Isaac's. "Believe me, it's all gonna end in a very short while."
My brain analyzes the order of the words, and the sentence that forms in my head leaves a few thousand question marks up there.
I continue watching my best friend and my bestie on the couch and I'm once more reminded of what I've done to them. I'm a terrible person.
She lifts her head up and wipes her tears away, looking down before looking at him and then looking down. And then looking back at him.
"I'm really sorry I woke you up," she says. "I just didn't know what to do."
"Don't apologize, it's fine. Really. Whatever happens, I'm here."
All these boys know to say is 'Don't apologize'. All they know is to make sure everyone is alright and no one feels bad and even if they'll need to walk through a hell, they'll do it, only because they're here. "But you owe me. Next time I come to your door because I need you, you're gonna ditch your boyfriend, if he so is the prince of England, to talk to me."
He pulled those two cards; I need you, and the boyfriend card.
Either she's one of his besties now, and he's treating her like he treats me, or there's something going on. I've heard he's had girlfriends before, a few, but I've never believed he's a player as some people have told me. Something's going on. What? I don't know.
She lets out a small laugh and wipes her tears once again.
"I don't have a boyfriend," she informs him. "A boyfriend is a man and a girlfriend is a lady, and most of the guys I've met haven't been men and haven't treated me like a lady. All the same crap."
"Really? Well, that's even better; you'll have time free to comfort my broken heart when I'm turning your porch into a puddle."
"You're not gonna do that," she says, her voice turning into an even softer one.
"Why? Boys don't cry?"
"Boys don't. Men do."
He smiles and then looks down.
"I'm not a man?"
"That's not why you won't cry. You won't cry because you just don't. You're the type of guy that won't cry only because you don't wanna give anyone an opportunity to see you vulnerable, but mostly, you don't wanna admit to yourself that you are vulnerable."
He sits straight up and looks at her with a weird grimace.
"What are you?"
"I'm studying psychology. One and a half hour everyday in school and a part time job at a friend's clinic."
"You're good at it," he tells her.
"Thanks."
They look like they're getting along well. That's good. They're the kind of people that when thrown together, they're gonna rule this Earth together, or destroy it. They're just the kind that all the bets are on.
I can't believe I'm spying on my friends. I practically locked the door to my life with thousands of locks, and when someone else's door is just a bit open, I'm literally jumping inside to see what's going on in their lives. This is the pure definition of double standards.
"It's pretty late, and the girls are coming over tomorrow," Dylan says and stands up, making me practically escape the crime scene as silent as possible. I enter the room and slowly close the door, lying down in Landon's bed.
"Why were you spying on Kaitlyn?" he asks, making me jump a few feet when his face changes in order to say that against my shoulder.
"How do you know?" I ask, shock written on my face.
"She's gone and you look like you've just spied on her."
"Okay, I did. She's getting along with Dylan."
He can't give me his opinion, since the door is opened by Kaitlyn on the outside, revealing her when she walks towards Dylan's bed.
•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•
I'm woken up by the roaring voice of Isaac.
"Get the fuck out of here!" he screams outside of the room.
Kaitlyn's gone, and Landon is too. I jump up and head out, only to see Isaac at the point of exploding from where he's screaming at my mum and John.
"You!" mum screams when she lays eyes on me. "What are you doing? What are you thinking? How dare you?"
When she reaches me she lifts her hand up, and I prepare myself for a slap that luckily doesn't come.
"Mrs Peters, please don't," Kaitlyn tells her, and I open my eyes when I hear her voice, seeing I'm protected there behind her.
"Kaitlyn don't interfere here."
She shoves Kaitlyn away, but Kaitlyn once more steps up.
"Stop!" she screams. "Don't touch her, what the fuck do you think?"
"Kaitlyn-," John tries.
"No! You're the reason she ran away, you and the son of a bitch you call your child."
"Kaitlyn you don't dare talk like that about my son."
"What the fuck are you doing here?" Landon's roar is heard echoing through the whole house, before he three seconds later shows up in the hallway. "Leave her alone, what the fuck is wrong with you?"
"You," mum exclaims and starts walking towards him, hitting him.
"Mum stop!" I yell.
"Come on. We're leaving, come on!"
She grabs my wrist and starts pulling me with her.
"Mum stop."
The others try talking, yelling or threatening her, but it doesn't work. "Mum!"
I snatch my arm out of her grip and watch her. "Enough! I don't want to, I'm not coming back! I'll rather die, than going back to Minneapolis with you. Stop! I'm not leaving!"
"What are you talking about?" John asks.
"Don't talk to her," Landon threatens.
"I'm done with you," I yell. "I'm done with pretending like I'm fine, mum, I'm not. I tried telling you, I tried letting you help me, but you just ignored it. I'm not coming, I'm eighteen, you can't force me."
"You're eighteen," she snorts. "You come with me when I tell you to!"
She once more starts dragging me with her, and no one manages to get me out of her grip until we reach the first floor.
"You don't touch her," Elaine's voice spits.
"Elaine," John sighs shocked.
"Don't say my name," she spits again. "Don't talk to me."
"Elaine leave," Landon demands. "Get the fuck out of here I'm telling you!"
His scream is sudden and shocking. What is going on?
"I'm calling the cops," mum says and takes out her phone.
"Do whatever you want," Elaine tells her, ignoring Landon's aggressive threats. "She's eighteen. If she wants to stay, she stays. You can't force her even out of that door if she doesn't want to. That's counted as attempt of kidnapping."
"Elaine!" Landon yells.
"Why are you defending them?" John asks her, but she ignores him.
"If you lay one finger on her, I can make sure you're behind bars," she continues, her voice louder now.
"Elaine in what fantasies are you living? Are you gonna put us behind bars? Hayden."
John turns to me. "Come on sweetie, let's go home. Whatever mistake that's occurred we can solve it, we're a family."
"What fucking mistake?!" Isaac roars. "That fucking waste of oxygen you call son is raping her!"
John grits his teeth.
Silence.
Tears.
"You knew?" Elaine whispers. "You fucking knew?!"
Less than a second later she's jumped on John, scratching his face as I stand there and watch them, paralyzed. He knew? They both knew? And they didn't do anything?
"Elaine!"
"Hayden!"
Elaine. Hayden. Elaine. Hayden. Elaine.
"Hayden please!"
•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•
I open my eyes and grit my teeth when my head starts pounding. Did I hit it somewhere?
"Hayden!"
I feel Landon's hand instantly grab my neck lightly, stroking my jawline as I try organizing my thoughts.
"Where are they?" I ask.
"They left, don't worry. They couldn't do anything."
"The others, I mean."
"Isaac went with Elaine and Kaitlyn's been downstairs the whole while with Dylan. Do you-"
"I'm sorry, okay?" I say and look up at him. "I'm sorry for always causing trouble, I'm sorry for always hurting you, I'm sorry for always messing everything up every time a small part of it has been fixed, and I'm sorry, but I don't wanna talk about it. My mother sold me for being the wife of the governor. Is there even more to talk about?"
Instead of answering the question, he gets up on the bed and hugs my shoulders and waist.
They knew, both of them, and yet they let it happen. Fine, don't report it, but when you knew something like that was going on, why didn't you try to prevent it from happening? Forget John a second, Noah's his son, but why mum? Why didn't she help me?
I don't find any reason, not even a bad one, and that's what angers me. The only reason I can think of is that she didn't want her Mrs Governor time to come to an end, which it would have done if her daughter would report the governor's son. I hate her. I was really worried about what was gonna happen if she'd find me, but now all that worry is gone and replaced by anger.
He lets go of me and strokes a string of hair behind my ear, keeping his hand there.
"Look I've said this before," he starts while taking my hand. "And I'll say it again; this is never in a million fucking years gonna happen again. He's gonna pay for it, and they will too, and I swear, if the price is anything but high, my name isn't Landon Fernandez."
I don't know if I want revenge or if I just want to put an end to it. If my mum would help me, I would definitely just put an end to it all and just stay with her and let her do it. But now it's all but that. Now she's leaving me because of her husband and his son, and somewhere in that sentence, something inside me dies while something else ignites. She sold me for her clothes, things, house, car, and that angers me more.
When he lets go he pulls me down with him and I see Kaitlyn screaming at Dylan.
"You shut the fuck up!" she screams and then shoves him away on her way out the door.
If there's someone I should talk to right now, it's Kaitlyn. She needs an explanation, an apology and a hug.
"Kaitlyn!"
I run up to her and pull her to me in a hug. That's the first time we've hugged in one and a half year. One and a half year.
She hesitates at first, but then she tightly hugs me back. I feel her tears on my shoulders, her mascara probably mixed with them and coloring my shirt, but I don't care. My best friend means more than a shirt.
"I still hate you," she says, and I find myself snorting at that.
•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•
Kaitlyn didn't stay for long after that; she went back to Minneapolis just a few hours later, leaving Dylan disappointed. No one knows what she screamed at him for, and if they know, they're pretending like they don't.
The police were here, but they couldn't do much and they didn't have the right to ask much either, according to Isaac. Landon's mum came over too. She slapped him across his face and yelled something at him in Spanish as Dylan went up with Jordan. Giving the fact he's angered easily, I'm surprised he hasn't reached his boiling point, but I guess it's got to do with that she's his mother and even more of a Fernandez than he is. This is probably the only living creature of God's that he hasn't lashed out on after such an intense fight, being the unpredictable volcano he is. He always risks having an outburst and melt everyone in his way with the lava pouring out of him that is in fact his anger. If this woman ever talked to me and said something with just one percent of the anger she's carrying right now in her voice, I would even change my name if she asked me to do it, that's how scary she is. Not to mention when she finds out I'm the reason her son escaped town and not even to mention more, the fact that I'm his girlfriend. She seems like the woman that will make me regret the day I was born.
"Don't worry," Isaac says from beside me, his voice sounding kinda shut. The reason to this is that his lips are sealed, so the words don't sound normal, since he's trying to prevent being the next victim of Mrs Fernandez's anger. "It'll be over soon and she'll make us enchiladas."
I smile and then Landon turns to me. I watch him with big, scared eyes as he says something to his mum that I'm not even gonna try and distinguish into separate words.
She looks me up and down and then calms down, but not to the point where the scary grimaces go away. He tells her something more, and then she exclaims, "Dylan!"
He runs down in the blink of an eye.
"Sí, mamá?" he asks.
These two are so cute. He calls Landon's mum mum. Now I get their whole brother thing.
"Mamá-" Landon tries but is cut off.
"Sch," she says and holds her hand up. "Dylan...." I can't exactly part the upcoming words that she says.
"Mamá," Dylan says with an amused smile. "Por favor, no. Para mi."
"Sch," she says again.
Dylan let's out a laugh and holds out an arm towards me, looking at me and mimicking "Sorry".
She walks towards me and I freeze immediately. He whispers something to her, and with a straight face and monotone voice says "Hija, you seem like a nice girl...." he tells her something more. It's weird that she doesn't know English, because from what I know, she's been here since high school. "But now is not a good time to meet."
She doesn't have so much of an accent. You hear the Spanish that puts some color to her words, but she talks pretty good for letting Dylan translate what she wants to say for her.
I just nod. She smiles and grabs my hand in both hers, hitting it lightly as I start cursing myself for imagining her of being a monster. Not all mothers are like mine.
In the upcoming words she says, I can only distinguish "Jordan", but I'm positive she told Dylan to get her youngest son since he a few moments later is standing in front of us with the youngest member of the Fernandez family.
"Bye," Jordan says on his way out.
"She must hate me," I comment when the door closes.
"No," Dylan says. "She does not."
Seconds later loud knocks are heard on the door and I volunteer to open. The second I push down the handle, I'm shoved away by a girl who storms inside and slaps Isaac before pushing his chest.
"What the fuck is wrong with you you fucking asshole?!" she screams and hits him.
Is today the day of unexpected visitors?
"Gina-," Isaac starts.
"Shut the fuck up! You were in fucking jail? And no one decided to tell me? What is wrong with you all?"
Jail? When?
"Gina," Dylan warns. "Please. Not now."
"Shut up Dylan. I'm mostly pissed at you guys. I know this asshole won't tell me anything, but I expected to at least hear from you when he's thrown behind bars for attacking a cop and the governor. The fucking governor you fucking idiot. What were you thinking?"
My world stops a second. Was he in jail? Because of me? What's been going on?
"You were in jail?" I ask, my voice close to breaking.
The girl, Gina, snaps her head towards me.
"This is her?" she spits. "This is the bitch you got kicked out of school for?"
Wait, what?
My heart starts hammering when she paces towards me. Landon jumps in her way and holds her back.
"Let me fucking go!" she screams. She's not older than us, she even seems to be younger, but I still widen my eyes when I feel the anger that's radiating from her burn the hair on my arms. "You're so fucking stupid Isaac! Mum didn't send you here to get your ass behind bars! You know how much she worked for that scholarship, how can you be so fucking selfish?! I trusted you, I thought things were gonna get fixed now that you're older and wiser and smarter, so smart you've gotten a fucking scholarship to a university you couldn't even dream of, but no, of course not. You just had to fuck this up as well."
Isaac's not looking at her. He's staring at the floor, his fists turned into balls and his jaw breaking. Dylan's rubbing his hands over his face, as if he can make her vanish by doing so, but she doesn't. She keeps hitting Landon's arms that have lifted her up from behind, preventing her from killing anyone. "You're the same, you will never change Isaac! This is why dad left us, he couldn't stand all this bullshit, not from you and not from mum, and now look at us. You got kicked out of school, because apparently, they don't accept criminality at the place educating law and order. And now what? Let me fucking go Landon!"
I see her elbow bore into his chest and he drops her to the floor. It's now that I realize how much black makeup she's painted her face with; lipstick, eyeliner, eyeshadow, everything, and it's now a wet mess with her tears. "I hate you! You've ruined everything!"
"Gina-" Landon tries, but she's halfway through the door.
"What was she talking about?" I ask after some seconds.
"N-," he dares start with, but I'm prepared.
"Isaac don't dare lie to me," I say, ignoring the warning clocks ringing in my head. "You got kicked out of school? Because of me?"
"Hayden stop."
"What did you do?"
"S-"
"Isaac stop!" I scream, reminding myself of the screaming girl that was standing her a few minutes ago. "What have you done?"
"I jumped on a cop!" he roars. "I jumped on a fucking cop that got in my way when I was gonna rip the motherfucker's bones out of his body! They threw me in jail for three nights, and when they let me out I jumped on his fucking father, and school had enough of me and kicked me out."
"What?" I whisper.
I've ruined everything. I've ruined his whole life. He had it in him, he could become a great lawyer, he had a future, and I stole it from him. He was going his last year, it was his last term, and then he'd get his degree. How did I let myself do that to him?
"Hay-"
"They kicked you out?"
"It's fine, they would've kicked me out sooner or later. My register isn't so clean."
"But it's different!" I exclaim. "You got kicked out because of me."
"No Hayden I didn't. Don't care about Gina, she's been like that ever since dad left. It's not important."
But it's everything but not important. He looked so forward to finally graduating and getting on with his life. He worked so hard for that scholarship, he studied so much, even though he's dyslexic.
"Isaac...."
I drop it. I just drop it. What kind of person am I? I've ruined his whole future. I've popped all his dreams, broken all hopes, I've made his hard work worth nothing. It's not fair.
"Hey, it's okay."
He takes a few steps forward and hugs me. I can't believe he's the one who's been robbed his future, but that he's yet the one telling the robber it's okay. I push him away and his gaze falls to the floor.
"It's not okay!" I exclaim. "Stop saying it's okay, it's not!"
"Hayden-," Landon tries, but I shoot him a look I wouldn't even dare think about giving him a few weeks ago.
"What do you want me to say?" Isaac asks.
"Curse! Scream, be mad at me, hit me, I don't know!"
"I'm so fucking done with this," he says nonchalantly and walks up the stairs, leaving me here as mad as ever.
"Hayden come on," Dylan says. "Let it go. Mia said she'd solve it. She's the smartest girl at university, she'll fix it."
"But it shouldn't even be something that needs to be fixed Dylan," I say.
"Shut up," Thomas says. I turn to look at him and his features are hard. I've never seen Thomas, out of all people, lose it. "Shut up. It's happened now. You can't change it. Stop it. There's already too fucking much that's going on, and you lashing out on him for not being mad at you isn't exactly something we need to solve in this shitload of problems."
I'm taken aback. He's right. I shouldn't have talked to him like that. I don't have the right to scream at him when he's the one that's taken the punch.
With big steps he's stormed out of the house, ripping the door off.
I can't believe what kind of friend I am. Instead of thinking about what to do to make up for them being dragged into this mess, I'm throwing more and more problems at them.
I see none of them are left in the hall, they're all gone, and even though it shouldn't and I have no right to complain, it breaks my heart.
I steer my steps towards Isaac's room and knock. I owe them all an apology.
He opens, his eyes tired but his eyebrows lightly risen.
"I'm sorry," I say. "I have no right to talk to you like that, and I don't even have an excuse. I've caused you so much trouble, Isaac, and it hurts to see I'm ruining everything for you."
"Hayden you're not," he says, dropping his hand from the door and lowering his eyebrows. "It's been nice having you here, and the," he raises his hands and does quotation marks, "problems, you've caused us haven't been by choice. You shouldn't be sorry. You, out of all people, don't have the right to be sorry."
I force a smile and he pulls me in for a hug, a short one. When I leave I decide to talk to Parker and Landon too since I know the look I gave him wasn't fair.
"Stop," Parker whines, whines, for the first time, sounding almost like Dylan. "I'm sick of you apologizing for your existence. Get out of here Hayden. I love you, but get out of here if that's the only thing you're here for."
He slams the door in my face, and I instantly start blinking. This conversation felt like being held with Dylan, not Parker Graham. It made me feel better though.
I knock on the last door and step inside after getting an answer.
"Hey," I say, causing him to look up from his phone.
"Hey," he says and puts it down. "Why did you knock?"
"I thought you'd be mad at me."
He snorts.
"Yeah. Sure. I'm pissed."
He isn't taking it seriously, so I walk over to his bed and sit down in front of him.
"Look," I start. "I know I-"
"If this is an apology, then please don't."
"Why are all of you hating my apologies?"
I let out a laugh.
"Because they're for the most ridiculous things Hayden. Please."
"But I'm sorry."
"For what exactly?"
He raises his eyebrows and leans closer, leaning his arms on his knees and resting his chin on his arms.
"Stop!"
He starts laughing and sits up straight. With a quick move he snakes his arm around my waist and pulls me towards him where he leans against the back of the bed. I catch him half smiling half grinning, as Dylan says, before placing his lips on mine. I put my hand on his shoulder but he removes them much sooner than I wanted him to. Now he's only grinning, less than an inch between our noses. He strokes that usual string of hair behind my ear and lets his hand remain on my cheek as the other one tightens around my waist.
"I forgive you," he says before connecting his lips with my smiling ones.
~
Interesting, isn't it?
The line between an ugly truth and a beautiful lie is as thin as one single strand of hair, and yet holds two different worlds on each its sides.
~
They chiggen friggin nugget knew???! Who could've guessed ???? *me*
What's going on with Elaine?
Isaac's gotten kicked out of school?
Gina????
What on ACTUAL EARTH have they missed? Is there more?? ;)
And the billion dollar question :$ Kailan... Ship or Nah?? *0*
That's it for chapter thirty five, hope you liked it, and if you did,
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Enjoy the last chapter now before Friday :)
xoxoMichelle <3