Chapter 21

Aubrey's POV
             Krystina and Aiden are still on their date, Jonas and Ellie are in the living room taking naps and my mom is still at work. Hayden is in the kitchen with me making dinner, we've been having dinner fairly early lately. Hayden was spicing up some gravy to go with the chicken we are making, I'm shredding lettuce for the salad. We hardly ever have a real family dinner but since Hayden, Ellie and Jonas moved in we've had nice sit down family dinners. I look over and see how serious his face is.

            "Why so serious?" He looks at me and smiles.

            "Sorry, when I cook I put on a 'try hard' face." I laugh.

            "Cute, why though?" He shrugs his shoulders and throws in a dash more of flour into the pot.

            "I don't know, I think a lot when I cook so maybe that's it."

            "What do you think about?" He bites his lips and sighs turning off the stovetop.

            "Things I should have told you about before." Is this about the male prostitution?

            "And what's that?" He walks to me, lifts me onto the counter and grabs my hands. He sighs heavily and looks up at me.

            "I should have told you a long time ago, I just didn't exactly know how to. I could try to sugar coat it but either way it sounds bad." He looks down again. I lift and run my hand through his hair.

            "You can tell me Hayden." He grabs my hand and kisses it.

            "The reason I got the label as a man-whore is because it's true. To help Ellie and Jonas survive I had to sell myself for money. I was a male prostitute." Finally. I lift his face and kiss him. When I pull away I sigh lightly.

            "I know Hayden."

            "What?"

            "I've known for a while. You told my mom, after you told Krystina." He pulls away from me.

            "And you didn't bother to tell me you knew?" I jump off the counter and walk up to him.

            "I wanted you to tell me on your own time Hayden." He walks away from me.

            "You should have told me Aubrey. It was eating me alive knowing that I had to tell you!"

            "Hayden there's nothing to be upset about-"

            "Yes there is Aubrey!" He yells. He sighs and looks over in the direction of the living room then back at me. "Yes there is. If you told me you knew, sure I'd feel like shit but I wouldn't have to dwell on telling you. It's been killing me knowing I've had to sleep with one of your best friends so she wouldn't tell you what I did." I feel my heart break.

            "You slept with Kitty?" He looks down and nods.

            "This is why it took me so long to tell you. I actually care about you Aubrey. You got mad at me and considered dumping me for keeping secrets-"

            "What?" He lifts his face and looks at me. "You were eavesdropping?"

            "Aubrey I'm fucking happy I was you don't tell me what you want and that bugs the shit out of me. You were going to dump me for keeping secrets from you, I didn't know you knew I had secrets! You should have told me."

            "Hayden I don't have to tell you everything."

            "I'm not asking you to Aubrey." He walks backwards to the living room. "I'm asking you to tell me things that matter, things that hurt you and things that can ruin what we have." He turns around and walks into the living room. I turn back to the lettuce and continue to make the salad.

            He's right; he probably thought I stopped self harming too. I should have just told him, then again I didn't know he was gonna make a huge deal out of me knowing. I had good intentions. I walk to the fridge and pull out the olives.

            I do want things to work with Hayden, why does he have such a temper? I pull out a knife and start cutting the olives. I just wish he understood that I didn't tell him because I figured he wanted to tell me in his own time.

            "Ow!" I drop the knife and run to the sink. "Fuck!" I can't believe I just did that, I cut my fucking finger. I look up and see Ellie standing in front of me. "I'm sorry Ellie, I didn't mean to curse in front of you." She just stands there looking at me. "What's wrong Ellie?"

            "Are you and Hayden not gonna like each other anymore?" I sigh. I can't believe she heard everything.

            "Of course not Ellie, I like Hayden a lot. I don't not wanna like him." Ellie walks into the living room and I sigh. "Fuck." I grab paper towels and cover my finger, I hope I don't need stitches. I turn to get the first aid kit when I see Hayden walk in and set it on the counter. He walks over to me, lifts me and sets me down beside the first aid kit.

            "Let me see." I take off the paper towels and he lifts my hand. He opens the first aid kit and takes out an alcohol wipe, tiny gauze pad and a tiny roll of medical tape. "It doesn't need stitches." He opens the alcohol wipe thing and wipes my finger, it stings like a mother. I bite my lip with a moan, I feel his grip on my hand loosen. He doesn't want to hurt me.

            "Hayden-"

            "Don't." He places the tiny gauze on my finger. "I'm sorry." He wraps the tape around my finger to cover the complete gauze pad which covered just the tip of my finger. "I shouldn't have gotten upset. You had good intentions and I should have respected that." He throws away the packaging from the alcohol wipe and the gauze pad. He puts the roll of medical tape back in the first aid kit and closes it. "I was being a bit over dramatic about it, being a bit bipolar doesn't help either. I honestly don't know what to do with myself, I've honestly only been on one relationship and that lasted a month. But our relationship is different." He looks up at me for the first time since reentering the kitchen. "I honestly have no clue what to do. I'm a guy whose had nothing but flings, and it's hard to know what to do in a real relationship. I haven't told anybody this, and nobody else needs to know. I just want to tell you so you can know that I do things that don't make sense." He looks down at my hands and kisses the finger he just bandaged up. "But know that I do care about you. I don't intentionally try to push you away, hide things from you or get mad at you for irrelevant things." I lift his face and kiss him; I feel his hands grip my waist lightly.

            "I'm sorry too." I pull away and sigh. "I keep secrets from you too, it's just something I've done before and I'm scared to open up because you guys might get mad or something. So I bottle it all up and that's why I cut." I lift my shirt enough to show the still fresh cuts on my stomach, Hayden looks at my stomach with disappointment. "That face is exactly why I keep secrets." He looks up at me and back at my stomach. He brings his hand to the cuts and lightly runs his fingers over each mark.

            "Where are they?"

            "Where are what?" He removes his hand and looks up at me.

            "Your razors, all of them," I didn't give Krystina all of my razors, I still have some in my room. I sigh and get off the counter, before I walk away Hayden turns me around and pulls me into a kiss. After a few seconds of kissing he moves the hair out of my face. "I love you Aubrey." We rarely ever tell each other 'I love you', but when we do it's at moments like these when we both really need to hear it.

            "I love you too." He gives me a single, gentle kiss and smiles at me. I smile back and pull away grabbing his hand. We walk into the hallway and once we reached the top of the stairs we see Krystina and Aiden walk in. Aiden is only in his boxers holding his and Krystina's clothes in his hands, Krystina has a blanket wrapped around her. I give Hayden a strange look and he shrugs. I see Aiden look around the corner.

            "Go." He whispers and pushes Krystina, they're both too busy being quiet and looking downstairs they didn't see us waiting for them at the top of the stairs. I hear Krystina giggling and Aiden snicker, then Krystina looks up and stops us stopping in her tracks. Aiden runs into her and his face goes serious.

            "Had fun you two?" Hayden says with a smirk. I hit his chest and Krystina pushes hair behind her hair.

            "What happened and Aiden why are you half naked?"

            "Well in my defense Krystina is half naked under the blanket." She glares at him and he shrugs, "Sorry not sorry." She rolls her eyes and walks up the rest of the stairs still with a blush.

            "So," I say grabbing Krystina's hand. "Mind telling us what happened?"

            "Aiden pulled me into the river."

            "Not true!" Aiden yells. Hayden is still standing behind me laughing. "She pushed me and I just happened to take her down with me." Krystina turned to him and I see mud on the side of her face.

            "Did you guys go mud wrestling too?" I say touching the dried mud on Krystina's face.

            "I'll explain later. If you don't mind," Krystina walks over and grabs the bag off Aiden's shoulder. "I need to change." She walks into the bathroom and Aiden walks to his room.

            "Yeah I should put some clothes on." I laugh and Hayden and I walk into my room.

            "We should have a date like that." I look up at him.

            "Sorry, I don't like taking my clothes off for any guy." He laughs and kisses my hand.

            "Who says I'm 'any guy'? And I'm not talking about the being half naked part. I mean the part that makes people wonder what happened with one look."

            "So what are you suggesting?" He smiles and lies down on my bed.

            "You'll find out the day we go out on our first date." I laugh and lay my legs on his stomach. Krystina walks in putting her hair into a ponytail and back in her hospital clothes. I stand up and pull her to my vanity mirror.

            "We should take the now smeared makeup off your face." She laughs and I pull out my makeup remover, once I'm almost done Aiden walks in and is now fully dressed.

            "So," Hayden says now sitting up on my bed, "Can we hear about what happened?" Krystina points at Aiden.

            "Well," Aiden says sitting on my desk and grabs Krystina's hand. "It was a great first date." Krystina smiles at me. I'm beyond happy she's finally able to live a normal life.

            "Yes it was. And now I have to look like part of the living dead and sneak back into the hospital."

            "You have a plan right?" Krystina opens her mouth but Aiden cuts her off.

            "Of course she does, she's a criminal." Krystina hits the top of his leg and they both laugh. I finish taking off her makeup and step away so she can look herself in the mirror.

            "Wow I look like shit." She says lifting her hand to her eyes.

            "I think you look beautiful." She looks up at Aiden and smiles. I hear Hayden beside me make a whipped sound. We all laugh and Aiden walks over and hits him upside the head. "So are you. Might I bring up the many times you talk about her?" Hayden has a subtle red to his cheeks.

            "Aww, you talk about me?" Krystina laughs and Aiden stands beside her satisfied. This is my family.

            We harass each other, laugh at each other, but we also have fun together and love each other. Krystina, Aiden, Hayden, Ellie, Jonas and my mom. But I'm sure that dad and Ashton are with us all the time laughing with us.

Sky's POV
             I wake up with a pounding headache, that fucking girl can really throw a punch, maybe I should have just faked it. I throw my legs over the side of the bed and stand up. Just then Jordan walks in.

            "How you feeling Knock Out?" He walks over to his bed and pulls out a book from under his pillow.

            "I feel like I was hit by a train."

            "Dude, she's a girl. Get over it." I scoff.

            "You're one sexist bastard." Jordan shrugs.

            "Whatever, so why did she punch you?"

            "I called her out on mom problems."

            "And this leads to the question, why?" I sit back down on my bed and Jordan lays down on his.

            "To help Krystina," Jordan let's out and angry sigh.

            "Dude, why the fuck are you helping her? She chose some douche over you."

            "I still like her but I honestly don't expect me to be happy with any girl ever so why would I pull her away from him just to not be happy with her?" Jordan shakes his head.

            "You're a fucking moron. So what? You're hoping to be a rebound or something? I mean come on Sky. Even you're better than being some girl's rebound." I shrug.

            "I just wanna be friends. Maybe if it happens then I'll let it, but for now she's set on this guy and I don't think it's worth it pulling her away from him." Jordan lays back down.

            "Whatever, by the way, that Flavor chick and the Dunkin Donuts guy want to talk to you."

            "Frayia and Duncan," I say lightly and walk out the door. I head to the commons area when I Krystina sitting with Frayia, Duncan and Talia. Was I really out for that long? I walk over and Talia is about to stand up.

            "Talia I told you its fine." Krystina says gripping her shoulder lightly. I sit down and sigh.

            "How'd you get back in?" Krystina looks down at Duncan and Frayia.

            "Duncan and I broke one of the rules and Danni turned us in."

            "Which rule was it?" Duncan smiles and Frayia blushes.

            "No male and female alone time. It was kinda awkward." Duncan says rubbing the back of his neck. "We had to make it convincing."

            "Please tell me you two didn't-"

            "They didn't have sex." Talia said interrupting me. "They just had a heated make out session. I just gotta say finally. It's weird being around you two when you both secretly wanna suck face with each other." Krystina laughs and Frayia glares at Talia.

            "Hey Talia," She looks up at me, "I'm sorry for-"

            "Don't bother. It's honestly gonna take a lot to forgive you." I sigh and nod.

            "Understandable. Just know I'm sorry and I should have told you." She nods and starts talking to Frayia and Duncan. I feel Krystina grab my hand. I look up at her.

            "Thank you Sky." I smile and pat her hand.

            "I'd do anything for you." She smiles and pulls away. I get up and walk over to the nurses' station to pick up Tylenol.

            I honestly do like Krystina but seeing the extent she's willing to go too just to see this guy, I can tell she really likes him. He makes her happy, I just hope I can find someone like that one day.

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