Chapter Twelve: "Understand."

I WAS ABOUT TO open the door when I heard the thump against it. The sound of something hitting the bottom of it.

I opened it anyway only to be partially blocked by toilet paper on the ground. It looked like it had been filed up into a pyramid. I looked down the small hallway to find Peter holding a tennis ball in his hand and a stack of tennis balls on the table next to him.

He stopped that look of concentration on his face before smiling at me. "Hey Macy. You mind getting out the way so I can get a spare?"

I didn't even question it. Instead I walked down the small hallway to stand beside him. I watched Peter bit his lip in concentration and hold the tennis ball as if he was about to throw it like a baseball before he swung it roughly underhand and the rest of the toilet paper rolls fell to the ground from the impact.

He raised his arms up in victory. "Yes! Sam your turn." He yelled, going over to the toilet paper and setting them up.

I watched Sam come out of the one room and I didn't even hesitate to jump into his arms. He laughed and felt him envelop me in a hug, burying his face in my hair. "Hey Hazel."

I couldn't even say anything before I heard Peter speak. "And the lovebirds are reunited."

Sam flipped him off with a finger before pulling me to the living room. "Wait what about our game?"

"You can take my turn." Sam yelled back.

"Great." Peter agreed.

The second he stepped into the living room, I found myself laying on my back on the couch with Sam over me on his forearms to take most of the weight off of me. "Did you just have practice?"

"Yeah." I told him. "Practically ran over here."

He didn't kiss me. Not yet. He used his index finger to trace under my eyes, the curve of my top lip, my chin and jaw. Almost as if he was memorizing me. I smiled under the ticklish feeling and twirled a lock of his curly hair around my finger. "How was the shoot?"

"Stressful. The photographer just kept yelling until the point where I got a headache. He was like 'stand there', 'you're doing that wrong', 'holy are you serious? Why are you making that face', or 'you look constipated'."

"He said that all to you?" I asked, not believing this.

"No, he said that to other people. Definitely not me." Sam said smugly and I rolled my eyes at his cockiness.

"Any other troubles?"

Sam eyes flickered around my face as he was in thought. "When I went out to get from one location to the one down the street, I was walking on the pavement and suddenly I was bombarded with cameras."

"What? Really?"

Sam nodded. "I don't really get it. I mean, I come from a wealthy family where my mom and dad are famous. But they live in a town where no one really bothers them, you know? I mean the only huge problem was... remember they had to install that fence around our compound since our family did that shoot for the national magazine back in the summer and the gossip magazines and that guy that tried to break into the place?"

I nodded and Sam sighed, getting off of me and sitting down properly. "Ever since then it's been complicated."

This was new. "What do you mean?"

"There would be once or twice people taking pictures of our family specifically mum, dad or even Ivan because he's going to be taking over one of the biggest companies in the world soon. According to my mother, they've been trying to get info on our family to see if there's any drama going on but nothing so they go after a person that used to be the problem child in the family. Me."

"You?"

Sam laughed under his breath as I tried to comprehend what he was telling me. "Yes me Hazel, keep up."

"Well I'm sorry considering you didn't tell me any of this before." I muttered, sitting up from my position and facing him.

He took my hands and laced them with his, placing our intertwined fingers on his lap. "I'm sorry I wasn't even sure if this was honestly a huge problem until the weekend."

I didn't say anything, twiddling my fingers with his for a couple of moments. "I wouldn't call you the problem child of the family."

"I was though. I really was. You know Macy, you know how badly Bethany's death affected me. But now I'm attending this school. I'm back in England. I have you. I have this modeling thing going on and soccer. They kept asking me so many questions about soccer then they were like 'are you dating a model'?"

"What did you say?"

"I did what my mum always told me to do," Sam admitted. "I put my head down and didn't answer any questions until I got to the building. But this...it was overwhelming. Not a big fan of the flashing lights in one's face."

I waited for him to explain until it clicked. "You realize that if you become a National soccer player...you're going to face cameras all the time. Not just with your family name on your back but of you representing a team that represents a country or even just a club team. And the people behind the cameras have a way of twisting your words."

"Exactly," Sam sighed, almost with relief. "You understand, Hazel. But I need you to know something."

"What?"

"What you see on TV, on some blog, on some gossip news page about me, could be fake. It could be twisted like you said."

"I know that." I assured him.

Sam unlaced one of his hands with mine to run it through the top of his curly hair. "Thank you."

"Of course. I understand Sam."

"I know you do." He mumbled and it was then that I realized that the distance between us was closer than it was a moment before.

It was then I realized I hadn't kissed Sam in only days and he closed the distance between us before I could. Lips against lips, his hands in my hair and just like that everything seemed to fade away.

Only he was in my head the entire time. The feel of his lips against mine made my eyes shut involuntarily and I felt dizzy and overwhelmed. My hand fell over his chest, feeling his heart pumping erratically and my other hair winded its way to his curls on the top of his head.

I think the thought of Peter walking in on us kissing went through his mind at the same time as mine because he pulled away slowly-so slowly it was as if he didn't really want to move away.

When Peter had actually entered the room, he was carrying the toilet paper and threw one at Sam and I who were side by side, my legs swung over his lap and his arm around me as we talked.

I don't know if it was the toilet paper that reminded me of what I had to tell him but I remembered. "Oh, I have something to tell you."

Sam looked at me quizzically. "Yeah?"

"Oh so I saw Zach when I went on a walk with Anmol and Maddy the other day and he invited us to a party he was throwing." Sam raised an eyebrow as I waited for him to take in what I had told him. "And I was wondering if you want to go?"

Sam had his tongue under his bottom lip, tilting his head back before looking back at me. "You're going right?"

I nodded. "Just because you may not come doesn't mean I don't have to go."

"Understood," He said before taking a brief moment to think, looking into my eyes. "Okay fine."

"Fine?"

Sam groaned out loud, almost dramatically. "I'll come Hazel. I'll go."

"Are you sure? Because I know how you are when you see someone...from years ago."

"It's just unexpected when I see them Hazel. I'd be an idiot to think I would never ever see anyone from Bath ever again."

"But are you going to be okay?"

"I'm going to okay," He assured me, then he got this glint in his eye and his lips quirked up in amusement. "Now...what are you dressing up as for Halloween?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Maddy leave me alone," I grumbled, trying to finish the sentence. That's when she reached out and tried to take my book again and I almost threw it at her. "Maddy, let me read."

"You've had your head stuck in that book for almost two hours. Don't you have any work to do tonight? Assignments? Or write a blog or something."

"A blog?" Anmol asked giving Maddy one of her 'are you serious' stares. "What?"

"Or a vlog. Or create a Youtube channel....no Anmol you should create a Youtube channel on ranting-"

"Mads on a scale of one to ten how bored are you right now?" Anmol asked her.

Maddy eyes flickered around the room behind her glasses as she thought. "14."

"Wow beyond the scale much?" I muttered, trying to read the same line for the 50th time.

Maddy took the book from my hand and my mouth dropped when I realized I had just lost my page. "Oh my god you-"

"You what?" Maddy almost mocked with her eyes and I already knew what she was going to say. "You flying lemur?"

She started laughing and I almost groaned, leaning back on the couch in the common room and wanting to forget that one day.

Anmol stared at the both of us. "What?"

"When I first met this tall giant here-"

"Hey!" I threw a throw pillow at her and she dodged it, laughing.

"Sorry, when I first met this tall, beautiful, amazing friend of mine, I may have accidently almost spiked the ball at her face."

"Are you serious?" Anmol said to Maddy.

"It was accident," She exclaimed. "Anyway, as an instant reflex I honestly thought that she would've called me something rude or would've said something in shock. But the first words that came out of her mouth were 'holy flying lemur'."

"What?" Anmol stared at me, amused before her and Maddy both burst out laughing.

I rolled my eyes. "I used to say that a lot, okay? You rarely hear me say that."

"No, no, no," Anmol started, "I wanna hear you say it."

I rolled my eyes. "No."

"C'mon Mace-" Anmol stopped talking when someone else joined us in the living room and I mentally groaned when Tanya and a bunch of other people came into the common room and sat down on the couches around us.

Her eyes glanced over to me before she gave me a smug smile before turning to one of her friends.

I don't think Anmol noticed her yet because she didn't roll her eyes instead she looked at me. "Hey can I ask you something?"

"What?"

"How did you and Sam get together?"

"Read the book 68 Days." Maddy blurted out as I put my legs on the couch, tucking my feet under me.

Anmol looked confused then her face lit up in recognition when she realized that she did know that book. "Wait...what does that book have to do with Macy and Sam?"

"Maybe because the author of the story wrote it based on them." Maddy said.

Anmol's eyes widened and the girl literally leaped from her spot beside Maddy to me. "Are you serious? I haven't read the whole story but I've heard about it. Like that it's good! Wait- you know the author? Romero Henderson? But-"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down," I raised my hands in a gesture to stop her. "Yes I know Romero Henderson. Remember that guy I told you about? Caleb? Yeah that's him. Caleb Romero Henderson."

Anmol's jaw dropped. "Really?"

"Yeah."

"But how did you two get together? Like I actually want to know. Give me the summarized version and then I can buy the book and read what you won't tell me."

I propped my elbow on the back of the couch, and leaned my head against my hand. "I met him in February. Let's just say when I first say when I first met him he was a-"

"Dick. The guy was a dick." Maddy finished for me.

"Let's not call Sam that word," I told her. "But honestly he was a bit of a jerk but eventually he grew on me."

"Oh so he was a jerk back then?"

"He's still kind of a jerk now," I joked. "But honestly, Sam had this 'bad boy' image to him. Still kind of does but he doesn't show it as often as he used to in high school."

"So trouble?"

I blew a raspberry with my lips, feeling the vibration. "Well...I ended up dating his brother later on when I met him. And Cedric and I-"

"Whoa," Maddy intervened. "Wait...Cedric? You dated Cedric? Stevie's current boyfriend? I didn't know that!"

"You know now," I said, feeling a little bit awkward because I never really talked about this out loud and Maddy was one of the people who had actually read the story and knew what went on between Sam and I months ago but she never really asked about the pure details. "But, then I started to get feelings for Sam and-yada yada yada-we started dating-"

"No, that's not how it happened." Maddy said.

I sighed. "Okay so the thing was Sam and I ended up in the same place during March break and I was still dating his brother. What happened? We kissed. Then we had this stupid idea to get each other out of our systems by being together for the rest of that week and we acted as if on the following Monday that everything would return back to normal. We were idiots. Of course that wouldn't happen. You don't just go back to be being friends after that."

I took a deep breath. "But here was the thing: I cheated on Cedric. I was also using him to get over the feelings I had for Sam. I felt guiltily. But then Cedric says 'oh hey guess what? I used you too because, well, I did like you but honestly I just using you as someone that my brother- who apparently gets everything-didn't want because 'I wasn't like other girls'. I was like, okay. That's fine and some of the guilt was taken off of me."

"Some?"

I looked down at a part on the couch. "Yeah some because deep down I still knew I had cheated on somebody. I never thought I could envision myself in a relationship back then, let alone actually have the capability of being with someone at the same time as someone else. So yeah I felt guilt because it wasn't a mistake but I should've broken up with him when I realized that I had had feelings for Sam."

Anmol nor Maddy had said anything about that and I realized that for the first time I had actually talked about this with someone openly. I never even spoke about it with Jasmine or Stevie. 

"But everything's okay now? I mean you and Cedric are friends and you've both clearly moved on from each other."

I nodded. "Yeah, it's not like I think about him the same way I thought about him months ago or even in tenth grade."

"But what makes you think that just because you've moved on from one guy doesn't mean you'll cheat on the current one?" A voice said.

I didn't even notice when Tanya had stood near our area, her arms crossed. I paused, turning around fully to face her. "Because I know I won't."

"But...you said it yourself. You cheated. You're a cheater meaning you'll probably end up cheating on Sam."

"That's not going happen," I stood up, getting a little riled up as what she said went through my head and stuck there like glue. "It was half a year ago. Half a year ago I was a different person and I barely understood my feelings-wait! Why am I even explaining myself to you of all people?"

"Because you're badly defending yourself and I probably know that Sam might as well find a new girl because he knows you're going to che-"

Oh God, I almost punched her. Emphasis on almost. " Does any information go through your incredibly thick skull. You may not understand this but I don't just love Sam, I'm in love with him. And you may not understand the idea that he's in love with me too. I don't know how you don't understand that and yeah Sam and I have and will fight and we will get into so many arguments that will be resolved. But if there's something I will never do it's that I will cheat on Sam."

Tanya narrowed her eyes at me and I bent down to reach her level. "did you process that information?" I asked her quietly and I realized that the common room had become incredibly quiet and people were listening in.

Tanya twisted her mouth to the side. "We'll see about that, won't we my fellow soccer player?"

With that, she got the last words, walking away and some of her friends trailing after her.

You see there was a slight difference between the way I talked to the 'mean girls' in high school and university.

Back in high school I always and always managed to get the last word in any argument because I knew that would shut them up.

But here people knew how to defend themselves and knew how to leave you hanging. I've noticed that a lot. So when Tanya said that 'we'll see about that', I sat back down knowing that she meant that.

"Macy are you okay?" Maddy asked me.

I opened my book back up, finding the page I had been reading and looking over the sentence I had read a million times. "I'm fine."