Justin

       "Hey, sweetheart. Wake up."

 No response. Just a muffled groan as Laila shoved her head underneath her pillow in attempts to block me out.

   I nudged Laila gently again, prodding a finger into her back. She slapped a hand in my direction.

"Stop that!" she moaned, sounding barely awake.

   I chuckled against my better judgement and wrenched back the covers away from her, almost sending them flying off the end of the bed.

   "Wake up, sweetheart," I repeated with a crooked grin.

Laila huffed out a sigh and sat up, pushing back her tangled hair from her face.

   "What do you want?" she demanded, her sea-blue eyes barely open.

"It's almost noon," I explained, crossing my arms. "Our moms told me to come and wake you up."

  "Ugh," Laila groaned, flopping back against the mountain of pillows on the bed. "Why?"

"Because we're going shopping," I told her with a chipper smile.

"What for?" she shrieked, her voice pitching up at least three octaves. "I hate shopping!"

 "Are you forgetting that we're leaving for Colorado the day after tomorrow? For a wedding?" I asked her, my grin widening.

  A blank look crossed Laila's face for half a second before she was practically crying.

  "Come on, sweetheart," I sighed, bending down to wrap an arm around her waist to help her to her feet.

  "Shopping isn't going to be so bad," I told her conversationally as I lead her from the room. "Nick'll be coming with us, anyways. And he's always a laugh, right?"

 "Yeah, Nick's always - wait, why is Nick coming with us?" Laila broke off in confusion, glancing up at me.

  I adverted my eyes, looking anywhere but at Laila, nudging her so she would start heading down the stairs first.

  "Because Nick is coming with us to Colorado," I began, taking a steady breath. "And.... so is Maggie."

   Laila stopped short, her fingers gripping the banister. I nearly walked into her from behind.

"Are you serious?" she squeaked.

   "Nick and Maggie's parents are close friends with my parents and my mother's brother - Ashleigh's father," I explained in a rush, trying to get everything out in one breath. "We have a vacation house about forty minutes away from Silverton - in Ouray - and since it's big enough, the Petrolas family is going to be staying with us, since they've been invited to the wedding, too."

  Laila didn't say anything after my stupid explanation, which made my nerves start twisting into knots.

   Just as I was about to ask her if she would just say something already, she said in a high voice, "How long are we staying in Colorado?"

  Oh, great. She'd had to go and ask another horrible question.

"About a week or two," I answered hesitantly.

  She turned to me with a rather interested expression on her face.

"I'll be in Colorado for my sixteenth birthday?" Laila said, her tone peculiar.

  My face fell blank. Right. So I wasn't expecting to hear something like that, but I should've realized it.

  Laila's birthday was July 19th.

"Are you okay with that?" I asked her slowly, completely unsure of everything.

  She thought that over for a few moments before she cracked a grin.

"As long as I get to spend it with you, I think I'll be fine."

  I blinked in surprise at first, but then cracked a grin of my own.

"I think we can arrange that," I said tauntingly.

   Still grinning, I lowered my head towards hers, cradling her face in my hands before I pressed my lips against hers.

   My fingers tangled in her hair the more we kissed, teasing her into opening her mouth for me. I was pretty much revealing in the success of that as she complied when I heard my mother's cheerily bright voice floating down the hallway.

  "Remember, kissing leads to making children, children," she trilled as she made her way to the dining room.

   I broke away from Laila and tried to keep my face from flooding with color as Mom tossed a wink over her shoulder with a chuckle before disappearing from sight to the kitchen.

  "I was wondering when that was going to happen," Laila sighed, gnawing on her lip.

   I'm pretty sure our faces both resembled a freshly cooked lobster.

"What?" I asked, taking a deep breath.

   "When our moms would start teasing us because we..." she trailed off embarrassedly, adverting her eyes.

  "Made out a few times?" I supplied with a lilting smirk.

"Must you be so crass?" Laila sighed, blushing all over again.

  "Just to see you blush like that, maybe," I chuckled.

Laila gave a scoff and rolled her eyes, walking back down the stairs. Before she could step off the bottom step, I grabbed her hand and turned her back around to face me. 

  "Laila. I'm not going to let anything happen with Maggie while we're in Colorado. You know that, right?" 

  Laila just smiled in response and disappeared down the stairs to the dining room without saying anything.

  I frowned in confusion. 

Well, that was Laila Hayes for you.

   And I did like what I was seeing, in all honesty.

 "Come on, man, I think you have to find at least one thing that's nice," Nick pleaded, running a hand through his already touseled blonde hair.

   I raised an eyebrow, pursing my lips.

"I don't like shopping," I said, taking a leaf out of Laila's book.

  My best friend and I were currently standing in the Men's department in some ridiculously expensive outlet store that my mother insisted on dragging us all to. It'd been nearly forty five minutes since we first got here, and to say that I'd been stubborn was putting it lightly. I'd been making it bloody unbarable for Nick here.

   I can't say that I'm rightly sorry.

"Yes, I know," Nick sighed, pulling an exasperated look. "You've only said that about a hundred times."

  I shrugged, biting back a smirk. "Sorry, sorry. Just felt the need to repeat myself."

Nick rolled his honey colored eyes at me, giving me a withering look.

 "We'd be done a lot faster if you'd just pick something already," Nick continued on in a huffy voice. "I swear, I've never seen anyone turn down so many different outfits before."

  I sighed dramatically, rubbing my temples to try and get rid of my raging headache.

"You know what? Here," Nick said suddenly, grabbing a random shirt and pair of slacks off the shelves. "Try these on and let's be done with it already, okay?"

  I grabbed the clothes with a disgusted look and slouched off to the dressing rooms, muttering obscenities under my breath. Laila hadn't been kidding when she kept muttering that this was going to be God awful on our way here.

   I tried to distract myself, keeping my thoughts anywhere else but on what I was doing, yanking on the itchy formal clothing. Once I was dressed, I glanced at my appearance in the mirror in the dressing room.

  Nick had picked out a simple white dress shirt that didn't seem as bad as I'd first thought. The slacks were nice enough, I supposed, just in a regular black color. Not too formal or too casual for a wedding, I thought.

  But like most times I went shopping (against my will) for clothes, my mother had to examine me thoroughly first. There was just no getting around it. Resistance was futile.

  "Yuck," I mumbled, rubbing my eyes.

Well, it had to be done.

  I dragged myself from the dressing room and went in search for my mother and Nick.

 Nick let out a low whistle when he found me strolling through the rows of clothing.

"Not too shabby, eh?" he said with a chuckle. "You clean up nice."

 I pulled a sarcastic face. "Thanks, man."

 My cell phone started playing some song by The Strokes before I could ask Nick if he'd seen my mother. I yanked my phone out of my pocket with a scowl before opening it.

  "Hello?"

"Justin, where are you?" my mother's dulcet tones floated over the line.

 "Still in the Men's section with Nick," I said dully. "Why?"

"I have something I want to show you," she said, her voice sounding oddly smug.

 I frowned. "What would that be?"

Mom abruptly changed the subject, like she was so good at doing all the time.

 "Did you find something to wear for the wedding?" she demanded, quickly switching to the stern-mother mode.

  I glanced down at my outfit with an appraising look.

"Yeah," I finally said. "I did."

  "Good, well, then come over to the Junior girls section, all right?"

And then Mom hung up on me.

  I sighed as I tucked my cell phone back into my pocket.

"Watch my stuff, will you?" I said to Nick. "My mother's paging me."

Nick laughed, not looking sympathetic in the slightest.

  "Sure, man. Come back in one piece, why don't you?"

"Ha ha ha."

  I wandered my way through the outlet store, trying to ignore the stares that I was getting. Granted, most of the people that were staring at me were teenaged girls, which kind of bugged me. Which was definitely a first.

  I rolled my eyes, thinking of Laila. She'd definitely already changed a lot of things about me.

I found Mom standing beside rows of formal looking dresses in the Juniors section with Jeanine and a thoroughly disgruntled Maggie. Mrs. Petrolas - or should I say Patricia? - was also apart of the group, looking as fashionable and put together as ever with her smooth blonde hair and designer clothing.

  "Well, don't you look daper, Justin," Mrs. Petrolas exclaimed when she caught sight of me.

"Hey, Justin!" Maggie chirped, her mood instantly brightening.

  I hadn't talked to Maggie since Nick's party a few weeks ago. This was pretty much awkward, through and through.

  "Hi," I said flatly.

Mom stepped forward and started tugging at my shirt sleeves, a business like look on her face.

  "It'd be a lot easier shopping for you if you weren't so tall," she muttered with a sigh.

"Not my fault," I said, holding up my hands. "Blame genetics."

   "I blame genetics that you're so gorgeous," Maggie interjected, just loud enough for me to hear her.

I convieniently ignored her.

  Mom pursed her lips, a hardened look coming over her face, before she sighed again.

"Anyways," she said, changing the subject. "There's something I want to show you."

  It was my turn to give a heavy sigh. My interest was caught, though, when Jeanine gave a rather girlish giggle.

   "Believe me," Mom said with a wide smile. "You won't regret this."

"What?" I demanded, now interested.

  I sure hoped that this wasn't going to be a waste of my time.

"Laila," Mom trilled in a sing-song voice, moving towards the girls' dressing room. "Why don't you go ahead and come on out?"

   Behind me, I heard Maggie snort under her breath. I didn't have to be looking at her to know that she'd be rolling her honey colored eyes. I gritted my teeth, trying to keep my composure. It wouldn't do good to snap and start yelling at the unpleasant girl in public as much as I was telling myself otherwise.

  I heard Laila's muffled response from within the dressing room.

"No!"

  I raised an eyebrow and glanced over at Jeanine questioningly. She just shook her head, fighting back a smile.

   This definitely had to be good.

"Laila," Mom repeated, this time more forcefully. "Please come out. I don't know what you're so nervous about."

  "Justin's out there!" Laila called back, her voice high pitched. "That's reason enough to be nervous!"

  I burst out laughing, unable to keep it back.

"Laila, darling, I'm sure you look wonderful," Patricia called, sounding just the slightest bit desperate.

  "Come on, Laila," I said loudly to her. "I promise not to laugh."

Laila grumbled something that I didn't hear - probably some cuss word in Spanish - before she hesitantly made her way to the edge of the dressing room, peeking around the corner.

  "There," she said, her voice nervous. "I'm here."

Mom gave Laila a look. "Step out here, Laila."

  Laila sighed, giving me a shiftly look, before she left the dressing room, taking a few uneasy steps towards the rest of us.

   My eyes widened in surprise and my mouth opened in shock.

    Laila was wearing a pale golden dress - so pale it could actually be described as a light yellow, but not nearly there. The dress was strapless that hugged her curves in the way God intended, showing off her impossibly tiny waist and narrowed hips.

   She was completely and undeniably beautiful with her dark wavy hair cascading down her bare shoulders to the middle of her back.

   I couldn't even believe for a second that I'd been attracted to the blonde haired girl sitting off to the side while I took in the sight of Laila in full view.

   "Sweetheart, you're beautiful," I told her, not even caring that my mom, Jeanine, Patricia, and Maggie were all in the same vicinity, watching us intently.

   Laila flushed, biting her lip, adverting her eyes.

"Thanks," she said, clearly embarrassed.

    "This look right here on my son's face was the test, Laila," Mom said, reaching over to pinch my cheek. "And you've definitely passed."

  Laila turned even more red, if that was possible.

 "So, do you like the dress, Laila?" Jeanine asked her daughter, grinning.

   Laila bit her lip, glancing down at the dress she definitely rocked.

"I guess," she mumbled a moment later. "It's certainly very pretty, isn't it?" 

   Maggie muttered something under her breath that I didn't catch, but made Laila turn as white as a sheet and Patricia shoot her a nasty glare in her daughter's direction.

  "But do you like it?" Mom asked, having enough tact to change the subject quickly.

"Yeah," Laila said. "I do."

  "Great!" Patricia, Mom, and Jeanine all exclaimed in unison, clapping their hands together.

"Then you're definitely getting it," Mom decided, smiling at Laila.

  "Great," Laila muttered, trying to smile, but failing miserably.

I didn't have to be a genius to know what she was thinking about as her eyes flickered over towards Maggie. Sighing heavily, I walked to her side and bent to her level so I could whisper something in her ear.

  "Don't listen to her, sweetheart. You are beautiful."

Laila glanced up at me with a shocked expression, like she couldn't believe what I was saying. I grinned crookedly in response and kissed her cheek.

   I just hoped my cousin Ashleigh would be okay with Laila wearing this dress, because she was definitely outshining every possible girl in this vicinity.

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   So, this was sort of a filler chapter I guess, but there was some excitement to it! D: some people have been asking about what's going to happen with Maggie, so now that that's out of the way, all that's left is to sit back, read, and enjoy! (:

  Thanks so much for all of the reads, votes, comments, and encouragement so far! It means so much! :D