Bonus Chapter 2 | Chapter 8 (in Kayden's POV

Kayden

Son of a bitch!

I rolled over on my back and stared at the ceiling. There was no point of even trying to sleep. Not even the darkness that flooded the room could allow me a second of peace. I could still see it. The torment in her glossy eyes. There was nothing I could do but watch her and wonder why she was upset.

Questions rattled around in my head. Was it me? Was it Angela? Was she jealous of us? None of those made sense. I didn't do anything. Angela was with me the whole night so I knew she didn't do or say anything either. And, of course she wasn't jealous. I needed to get it out of my head that she felt the same way because the odds were against it.

Ever since everything happened, I felt particularly overprotective of Bella. Seeing her hurt broke my heart. Physically or even emotionally. The rest of my life was devoted to making sure nothing bad ever happened to her again. With my eyes fluttering closed, I finally managed to get a couple hours of shut-eye.

The room was much brighter the next time I opened my eyes and the sound of my parents talking could be heard from all the way up here. Even in my barely-awake state, I knew it was mom who opened my curtains to torture me with the natural sunlight seeping through the windows.

It was a long shot, but I rolled over on my stomach in hopes that I would eventually fall back to sleep. Pointless. All I got were more sheet marks on my arms. There was a knock at my door but I chose to disregard it and snuggle with my sheets and blanket. My sister identified herself when she cleared her throat.

"Go away!" I mumbled against my pillow.

She cleared her throat louder. Little to no seconds passed before she invited herself into my room and jumped on my bed, using all her might to roll me over. My fingers were white-knuckling the edge of the headboard to keep me steady on the bed. The exhaustion was too hard to ignore. Only to pacify her did I willingly twist my body to face her.

"What happened last night?" Her tone left no room for arguing. It was either I answered her or she beat me with a baseball bat until I spilled my guts.

"What makes you think that something happened last night?"

"Well, for one, you were mumbling to yourself when you came home and you were short with mom when she asked you what was wrong."

Trying to deny it would be pointless. My sister knew me so well, she could read me like a book. The problem was, I didn't know what happened. That was exactly what I told her. How Bella started crying out of the blue and stormed out of the house. Zach tried to talk to her but she kept walking away.

"What did you do?" Jackie was quick to accuse with her hands on her hips and her glare fixated on me.

My brows furrowed. "What the hell do you mean 'what did you do'?"

"What did you do?" She repeated, this time pausing between each word for emphasis. I chuckled at her attempt at being a badass and waited for her facade to break. Jackie couldn't maintain her glare for much longer. Her lips twitched into a grin and a giggle broke free. It was cute when she tried to act tough but the truth was, she was a harmless teddy bear.

"I didn't do anything. She just—" The words froze on my tongue.

"She just what?"

I sighed. "I'm in love with Bella." The confession came out of my mouth before my brain could stop it. Looking into Jackie's eyes, they didn't show anything. Her mouth didn't fall agape. It remained clamped shut. She was looking at me like she was waiting for more. Suddenly, her face lit up in realization.

"Ah, I see." Jackie made a whole show of readjusting her hoodie's collar and clearing her throat. She inhaled a fake-sounding gasp, putting her hand on her heart. "You? In love with little ol' Bella? Boy, I did not see this coming. I am... shooketh."

"You knew?"

"Oh, for the love of God! The neighbors' dogs knew of your not-so-secret crush!"

"How did—when did—"

"When she gave you your present at your thirteenth birthday party, you were like," she wore a bright smile with her fingers intertwined behind her back. She tilted her head to the side. "For me? Thank—you're—you're the—you're... hehehe."

Blood rushed to my cheeks at the humiliating memory. Thankfully, Bella had already walked away before noticing my awkwardness but the fact remained. That was among the most embarrassing moments of my life. Leave it to my sister to never let me live that down.

"You're lucky she walked away and started talking with me. She was completely oblivious to your stupidity."

My fingers weaved through my hair in frustration. I was going crazy wondering if she was okay. Unless it really was her period that amplified her emotions like Zach said. However, there was something in my gut that told me it was something deeper. "All I know is that... I need to make sure she's okay. Otherwise, I'll go insane."

That was all it took to blow out the flicker of mockery dancing in her eyes seconds before. Suddenly, she appeared unsettled. It wasn't often we had brother-sister heart to hearts like this and clearly, this didn't sit well with her. She shook it off and fully sat on my bed with her legs crossed. "What are you gonna do about it?"

-

Hours later, I found myself pacing back and forth on Bella's front porch. Now that I was here, I began to think that I shouldn't be doing this. Perhaps she needed space and didn't feel like talking about it.

After sending numerous texts to Jackie, who was waiting in the car, I realized it was too late to go back. We were already here. I might as well go through with this. Before I could talk myself out of this, I rang the doorbell and stood with my hands behind my back.

Bella answered the door with a blanket wrapped around her body and her white sweatshirt underneath. Her hair was a frizzy mess and the blend of blues and grays in her eyes mesmerized me. Even though she was in comfy clothes, she looked sexy. She was comfortably beautiful.

"Kayden? What are you doing here?"

For a second, it looked like she was checking me out. Just thinking about that elicited a red hue to creep up my face and neck. I hated what she was doing to me. She was turning me into a man who melted at every little thing she did.

"I wanted to check in on you after what happened at game night the other night."

She waved me off. "That was just... nothing. It was nothing. Zach and I already talked it out and I feel better now."

A weird feeling stirred in the pit of my stomach. It felt like jealousy. That she reached out to Zach and talked it out with him instead of me. But I had to understand. They were a lot closer than she and I will ever be.

"Oh." My hand reached to massage the back of my neck. "Was it because I invited Angela over to the game night?"

Bella's hesitance gave me my answer. She weakly nodded. "I mean, Olive had been in our group longer, right? So... I don't know. I was just... uncomfortable seeing... Angela there. I'm sorry."

"No, no, no. Don't be. If anything, it should be me that's sorry. I shouldn't have invited her. I only just started dating her so she shouldn't be a part of the group yet." It was hard to argue with that. Olive wormed her way into our group freshman year and the four of us have been a tight-knit group ever since.

It wouldn't be a game night without her. It would, however, be one without Angela. I didn't even like her like that. She was too clingy and too into public displays of affection. She was a great girl. Just not someone I'd want as my girlfriend.

"Yeah," she chuckled. "Exactly."

I needed to see her happy again and with her laugh that made me feel weak at the knees bursting through her lips. "How about a do-over game night tonight? Without Angela. I promise, it'll be a lot more fun."

There it was. The smile I had been waiting for for approximately twenty-four hours touched her lips and an incredible weight slipped away from my chest. Bella nodded. "Yeah, that sounds like fun."

"Perfect! I—" My arms were spread out as if I was going to hug her but I froze. Did she want me to hug her? Was this something that a guy did to his best friend's girl best friend? No. But then again, having an irrevocable crush on your best friend's girl best friend wasn't something one would do either. Yet, here I was.

I crashed back down to Earth only to realize my arms remained frozen in mid-air, Bella's brow raised. An awkward chuckle released itself from my lips while another blush was taking over my cheeks. I held up my hand which she slapped in a high five and spun on my heel, taking long steps toward the car.

"A high five? Really? You big dumb idiot," I mumbled to myself. The second I climbed back inside the driver's seat, Jackie's eyes were burning a hole in my cheek. Her scrutiny was making me squirm as I slouched against the chair. I yearned for the ground to split open and swallow me whole. "You're gonna say things now, are you?"

"That high five was pathetic." She didn't waste time to bring me down when I already felt foolish.

"I know!"

-

AUTHOR'S NOTE-

Surprise (again!)

I guess it's not really a surprise since I announced one more new bonus chapter in the previous chapter. But what the chapter was about was a surprise! I thought it'd be cool to add a little bit more about his relationship with his sister.