Katie Knight was many things; conniving, resourceful, ambitious, exploitative.
But the one thing you could never call her was careless. Especially when it came to family.
As soon as she had received the news, she had immediately bolted from the room, dragging her mother with her as they made a bee-line for Rocque Records.
Her mind was spinning with thoughts of her brother and the guys and how this news was about to affect them, they had only been in LA for a few months and this was about to change everything.
If Katie knew Kendall like she thought she did, then there was about to be a lot of yelling, crying and possibly even some punches thrown. And once that happened, there would be no stopping him from taking off, everyone knew that.
She glanced over at her mother, her eyebrows furrowing as she observed her mother's death grip on the steering wheel and a look of intense worry on her face. Katie knew that she was only holding everything in out of concern for her children, which meant that she would inevitably snap and let everything out.
Katie needed to make sure that the explosion didn't happen in a public arena, hence why she reached over and placed a hand over her mother's gently, "Mom ... it's going to be okay, she'll make it out of this. You know she will" She explained to her mother softly, careful not to spook the woman.
Jennifer Knight took a deep breath as she glanced over at her youngest child, her heart swelling at the amount of love and adoration that she had for both of her children. She knew that Katie was aware of how this accident would affect her brother and she felt overwhelmed by the inevitable hurt and pain that would be felt by not only her two biological children, but also the three other boys who were currently under her care.
They were all still so young and so full of hopes and dreams and desires, too young to have to deal with an accident such as this. Her heart was already breaking for her eldest child and she hadn't even broken the news to him yet. It was taking all of her strength and courage to not openly express the complex levels of emotions that she was currently feeling.
"You know he still loves her, right mom? This is going to kill him" Katie spoke softly, uttering the words that both of the Knight women were already thinking. No matter how hard Kendall might be trying to fool himself, everybody was still very much aware of the fact that Kendall was nowhere near over her, and this wasn't going to help that at all. If anything, this would exacerbate the already tense environment they were all forced to endure.
"I know, honey. We all do. Just be prepare, okay? Because Kendall will probably not take this well and he might lash out at someone" Mrs. Knight warned her daughter of the very thing that Katie had been thinking of earlier. "His desperate attempts to push her out of his mind will only have made the situation worse, and he'll probably start to blame himself. I don't want to scare you, but this is not going to be pretty" She glanced at her daughter warily.
Katie nodded thoughtfully, "Maybe this will be good for him. He needs to deal with this and her and everything that he's feeling before he can move on" She said softly as her mother hastily pulled up in front of a spot in front of Rocque Records. They both exited the car quickly, hurrying towards the building as they began to prepare themselves for the confrontation which they were about to face.
"In the middle of a perfect day,
I'm tripping over words to say
Cause I don't want to keep you guessing
But I always end up getting stuck, stuck
And I'm never giving up, up"The boys of Big Time Rush let out a cheer and began high-fiving as they wrapped up another song for their first album, earning a predictable eye-roll from their hot-tempered producer Gustavo Rocque.
"Dogs! Stop celebrating after ever single recording! You're getting on my last nerve!" he shouted through the speaker, making all of the boys clutch their ears at the loud intrusion of sound - something which made the producer cackle with glee.
Beside him, Kelly Wainwright rolled her eyes, whacking Gustavo on the shoulder "Why can't you ever thank them? You never give them any sign of gratitude for all of their hard work!" she scolded him, earning a glare from her boss as he began to open his mouth.
"Kelly-" he began what was sure to be a riveting lecture, but was cut off by the sound of the studio door swinging open abruptly - causing the duo to spin around and face the remaining members of the Knight family.
"Mrs. Kendall's mom, we're in the middle of a recording session" he began, once again being cut off at the look on Jennifer and Katie's faces, the ever-loud producer was eerily quiet as Kendall and the boys emerged from the booth with confused looks upon their faces.
"Mom? Katie? What are you guys doing here?" Her eldest child asked in bewilderment, the three boys behind him echoing the sentiment with similar looks of confusion on their faces. It wasn't like Mrs. Knight to interrupt a session with Gustavo, unless it was absolute necessary for her to do so.
"Kendall, honey, something's happened. You might want to sit down before I explain the rest. All of you need to hear this" She explained softly, her eyes flitting over the group of boys with a deeply sympathetic expression on her face.
"Sit down? No, mom, just tell me what's going on! You're starting to freak me out" He exclaimed, his hands curled up tightly beside his hips. His band mates shared a look of concern as they all stepped forward marginally, they had only seen him like this on a handful of occasions, and they had never seen Katie look as worried as she did right at that moment in time.
Katie knew that her mother was struggling to get the words out of her mouth, her hand squeezing Katie's tightly as a silent plea for assistance. She would never explicitly ask for the help, but Katie knew that she couldn't do this alone, and that she was going to have to be the one to hold the family up for the duration of this.
She stepped in front of her mouth protectively, looking up at her older brother sorrowfully, "Kendall!" she exclaimed, before softening her tone, "It's Pippa. There's been an accident" she explained gently, watching him carefully for his reaction.
She wasn't prepared for Kendall to fall to his knee's, his entire face crumbling as he absorbed his little sister's words. Logan stepped forward to his best friend's side, his hand settling onto Kendall's shoulder, "What accident? Katie, what's going on? What happened to Pippa?" he questioned her, struggling to keep himself together.
That was the thing that nobody had ever managed to grasp before. Pippa may have been Kendall's, but she was one of them - their fifth amigo. Losing her had been almost as hard on them as it had been on Kendall. Almost.
"I don't know the full story, all I know was that she was in the car with Jesse and they got hit. Her parents don't know what to do or how to handle it" Katie explained to the best of her abilities, searching for some way to help her brother and his friends.
Jennifer stepped around them and knelt down beside Kendall, placing her hand on top of his gently, "Honey, I know how hard this has been for you. But I think you need to go. She needs you right now" She glanced up at the rest of her son's friends, "She needs all of you to be there for her."
"Woah wait one second, who is this Pippa girl? And why haven't I heard of her before?" Gustavo's rough voice broke back into the conversation.
"Pippa is our best friend" James explained quietly, the gentlest that anyone had ever heard him be, "And she used to be Kendall's girlfriend. She broke up with him so that he could come out here without having to worry about her" he continued, his words seeming to break Kendall out of his state of shock.
He pushed himself up to his feet and glanced at his family and friends cautiously. "Mom's right. We need to get home, I don't care if we fly, drive, we can ride for all I care. But we need to get there. Now." he rushed out, his words jumbling together as he received nods of approval from his friends, matching looks of concern and agreement on their faces.
"It will be sorted by the time you get to the airport, just take care of yourselves and let me know when everything calms down" Kelly piped up, practically pushing all of them out of the door as she set about organizing their plane tickets and what-not.
Kendall's attentiveness slipped in and out as he stared out of the window of his mother's car, his mind spinning as he thought of all the possible outcomes of the accident. They had left things on such a bad note and what if he never had the opportunity to fix it?
Piper had been the most important person in his world for a long time, spending the past few months without her there had been absolutely excruciating for him.
Amongst all the memories which were floating around in his head, the one that stood out the most was the day that they met.