A/N: thank you so much Jules, annabellex2 for reviewing, letting me know you like what I'm doing here : ) I promise there's some excitement to come soon! And I hope these last quick updates have made up so far for my lack of posting in the past months!

The previous chapter contained several mistakes.. I corrected them as best I could.. as ever, sorry if you discover some faults here and there..

Chapter 10

It had to be late afternoon, looking out the window from my bed I saw it was still not dark. I sighed. What a mess was that day. When I'd come home from school I just collapsed on my comforter and the pile of clean clothes that mom had put there sometime during the day for me to put away. But I couldn't think of doing anything other than sleep and cry myself out a little. I so shouldn't have listened.

Or I so should get James to talk to me again. We should have discussed how we were going to behave in school. Of course I hadn't expected him to be instantly friends with me in the open, but I'd kinda hoped he wouldn't come onto me like that. Even if it was behind my back.

On the other hand, I had been so stupid I had made myself believe I could take it. Figures I couldn't. I just couldn't. Now that I'd had a kind of connection with him, it was tough. I wanted to stop caring, to act like it didn't matter. Like other times when I'd been picked on, I just shrugged it off. Whatever James' game was, I might hurt him with my acting like a baby. He's just defending himself.

I remembered him telling me I shouldn't be so caring, so soft. He was right. I always thought of others first. Here I was sitting barely able to stop myself from crying (again), and I was trying to get my shit together for him. Not for myself. Not to protect myself. To protect him. Why did I want to protect that asshole? I knew nothing about him. He'd been nice to me a few times so far. Other than that he was a player. This way or another, he was a player. Whether he had the disguise on in school or at home, he didn't play fair. And so I should listen to him, to Kendall, to my mom, and not want to be nice.

But I couldn't.

Although I'd been raised in a loving family consisting of my mom and myself, I was constantly looking for something nice in every single person I met, and was craving to love, and be loved. And with focusing on those little things I usually managed to blind myself from seeing the real things in those people. The real things, that weren't at all nice.

This time I should just accept it. James was indeed an asshole. A selfish little bastard, loved playing with people, his own father for God's sake, and me, and who knows what else. Just accept it. Don't like him. Don't want to like him. Just move on from this before you give yourself any more ache. I knew that was the right thing to do. But what if the only thing that actually felt right was doing the wrong thing? Then before I could pull apart the -everyone-has-a-little-nice-in-them- curtain that always blocked my ability to realize that people were not always good, James would finish playing his sick game, and I'd be dumped. Heartbroken.

I could avoid that.

If I just didn't let him get to me. Come on Carlos. Be strong this time.

I heard some noise from outside of my room. "He's been in there since he came home. Hope you'll find out what's wrong." Mom said. And Kendall entered.

What was he doing here? I sat up. Staring at the white ceiling wasn't interesting anymore. "Hey there." He sat on top of a few pieces of clothing that I should have put away already. "What's going on?"

"What do you mean, Kendall?"

He laughed. "You suffer from amnesia, huh?" Then he pulled his phone out of his pocket and began tapping on the screen quietly humming a song that I recognized from the night of the concert. I hadn't known that band before, but they were really good. And obviously they were one of Kendall's favorites. I looked at the screen as he held it in front of me. Our text messages. Meet by the lake after school?

Oh shit.

"Yes. Shit." Softly laughing again, Kendall pocketed his phone and slapped my left thigh just a little, telling me that I spoke out loud and hadn't actually realized it. Touchy fucker. My best friend fucker, of course. I smiled. "Now what are you smiling at?"

"I just really love you, you know?"

He grinned so wide I had to laugh. He was not only my touchy fucker of a best friend, but the best person on earth and ever so cute and proud of himself at that moment. "I love you too, but before you'd try to turn this chat some other direction, tell me what happened?" As I realized I wasn't going to be able to escape this, I sighed. "When you didn't come out I knew there was something up. So tell me now what it is before I'll have to pay a visit to a couple of my friends in your school to find out."

"Damn." Feeling a little cornered I pushed him away a little, but he wouldn't let go so easily. "It was just ... a bad day."

"You really think you're getting away with that?"

"No, I don't." I knew I wasn't going to. But a boy could try, yes?

"When did we start keeping things from each other?" I kinda wanted to answer that we didn't do that. But I actually had been keeping things from him, and as much as I hated it, I didn't want Kendall to cause James trouble.

So I had to say something. Give him a hint. "Fine. I'm sorry. I just don't want you to worry about me all the time. You've got your own things. But,..." I couldn't help but pause a little. Kendall patiently waited. "There's a kid ... he's been nice to me lately, but I don't really know whether he's just fooling me."

Watching Kendall deeply thinking and eying me suspiciously (he was so good at that one), I wondered if he'd put the pieces together and now was actually making different plans about how to finish off James. "Carlos." A pause, length of a breath-take, then he went on. "Don't even try to lie to me because I know you. I can see if you're making up something. Tell me the honest answer to what I'll ask or do not say anything."

"Come on, that's a trap." I tried to ease the mood a little. No success there. No visible. But I knew he was holding back a grin, because I knew him too and he knew that. He was aware that I figured out his thinking, just as well as he had figured mine. If I lied he'd know. If I kept quiet he'd know that what he had assumed was true. Either way he'd win. Just as I'd said before. Fucker.

"That kid. It's James, isn't it?" I did not make a sound. Instead I lowered my head. Kendall got the answer he needed. "I'm going to kill him." Ever so casually he announced.

"No, you're not!" I had no choice but put my hands on his shoulders and look him in the eye again. "I know that .. it's terrible I kept it from you, okay? But this is what I wanted to avoid. I'm sorry that you're hurt by my stupidity, but you have your own things and I ... I was trying to sort it out by myself. And I still am, actually. We've barely known each other and it's still such a long way to go. I don't want to take sides way too early, you know? I am trying to give him a chance."

"You didn't want to worry me?" His hurtful expression wouldn't go away. I hated to see him like that. I hated myself for causing him this. "What are friends for, Carlos? To help each other! You could have at least asked for my opinion on this, or anything like that, but don't be so secretive. If not else, you need to talk about these things with someone and hello, I'm always here for you! Didn't you realize?"

"I did." I murmured. "I really did. I just don't want to be a baby. Want to do it on my own. And you're not any more different, you know that, right?"

"What?" I surprised him. Good.

"Come on, Kendall! Tell me about Logan! What's going on there?" He instantly freed himself from me. "Oh no. You didn't let me get away, I won't let you do this. Tell me!" I punched his shoulder.

One of his hands lay on the shoulder I'd hit. He stroked it strongly. Uh. Obviously I'd gotten better at that. He used to always tease me about my hitting like a damned girl. "I .. don't.."

"You don't what?"

He shook his head. "I didn't want to worry you." Then our eyes met, and we grinned. "We're something. Aren't we?"

Smiling softly at my best friend I pushed him down on my bed. We lay across clothes and everything and stared at the ceiling. Like the answers to our questions were written there, we'd always do this if we weren't by the lake. Kendall didn't like the pressure of someone staring at him when he spoke from the heart, and I understood that. So we had this thing. Just looking at the ceiling got him open up, usually. I'd discovered that thing when he was in love the first time. He'd not wanted to tell me about it, for all the money in the world he kept quiet. But one afternoon it was terribly raining outside and we had to cancel our meeting at our secret place. Having stuck in my room we pretended the ceiling was the sky as we were flat on our backs on my bed.

The situation was similar. Except now half an hour passed without a word being said out loud. I know in my mind the wheels were spinning on the highest speed, and I could only imagine Kendall had the same thing going on. So I turned my head and for a minute I watched him blankly looking up. "I'm not gonna push it. If you're not ready to talk about it, fine. Don't. Just know that I'm here, always." I said. When his eyes came to meet mine, I winked.

"Thanks, Carlos." His voice was low. "What am I going to do with your stepbrother though?"

"Just leave it all to me, okay?"

"For a while yes. But I see you like this a couple more times and I'll give him a piece of my fist."

"I bet you will."

When I had arrived home that afternoon I thought I was going to be all alone. Funny how fast things change. I had to remind myself that Kendall wouldn't leave me alone.

Little did I know ...