A/N Hey, here is chapter 7, sorry for chapter 6 but it had to happen, I have this all planned out (kinda) so here ya go guys and gals. A song that I recommend for this chapter is Trouble by Coldplay. I'll talk more after the chapter :) -boundless
Chapter 7
She knew she had to stay alive for eight more days until Alex left, it was for the brunette's sake, but after that time was up... Piper didn't need an answer to something she already knew. She would be dead in nine days.
Alex's POV
Alex heard Piper close the door to the guest bedroom and she laid down on her bed in confusion. She had just told Piper that she would leave once she had finished recovering and the blonde seemed...frustrated? Alex thought that the sooner she got out of Piper's hair, the better. She didn't want to put Piper at risk of being hurt as well.
Alex was trying to convince herself that she had done the right thing but she heard the bathroom door to Piper's bathroom open and then close again. Alex wanted nothing more than to get out of bed and stop Piper from hurting herself but she just sat on her bed, wondering if it was something she had said. Alex blamed herself for most things. She couldn't help but feel that everyone she had ever cared about ended up getting hurt and it was all her fault. All she could see was Piper's tears as she remembered the last time she felt this way.
xxx
Alex walked home from work after school and was looking forward to finally spending some time with her mum. She turned the corner to their home and entered the house knowing that Diane would be waiting for her in the lounge/kitchen room on the couch. She walked inside and dumped her bag on the floor. Alex looked up and expected to see her mother coming in for a hug but instead, she was greeted with a note on the empty couch:
Hey Al,
There are some leftovers in the fridge. Sorry for not being here with you but I had to work a night shift tonight, I promise that in the morning we can do something together.
Love you
xx
Mum
Alex put the note down and leant against the edge of the couch. She knew that they needed the money so she wasn't mad at Diane for staying at work late, instead of sitting on the couch she headed towards the fridge and texted John now that her night was free.
Alex:
Hey, my night's free. You wanna hang out?
Alex opened the fridge and put the leftovers in the microwave. After the food had heated up, Alex walked back over to the couch and sat down, turning on the television as she made her way. She ate her food then cleaned up after herself. Alex checked her phone and realised that John hadn't responded to her text. It had been 45 minutes.
Alex, now slightly frazzled, texted John again.
Alex:
Hey man, are you free or are you asleep?
Alex got into her pyjamas and checked her phone but, again, there was no reply. She knew this was weird. John always replied to her messages immediately and he went to sleep late so he was almost always free to hang out. Alex phoned him but it went to answer-phone so she left a message "Hey John, just seeing if you're ok. Please call me back when you get this."
Now, don't get this confused as Alex being a worrier. Alex didn't have time to worry. She was always busy with her mum, job, or friends and she felt that getting stressed out over things was a waste of time. So when Alex is worried, you should be too.
She ran into her bedroom and put her shoes on. It had been five minutes since she had left the message and she knew that something was wrong, she was freaking out. Alex wrote a quick message to her mum and stuck it to the fridge with a magnet. Alex then rushed out of the door and into the night.
She jumped the fence separating their houses and climbed up the wall of John's home. Once she got to his window Alex opened it up and slipped inside. Alex knew that if John really was asleep, he wouldn't mind her going into his bedroom to check on him, she had done it many times before, so she turned on the lights in the room with no hesitation.
After looking around the room, Alex had come to a conclusion. John wasn't there.
As much as Alex wanted to run out into the night and look for him, she knew that the right thing to do was check on his parents to see if they were in the house. For all she knew, they could all be out to dinner.
So Alex walked down the hallway and into John's parents' bedroom, expecting for no one to be in there. Only, Alex walked into the room and saw that Mary and Joel Thomas were fast asleep. Panicking, Alex turned on the light to wake them up.
"Alex? What are you doing here?"
Mary looked at Alex with confusion written all over her face.
"I can't find John, he's not answering any of my calls and he's not in his bedroom"
Mary woke up Joel and Alex left the room to allow them to put on clothes other than pyjamas. Once they were out of the room, Alex followed them to John's bedroom where, after a second look, they could confirm that he was not there.
"John! Sweetie!" Mary started to call out for John as they looked around the rest of the house.
Joel checked all of the downstairs rooms and the bathrooms but he still could not find his son. "Alex, is there a party going on tonight that John might be at?"
Alex thought for a second "No, sir. Not that I'm aware of, and he would have told me if he was going" Alex couldn't think of a time when John didn't tell her something. Everything was slowly making her more worried about her best friend. "I'm going to check the park out back, he used to go into the trees when he was feeling low."
"Okay, Alex. We'll meet up with you in a moment, I just want to double check everything" Mary went outside with Alex and just like that, the brunette was running again.
Alex ran out to the back of the park. There was the entrance to the small woods in their neighbourhood where she and John would go and explore when they were bored or just wanted to be by themselves. Alex knew that if John was anywhere, he would be here.
She went through the branches and ran the familiar ground as she raced towards the tree that she and John would frequent.
As she got closer she realised something was wrong, the braches on the ground were all broken and the closer she got to the tree, the more devastated the ground was. Alex got to the large pine and saw the top of John's head around the other side of the tree.
"John! We've been looking all over for you!"
Alex went to get her friend but when she looked at him, a bit of her happiness died inside of her. For Alex was staring back at John's cold, dead, eyes."
xxx
Alex recalled the memory with tears and shudders. She didn't want Piper to face the same fate so Alex convinced herself that by leaving she was doing the best thing for the blonde.
So, Alex went to sleep and dreamt of the night she found John dead. Except when she looked into his eyes, they were Piper's.
In the morning, Alex woke up from her bad sleep to the sound of Piper getting up. There was a grunt and then the shuffling of feet across the carpet as Alex listened to Piper rising. Alex waited for around five minutes until she heard Piper's feet come to the outside of the guest bedroom door and the knocking of her knuckles on the wood of the door.
"Come in"
Piper opened the door and came over to Alex's side to help her out of the bed. "I figured since you want to be fit enough to leave soon, we should probably work on some more physical therapy"
Alex nodded in agreement, noticing the strained tone of Piper's voice when she talked about Alex leaving.
Piper helped the brunette out of bed and together they started to walk down the hallway and the stairs, if Alex had been paying more attention instead of being lost in her thoughts, she would have noticed the banister she walked into at the bottom of the stairs. So, Piper and Alex fell over, landing together on the floor. Alex was splayed over top of Piper and they were face to face. Noses only a centimetre apart.
Alex looked down into Piper's eyes and only realised now how blue they were. She had small freckles on her nose and cheeks, the structure of her face was also strong yet gentle. Alex could've looked into those eyes forever if she hadn't been interrupted.
"Alex, can you get off of me please?"
The brunette blushed and realised how much of an idiot she must have seemed like. Alex rolled off of Piper and onto the floor, sitting up as she reached the ground. "Sorry about that, Pipes"
"It's Piper, and don't worry about it. Are you hurt?"
Alex noticed Piper's reaction to the nickname and wondered why she was only being negative towards it now when she had no problem with it earlier. "I'm fine, thanks. What about you?"
"Yeah," Piper looked at Alex "I'm fine".
Alex felt chills run down her spine from the distant and cold voice Piper used. She thought that Piper might've just had a rough night and didn't think too much of it, she just hoped that it wasn't because of her.
Piper helped Alex off of the floor and to the dining table. What ensued was probably the most awkward breakfast Alex had ever endured.
After breakfast, Alex was sitting on the couch reading an old magazine she had found when Piper came into the room and sat down next to her. Alex looked up from the article she was reading (5 ways to get rid of that pesky belly fat!) and looked at Piper instead.
"Hey"
"Hey"
They maintained eye contact for a few uncomfortable seconds until Piper finally said something. "I figured that we should probably start on your physical therapy today considering you'll be leaving soon".
Alex did not miss the emphasis on the word 'leaving' and decided she wanted to know why Piper was acting so scratchy today. So Alex looks into the blonde's eyes intending to ask her what was wrong but those blue irises said it all. Piper was upset about Alex leaving. The brunette tried to figure out why.
Alex thought back to the times that Piper had quietly mentioned about no one visiting her, how she knew that Piper hurt herself, the book of notes she had found in the shed. Alex realised how lonely Piper must be and felt some guilt seeping into her veins. Piper only wanted a friend. Alex wanted to stop the guilt she was feeling so she tried to convince herself that she was leaving for Piper's safety. When this didn't work she voiced her thoughts out loud.
"Piper, these people that are looking for me, they're dangerous and-"
"Alex, I understand"
"But-"
"No. I don't want to talk about this right now"
Alex sat still, not knowing what to do, so for the rest of the day an awkward atmosphere remained.
The next day had the same tense atmosphere so when Alex sat down to have lunch she prepared herself for a truly uncomfortable meal. Alex though, was surprised when Piper decided to start a conversation.
"Why did you leave the cartel?"
Alex looked up from her meal, in shock that Piper wanted to start the weighty talk. "I left because it was too dangerous to stay"
"Can you elaborate?"
"Why?"
Piper looked at her with no clear emotion on her face "Because, being in a cartel is always dangerous, why did you leave then instead of earlier?"
The brunette let out a breath before telling Piper something she had told no one before "Okay Piper, I'm going to tell you everything, but if you want me to stop at any point, let me know." She closed her eyes, preparing to tell the whole truth.
"If you were someone looking in from the cartel from the outside, you would assume that we were stronger than ever before and almost impossible to take down. From the inside, it was a different story. The king-pin, Kubra, was running all of our mules to exhaustion and I was working 20 hours a day with no breaks except for when I was asleep. Piper, Kubra was trying to make us seem stronger than what we really were because another cartel was looking at taking us down. In the end, that wasn't the reason for our downfall.
It was the night before I left. I was in a warehouse meeting room with all of the main importers, the hitmen, and Kubra when everything really went to pieces. He was yelling at us about increasing sales when a mule came running into the room shouting about cops driving in for a bust.
We might have gotten out alright if Kubra wasn't so tightly wound from the stress of competition. He ordered for us to shoot the police down as they entered the warehouse, I got scared and grabbed one of the suitcases of money while running behind a crate as the police crashed down the doors. I heard shots and shouting from both sides so I tried to sprint for the back door, I turned around for one last glance and saw most of the cartel dead on the ground, Kubra included. So I ran away and never looked back, knowing that they would be following me closely."
Alex looked at Piper, trying to grasp her reaction and was met with a face of confusion. "I'm sorry that I've brought you into this Pipes."
Piper didn't say anything, she just kept looking into Alex's eyes.
"Did you say you saw them get shot?"
"Yes"
Piper shook her head and laughed "Al if they're dead then they can't be coming for you!"
"Piper, you don't understand" Alex couldn't believe Piper's reaction "They are powerful even now, I have no doubt that Kubra has sent someone to kill me."
"Alex, listen to me." Piper put her hands on the side of Alex's face and pulled her closer "Kubra is dead"
Alex shook her head and repeated herself. Piper let go and must have realised that Alex wanted to change the subject so they sat in silence for a few moments.
"Thank you for telling me."
Alex looked back up and saw Piper staring back at her with her beautiful blue eyes. She felt a soft pang in her chest as she stared back at the blonde and decided to laugh away the feeling with a small chuckle. "Do you want to tell me anything now?"
Piper scrunched her nose and closed her eyes, Alex couldn't help but think about how cute she was when she did this.
"What do you want to know?"
"Who is Polly?". Alex didn't want to beat around the bush. She wanted to know what was happening in Piper's life and thought it was only fair she told her this after Alex admitted about the cartel.
"She is.. was my best friend."
"Was?"
Piper sighed "I found out that when I was in a relationship with Larry, my ex, they had been having an affair with each other".
Alex was taken aback, she knew that Polly had done something to upset Piper, but didn't realise the extent of it. She was about to add something when Piper continued talking.
"I wouldn't have even been that mad if it was only that, but it started right after Larry proposed to me."
All Alex could say was "Why?".
Piper sighed and the brunette noticed tears forming in her eyes. "We found out that I was pregnant before he proposed so he wanted to get married before the baby came. I think he must've felt that he was going to be tied down so he started the affair with Polly. He broke up with me and left for her when I miscarried."
Alex didn't realise that there was so much that had happened to the blonde in such a small amount of time. Alex got up and hugged Piper. She wanted to somehow let the blonde know that she was here for her, even if it was going to be temporary.
After a while, they both started to cry. Piper was shaking in Alex's arms and Alex had tears flowing down her face onto Piper's shoulder. They just held each other, knowing that they both needed some consoling after what they had been through. Alex couldn't help but feel safe in Piper's arms. Her small affection for the blonde was slowly growing but at the moment, she didn't feel any need to fear that thought.
When they pulled apart they both promised to be more open about what was really going on, for their own sake.
Alex wanted to be there for Piper as long as she was around.
A/N So, I'm sorry for the long wait, I'll talk briefly about soon but firstly, thank you for being patient. This chapter definitely isn't my best work but I did want to get it out as soon as I could (you can probably tell that option B won). :)
I'll make this brief but I just wanted to give you an idea of what I've got on.
I am still in High School and internals are really getting to me, but I'm also taking an advanced course outside of school. As well as that I'm in a band and we're practising for another internal. I've also been dealing with my poor mental health (a small inspiration for this story) so I haven't had a lot of time to write this story.
I just want to say thank you for sticking with me through this :)
I don't know when the next chapter will come out but it definitely will! This story is far from over so please stick around for it, I think you'll like how it ends (or you'll hate me, each to their own).
Anyways, I'll see you around and PLEASE remember to review, it helps me know what is working and what is not. I'm trying to make sure that you enjoy reading this!
-boundless