Midnight:

Chapter 9:

May 15th

Charleston, South Carolina

3 PM

"Wake up!" Marta called from the doorway of John's room, chucking the pillow that she had in her hand at him.

John groaned, feeling the pillow hit him. They had rolled in around four in the morning and he wasn't sure how Marta was up and ready to get going on the day. "Seriously?" He sat up, letting out a small sigh as he brought his hand up to try and smooth out his hair.

"What? We made a plan in the car and you'll never get them done if you're laying around in bed all day."

"Fine, fine. Let me get dressed and we can talk about it at least."

Marta grinned. "Good. Meet me downstairs in the kitchen in fifteen minutes."

Laurens Kitchen

3:30

John finally had dressed, or as much as it was to just pull a sweatshirt and a pair of sweatpants where. Marta was sitting at the table in the kitchen on her laptop, typing away. He walked over to the cupboard, getting a glass and filled it up with water before making his way over to where Marta was sitting at the table.

She looked up as John sat down at the table with a glass of water. "So," Marta began as she glanced over at him. "Yesterday we made a plan on the way home."

"Yes, I know I was there in the car."

Marta rolled her eyes before shaking her head. "Well, the first thing I wanted you to do was to start a conversation with him again. I have one of his social media profiles pulled up or you can choose to text him since you have his number."

John's lips pursed for a moment or two as he pulled his phone out his phone. A couple of clicks and he had the texts to and from Alexander pulled up and staring at them. "John?" Marta asked after a moment or two. She reached out and placed her hand on his shoulder.

"What?"

"Text him."

"Fine, fine."

With shaky fingers, John began typing, deleting, and typing again. He knew it didn't have to be perfect but with the way things were left he needed to at least talk to Alexander, explain everything or at least he hoped he would listen to him.

Finally settling on the message to send him; Hey, can we talk?

Marta blinked as she watched her brother. "So?"

Before he could answer his phone buzzed and he glanced down seeing a new message from Alexander light up the screen: Yeah, alright, call me.

"He wants me to call him."

"Well, what are you waiting for, go ahead and call him."

New York

Mulligan's Apartment

3:45

Alexander stared at the phone in his hand. Hercules was out with Elizabeth, leaving him alone in the apartment. His phone going off in his hand as John was calling him. They hadn't properly talked until John had told him, told him the truth.

"Hello?" He asked the phone, gripping the throw pillow that was on the couch next to him tightly.

"Hey."

John's voice was a nice thing to hear, even after the second half of the semester and the rocky strain that the two of them where going through. "You wanted to talk?"

A small pause before John answered. "Yeah, please, I need to explain everything to you. Please at least give me that."

Alexander stared down at the floor as his free hand began picking at the pillow that was next to him. "I'm listening."

"I told you I was engaged, and my fiancée is pregnant but you left before I could tell you more than that."

Alexander rose an eyebrow. "Is there more to it than that? It seems pretty concrete to me."

John let out a sigh on the other end. "Fine, no I get it, but please here me out. First off, I'm gay. Second off, this is such a mess and we have been dating since high school no thanks to our families being close."

Alexander sat there, listening to John and letting him explain everything before speaking once again. "You know, it was still a pretty shitty thing to do."

John was silent for a long moment before sighing. "I know and I'm sorry."

Alexander let out a soft sigh. "Well, thank you for telling me everything."

"Of course."

There was a moment of silence before Alexander spoke again. "I…can I call you another time?"

"Sure, yeah, that sounds good."

"Bye."

"Bye."

Laurens Kitchen

4:05

Marta watched as John hung up the phone, hopeful smile on her face. "That sounded like it went well."

John shrugged his shoulders as he stared at his phone for a long moment before looking over at his sister. "I suppose so."

Before anything else could be said, Henry came into the kitchen, coming over to where Marta and John were sitting. "Good to see you both up, you got home late last night."

"It's a long drive," John shrugged as he shoved his phone back into his pocket as he looked up at his father after a moment or two. "You're home early."

Henry shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I was meeting with the Manning's. If you had been up you could have come with me."

John arched an eyebrow as his gaze followed his farther as the man made his way over to the fridge and began getting things out to start dinner. "Why? Why were you meeting."

Henry pulled out a carton of milk before glancing back over at John. "They want to move up the wedding."

Marta and John both glanced at each other after a moment or two and John pushed himself up out of the chair, moving over to where the island in the kitchen was. "I thought it was in August."

"No, it's going to be at the end of June."

"You couldn't have asked me first before you moved it up?" Before his father could say anything, John turned and stormed out of the kitchen before heading back up stairs to his room, slamming the door shut behind him.

He threw himself on the bed before hearing another knock on the door. "Go away, Marta."

The door opened and John pushed himself up, seeing his father standing there, eyebrow raised. "You want to explain what that was about?"

John winced a bit. He knew he shouldn't have stormed out and gotten angry like he did. He should have explained to his father what was making him feel uneasy about everything. "Sorry, I'm just tired."

It was a reasonable explanation or so he thought.

Henry nodded from where he stood. "Well, you know they want to move it up so it's before she's due, right?"

John wanted to roll his eyes but just let out a small sigh. "Alright, alright."

"They're coming over next week for a dinner so we can get some last-minute details for the wedding done."

John was silent for a long moment. "I have a question."

"Yes?"

"I know it's mainly family, but I have four guests I want to invite to the wedding."

Henry seemed a bit surprised but nodded. "Oh, well, go ahead then. It's on June 30th, so they know and could get here in a timely fashion." A small pause before Henry turned towards the door. "Dinner will be ready in about twenty minutes."

John nodded his head as he pulled out his phone, pulling up some numbers to send some texts. "I'll be down then."

It might have been going off plan of what he and Marta had discussed in the car but he needed to get these messages out and invite those four guests.