Here's the final chapter! It's been fun writing my first fanfic and I hope you enjoyed the story too! Thank you all for reading and leaving reviews. I have a new Gollly story in planning stage so you will hear from me soon! I might add an epilogue to this story if I'm motivated OR if you guys demanded one lol.

ellec77 - thank for your kind comments!

ButterflyMissy I hope you will enjoy the ending. Thank you for all of your reviews.

Guest: I'm glad you liked the backstory of Sage's brother. It is important for Gail's journey in this story.

Mimitash Glad you loved last chapter, and I hope you will love this one too.

fallsalot your review totally made my day when I read it. Native Americans are important people that are heavily oppressed. If my writing help educate/spread awareness to at least one person, then I'm already satisfied. I think fanfiction is a great source to discuss about minorities and their issues. Wilson-Raybould's appointment is a huge progress! I'm not Canadian, but I'm contemplating moving up there.

Gail paces back and forth in tight linear laps from the front door to the night stand by the bunk bed. Sage could return at any minute now and Gail still doesn't even have one sentence in her mental script. She stops by the bed post and her lips tingle in amazement.

"You're insane, you know that right?"

Completely insane, she thinks to herself. She smirks as she remembers the kiss. It was so light and so quick, not even full two seconds before Holly gets up and collect her things. It probably is one of the most chaste kisses she's ever received since a loser, Ted, kissed her under a maple tree in sixth grade. She punched Ted of course and told him never to do that again, but Holly's kiss punched her out of the orbit. How is that possible? A kiss light like that to be so indescribably marvelous. Does this mean something? Is Holly that into her as she is into her? Self-doubt begins to creeps in Gail's brain.

Gail blinks in astonishment as she watches Holly gather her things together. She looks up at Holly and asks, "Wha-Where are you going?"

Holly freezes for a second and gives Gail a dizzy smirk, "Oh, I just realized I need to start that outline and I need to at least get a reasonable amount of sleep before my busy day tomorrow. Will you be okay by yourself? Do you need me to stay?"

Gail shakes her head, "I'm good now. I-"

"Good," Holly interrupts, "I need to get going."

Holly turns around to leave, but Gail grabs her wrist lightly. "Wait-"

They are face to face, inches apart, and tension slowly sparks in between. Gail gets overwhelmed by the way Holly's eyes pierce past her eyes and into her soul. She stutters out, "I-God, this is-"

Holly raises her hand in between their chests, "I know. I just had to clear up that misunderstanding you had of Sage and me. There's nothing going on between us. We're just friends."

Gail realizes she has not thought of Sage since they've kissed. She starts to feel terrible about doing this behind her back. She takes a small step back, "She's my friend too. Best friend."

Holly nods, "I know. Can't we just end this night here? I know we need to talk about everything. Let's do that tomorrow night? I'll bring dinner and you already have drinks hidden somewhere I'm sure."

Gail knows Holly is trying to give her time and space to process and deal with her feelings. Holly wraps her hand around Gail's bicep for a moment before leaving the room.

That is a good sign right? Dinner and serious conversation means Holly is attracted to Gail and wants to work it out… right? She startles a little as Sage barges in the room. First thing first, Gail reminds herself. Sage angrily flings her backpack in her chair and leans back against her desk. Her head hangs low and her hands clench the desk edge. Gail cautiously approaches Sage silently encouraging herself.

"Sage."

Sage peeks at Gail and Gail notices the deep bags under her eyes and she is wearing the same clothes from yesterday. Gail frowns and quietly questions Sage with her furrowed eyebrows and a single nod. Sage sighs wearily and gets off the desk to face Gail squarely. "What's going on, Gail?"

"What? Nothing." Gail loses her confidence and takes a step back, giving herself some space. Sage stands in her place still.

"Bullshit. You have that look on your face."

Gail looks away, "What look?"

Sage waits quietly for Gail to looks at her again. "That look where you need to tell me something, but you're scared of what I'll say or do."

Gail swallows hard. She knows Sage is right and this is the moment. She has to let everything out now. There's no more beating around the bush.

Gail straightens her back up and puts on her confident mask, "I like Holly."

Sage's face grimaces without an ounce of surprise. She laughs bitterly and walks back to the desk with her back facing Gail. "Of course… everything makes sense now."

Gail knows she has been acting differently around Sage lately. Sage obviously notices and things are getting tense between them. She wants things to return to normal-the way things used to be. She swallows a ball of guilt and takes a step closer, "Look, I didn't mean to-"

BOOM.

Gail flinches after Sage pounds her fists onto the desk. Sage whips around and gets in Gail's face. She screams, "Enough! Of course you didn't mean it! You never do! You didn't mean to fall for Holly! You didn't mean to take over my people's fight! You didn't mean to let Brenly takes the fall for you! You're a coward and I'm sick of letting you get away with your sorry bullshit!"

Every single word hits Gail's chest like a bullet. She had no idea Sage felt like this. Her mouth hangs open as she is at loss for words. Sage's eyes burns directly at Gail's.

"Why can't you just let me have this one? I lost my brother because of you. Now are you going to swoop in and grab Holly before flying away? What the fuck are you? I'll tell you what you are…" Sage waits few seconds before spitting out every single letter, "V-U-L-T-U-R-E."

Gail brushes past Sage and stands by the front door. "So? So what? I'm a Peck after all. All I do is peck away and take people you value away right? What do you want me to do…" her voice raises, "go to Holly and tell her she means nothing to me?! That I was just playing around?!"

Thud. Something hits the floor outside the front door. Gail turns around and opens the door to see couple white take out boxes on the floor. Holly. Gail inhales as she realizes Holly probably heard her and dropped them on the floor when she left. She feels glued to the spot as she struggles on if she should go after Holly or stay and try to fix things between Sage and her. She's leaning toward the hallway and turns her head toward Sage. They watch each other in silence, their eyes communicating their feelings to each other. Sage's eyes soften and she lets out a sigh.

"Go, Gail. We will be okay. Just go."

Gail runs out of the room and takes the stairs instead of elevator in any hope of catching Holly. She skips every other step in her leaps down the stairs. She bangs her shoulder against the ground floor door and stumbles a little before taking a look around the lobby. No Holly in sight, so she jogs over to the security desk by the entrance. An officer is reading a guns magazine with his feet on the desk.

"Sir? Did a girl just leave here? She has brown hair and might be wearing a glasses. I'm not sure what she is wearing-"

"Slow down, ma'am. A lot of people came in and out, so I can't exactly tell you that. She must have a student ID to get through the doors. Try and call her?"

Gail sighs in frustration and walks away without saying another word. She goes outside and walks around, searching for Holly at the bus stop and trails leading to different dormitories. Not a hint of Holly in sight. Gail wants to text her, but her phone is still in the room, so she jogs back inside and takes the elevator. She bangs her head against the wall. Of course, of all times Holly could've shown up at, it just has to be the moment Gail screams out those awful things. She means to be sarcastic and wants to tell Sage to not make her choose between them. Holly clearly misunderstand everything, and now it's going to be ruined before they are able to try to start building on their recent confession. Well, Holly admitted her feelings by giving her that kiss, but Gail hadn't said anything to Holly about how she truly felt. She has to do something. She can't just let this go and accept it as inevitable. Not like she used to. Sage is right, she is a coward for letting things be the way they are and complaining about it. She doesn't face her problems, she just runs. Maybe it's time to stop running and take the chance to change for the better.

Gail sulks along down the hallway to her room and notices the take out boxes are gone. Sage probably clean up the mess in her absence. What is Gail going to do with Sage? She wonders how can she resolve this situation. She believes in complete loyalty, but she doesn't want to lose her chance with Holly if there is any left. She slowly opens the door and walk straight to her desk to pick up her cellphone. She presses call button to call Holly just in case she will talk to her. The call goes straight to voicemail. Of course. She slimily sits down on her chair. A throbbing pain appears in Gail's temple as frustration builds up in her chest.

"Couldn't find Holly, eh?"

Gail quickly looks over at Sage then looks back at her cellphone in her hand. "No. I wasn't quick enough to see where she went outside."

Gail waits for Sage to say something, then she decides to brave a side peek at her. Sage is sitting on her chair and breaking down a green hug on the desk. Gail feels conflicted about the two urgent situations happening right now. She hasn't a clue about what to do with Holly's misunderstanding. She is afraid the longer she leaves her alone, the harder it would be to resolve the misunderstanding. However, she needs to fix things between Sage and her. She cannot just leave the room with things the way they are right now. Two important figures in her life are on the opposite direction with Gail stuck in the middle.

"Wanna join?"

Gail notices Sage is not in her chair, but standing nearby with a rolled joint in her hand. Guess Sage just answered Gail's inner turmoil. Gail nods her head and gets up to join Sage. They walk over to Sage's bed and lay down like they normally have in the past. Sage pulls out a zippo lighter from her pocket and lit the joint. Gail begins to wonder if she should say something, but she isn't sure what. Sage's cough snaps Gail back to reality and she takes the joint out of Sage's hand. Gail decides she will tell Sage she refuses to give up on Holly. Not for Sage. Not for anyone. Well, after she takes a hit anyway to calm her nerves.

"I'm sorry."

Gail coughs in surprise. Sage peeks over at Gail with her eyes full of remorse. She takes the joint back then looks up at the bed above.

"I was an asshole to you, Gail. I shouldn't said of those things to you."

Gail shrugs. "You're right though. I was a coward."

"Well yeah, but you were just sixteen. I'm not so sure I could have beedn brave if I was in your shoes either."

Gail sighs as Sage gives the joint back to her after taking a hit herself. Gail contemplates on Sage's behavior and comments. She knows something happened. It is not typical for Sage to blow up on Gail like that. Did something happen while she was with her family last night?

"Brenly almost died."

Gail sits up abruptly and stares at Sage. "What?!"

Sage refuses to gain eye contact with Gail. "Yeah. They told us that he got shanked in the kitchen where he was cleaning three days ago."

"Three days ago?! And you found out yesterday?"

"Yeah. They didn't call my parents until last night when his condition became critical. They had to call to get consent for surgery to remove his kidney."

Gail's eyes widen in disbelief. "So they didn't bother to call your parents for two whole days?"

Sage exhales before whisper bitterly, "Yeah…"

Sage sits up and leans against the post and gazes distantly. Slowly, she shakes her head and slowly reveals what happened.

"When we got to the hospital, they refused to let us see him. They just wanted us there to sign the papers. I yelled at this guard and you know what he said? 'You don't get to see him unless he's dead. Prisoner is still a prisoner.'" Sage pauses and shuts her eyes, then growls out, "I wanted to hit him so bad."

Tears begin to fall down Sage's cheeks.

"Father moved around to stand in front of me and apologized. Mother dragged me to sit down and told me to keep my mouth shut. All we wanted was to see Brenly. We didn't know if he would be okay or not. We just wanted to see and touch for one last time if we were going to lose him. They treated us like we were dirt. Like our feelings didn't matter. Like Brenly isn't worth anything. They treated him like shit for crimes he didn't even do!"

Sage glances at Gail, gaining eye contact before continues, "I became so angry. Furious. And to make matters even worse, they send him back to recover in the infirmary in the prison. Apparently they needed to free up a room for a more deserving patient. Fucking assholes!"

Gail's hands clenches tight and anger starts simmering in her stomach.

"At that point there was nothing we could do but leave. I rode the bus alone and I just became so mad at the world. For injustice. When I got back in here and you confessed that… you were an easy target so I lashed at you. I had to get it out somehow and I made the wrong choice. I'm truly sorry."

"Don't be. I should've been in his place, so don't be sorry for being angry. You have every right to feel this way. I will never stop being sorry about what happened."

Sage cracks a laugh. "I already forgave you, so you don't need to carry the weight."

Gail slowly spread a smile. Sage turns around to squish the joint in an ashtray on the nightstand. They both lay back on the bed in their original position. The tension dissipates away in the air between them.

Gail needs to clear the air so she asks, "So, are we good?"

Sage peeks at Gail before confirms, "Yeah, we're good."

Gail tests the doorknob and finds it to be unlocked, so she enters softly. She notices the table is moved against the wall along with everything else. In the middle of the room, Ciara is standing in front of a huge canvas with pails of paint lined up on the floor. The canvas is blank and Ciara has this far away look on her face. Gail decides to flick the switch to flash the ceiling lights. Ciara looks over at her direction and acknowledges her presence, so Gail approaches her.

"New project?" Gail asks.

Ciara shrugs then nods her head in confirmation.

"The canvas is pretty big."

"Yeah, it's going to be the centerpiece for my upcoming exhibit."

"Writer's block…or should I say painter's block?"

Ciara lets out a nervous chuckle. "Yeah…"

Both begin to look around, avoiding looking at each other out of awkwardness. Gail gets frustrated, but understands why Ciara is being nervous around her. It's hard to be around someone you feel responsible for causing problems. She's dealt with that around Sage for years, so she knows that feeling too well. She decides to be the brave one and waves her hand to get Ciara's attention.

"I know you still feel bad."

Ciara shakes her head. "I feel worse than awful."

"It's not your fault or mine. I felt stupid for letting this happen to me, but someone told me that being a victim doesn't mean I'm weak. I'm not responsible for this. That bastard is. He did this to me. Not me. Not you. Understand?"

Ciara bits her lips and wraps her arms around Gail's neck and squeezes her into a hug. Gail allows this for a minute, before pushing her off.

"This isn't really how I communicate."

Ciara lightly shoves Gail's shoulder. "I know. That's how I communicate, not you. What are you doing here anyway?"

Gail begins to scan the room. "Oh, I'm looking for my paintings. I need the second one."

"Ah, you have someone in mind now?"

"Yeah. I figure there's no time like the present."

Ciara leads Gail to a corner where bunch of canvases are laid against the wall. She points Gail to her two canvases and signs animatedly, "Good luck," before heading back to her project.

Gail checks her painting's condition before picking it up and tucks it under her left arm and heads out to her next destination. Step one complete.

Gail fidgets with the painting and bag of takeout in front of Holly's room. Her hands become clammy and the painting starts slipping through her hand. She huffs and lays the painting against the wall by the door. This is it. Her heart is pounding out of her chest and her stomach is turning like a hamster's running wheel. She mentally recites her hasty speech when the front door abruptly opens, and Holly nearly bumps into Gail.

"Oh-"

Gail lays her hands against Holly's shoulder and the takeout bag hanging against Holly's arm. Last time Holly's face was this close to Gail's face was when she kissed her last night, so Gail couldn't help herself when she stared at Holly's lips. Symmetrical top and ample bottom, and Gail knows how tender they are from experience. She blinks her eyes and shakes her head out of her dreamy state.

"What are you doing here?"

Gail puts one of her hands behind her neck to scratch tension out of her skin and the other hand, holding the takeout, down by her hip. "Uh, I know you were at my room earlier and you sorta left our dinner on the floor…"

Holly slaps her face with her hand. "Right. I-"

"Wait, let me finish please."

Holly nods and keeps her mouth shut.

"I was fighting with Sage and I'm not sure what you overheard but I said some things that you might misunderstood. Sage is having a hard time right now with her family and she took it out on me. Things are ok between us now, so that's not the point. The point is I want to continue our dinner plans. I'm no good with feelings and all that icky stuff, but I really like you. A lot. I was dumb for not doing anything about it till now. I was so worried about Sage and our friendship, that I forgot about your feelings. I never expected you to return the affection, because I didn't think I was worth it. You make me feel worthy, Holly. I did this painting while thinking of you and I wanted you to have this. It's yours regardless of what will happen tonight. If you still don't want to see me, I'll leave."

Holly grabs Gail's hand, linking their fingers and press against her stomach, then studies the painting in silence. Gail watches Holly takes in the familiar scenery imprinted on the canvas.

Holly whispers, "Is this the huge tree we sat under near where the class is?"

Gail nods, "Yeah, I was freaking out and you found a way to calm me down just by a touch. That scared me, yet I never felt so warm."

Holly's lips rises in lopsided smirk. "I have been crushing on you since the moment I sat next to you. I didn't know what happened at the bar but we were having a great time and then you went off and danced with Ciara. I was jealous to be honest."

"Sage was there to see you. I was trying to be a good wing woman."

"I figured that now. I wasn't the only one misunderstood. You totally misunderstood when you saw me in Sage's bed. I cried and vented out my frustrations. She was there listening and I didn't want to be alone, so we just slept there. Nothing happened. I needed comfort so she just laid next to me. I know we tell each other things, but it was difficult for me to admit my feelings… especially with you hanging out with Ciara and I wasn't sure what was happening between you-"

Gail shuts Holly up by pressing her lips against her lips and sliding her hands along Holly's cheeks. They open their mouth to each other's exploration after Holly allows a moan escapes her throat. Gail pulls back a little with her hands still holding Holly's face gently.

"You just had to stop talking."

Holly takes the takeout bag out of Gail's hand and uses her other hand to grabs Gail's shirt. She whispers, "I won't say another word."

Gail smiles and kisses Holly again, more passionate this time as Holly pulls her in her room and the door shuts. The painting remains by the door guarding their bubble being formed in the room.

-fin