My Future Stepbrother

Chapter 148

There was movement around me, the room filling with people but I refused to move. I’d never get to hold him again and I didn’t want to stop, if I did he would truly be gone. I felt Dad try to take my arms but I wouldn't leave him. I couldn’t even open my eyes.


“Poppet, the ambulance has taken Jayce. We have to go sweetheart, Elizabeth will want to have Chad now.”


There was a scream at the other end of the hall. My eyes finally opened to see the scream came from Josh, his gaze at the floor where Harley’s body still lay.


He fell to his knees as the pain rolled over him, the people around trying to pull him back as he screamed inconsolably and tried to claw his way to his lost love. My heart broke as his eyes caught mine, my arms still around Chads heavy head as the blood that had pooled around me soaked through the fabric of my dress to my skin.


The loss we both felt in this moment caused the rest of the world to numb. A feeling that would never truly leave us.


They were gone and we couldn't get them back.


***********************


There had been to too many funerals.

Harley’s was two days ago, Josh was still a mess. Harley’s mum held him up the entire time as they sobbed into each others arms. Harley’s parents didn’t blame him for their son being there that night but I could see how much he blamed himself. I saw the same look on my face every time I looked in the mirror.


His service was beautiful, they draped his coffin in the rainbow flag and everyone wore bright colours to represent that beautifully bright personality of his. It was clear from the amount of people there how many lives he had touched.


Brie couldn’t cope. She collapsed onto a chair half way through the service and it took every ounce of strength I had not to let her fall to the floor. She had danced with Harley since he was four years old, she'd watched him grow and bloom into the ferociously fierce human he became. She had never been as proud of anyone as she was of him. I held her every night since the shooting as we both cried, nothing would ever be the same again for us and we knew it.

She hadn't been to the studio since the night of the shooting and I'm not sure she ever would, the pain of movement so much I hadn’t seen her take a single step to music in weeks.


Jayce was still at the hospital so he couldn’t be there for Josh, he'd had major blood loss and the bullet had torn apart his shoulder. He was still due for more surgery the last time I spoke to Tara but I hadn't gone there to see him. I couldn't look at him after everything that happened that night. He hadn't tried to contact me either so I knew he felt the same way, Chad's death was our fault and we both knew that.


Tara wasn't coping well. She'd almost lost her son, her best friend no longer had her only child because he died protecting her fiancé's daughter. I found out from her that Chad had ran straight back into the school when he heard shooting, he’d got half the kids from the junior hall out, including May, before he ran to find me realising I wasn’t outside with the others.

I didn't want to go to the funeral, Tara even made me come to the Manor to get dressed so I couldn't run away. She said we had to look united even though right now we were anything but. Despite the shooting no-one had forgotten about me and Jayce, and what we did to Chad. Our secret was out but I couldn’t even find a way to care anymore, it didn’t seem important in comparison but it had still hurt Tara and Dad that people knew.


There were too many eyes staring at me at this thing, like I'd been the one to pull the trigger, which let's face it, I might as well have. The second I let Chads feelings for me grow, knowing I still loved Jayce, I'd doomed him to a life of pain.



He died that night trying to prove to me how much he loved me. How I should have picked him. I would give up anything to rewind time, to go back to the day I moved into the Manor and tell Dad to move me into the pool house instead. To insist I have a different project partner than Chad that day in bio. They both would have just got on with their lives without ever having thought about me again. I would have saved everyone around me all that hurt if I hadn't been so fucking selfish.



Standing in the funeral Elizabeth couldn’t look at me. Coach couldn’t look at me. Mateo couldn’t look at me. Everyone couldn’t look at me. They all blamed me. They all knew what happened, they all knew Chad died to save me right after I told him I wanted Jayce. He was the hero, I was the villain, and rightfully so.


Tara couldn’t even meet Elizabeth’s eyes. She knew it could have been Jayce, probably should have been Jayce and I knew she’d never look at me the same way because of that.


Our whole family had been ripped apart and it was all down to one person. Me.

I stared down at the bracelet I couldn’t bare to take off my wrist, its touch seemed to be the only thing that brought me any comfort.


Brie didn't feel strong enough to go to the funeral after Harleys, I understood. There'd been eight funerals after that night, each one an innocent life stolen too soon. Even Brittany's.


After the shooting it came out that we weren't the only ones to receive threats from Victor, he had a lot of grudges in that school and the police found a number of kids at that place were walking around the dance in fear long before a shot was fired. It appeared to have started out as a way to blackmail people into him getting what he wanted but only turned deadly after what happened with me. I was always the main target of his gun according to what they found.


It was hard to stay angry after what Hannah told Tara. Apparently during Victor's autopsy they'd discovered the true extent of his injuries, his father had practically used him as an ashtray for over a decade by the number of burns they found on him and the healed brakes in his bones couldn't even be counted properly. He had been raised being told he had to be the best and anything else would result in violence. How was a kid brought up in that type of environment supposed to turn out as anything other than a psychopath?


As Dad took me back to Brie's he didn't say a word. That day he had been so glad I was alive but as soon as the dust settled and the news of me and Jayce had spread he just couldn't seem to find the words to say to me anymore.


Brie was waiting in the bug when I got there and I didn't even bother stepping inside to change out of this suffocating back dress. I just had to do this.


"Are you sure you want to do this now?" She asked, knowing that I'd already made up my mind.


"I'm sure."


Brie pulled into the car park of the hospital and I asked her to wait in the car, this was something I had to do alone.


The last time I was here I'd been more heartbroken than I ever thought possible but I'd held it together because Chad had made me. He never left me, not for a moment. His touch, his smell, his eyes. They'd all brought me such compassionate love but I would never have that comfort again and now all I felt was empty.


Room 107. I stood staring at the door sign for what felt like an eternity before stepping inside but this needed to happen now or it never would. My heart wasn’t racing anymore, it hardly felt anything these last few weeks.


Pushing open the door I could see Jayce laying flat on his back staring at the ceiling, his eyes not moving even as he realised it was me.


“How was the funeral?” His voice void of any emotion. He wasn't cold or angry, just completely empty and I understood the feeling all too well.


“He would have hated it.” It was true. Mahogany coffins and Bible hymns were so far from who Chad was but in the upper classes of Westbrooke I guess that was how it had to be. “How are you feeling?”


Jayce continues to stare at the ceiling, never leaving the spot he's fixated on. “Another op tomorrow. Still touch and go if I'll play again.”


Me heart hit my ribs so hard at the idea of Jayce losing basketball after everything else, he'd already lost too much. Just another victim to add to my list.


“I should have listened to you Aleah. When I came back from the clinic and you said us being together would only cause pain. I'd been so obsessed with the idea of us for so long, I just couldn't let the vision go but if I had... he'd still be alive.”


I breathe deeply. “It's not your fault he's gone Jayce, he didn't die to save you.”


His eyes snap to mine and my breath hitches in my throat, I'd forgotten how blue they were until they started to stare straight through me. “I broke him Aleah. He was my best friend and you were all he wanted. If I'd just stepped back and let him have you... he was the better man. He'd never hurt you like I did, he'd been there every single time you needed him because that's exactly who he was. He never said no to me, if I'd asked him for his fucking kidney he would have given it to me but I could never let him have one fucking win... He loved you Aleah, better than I did. He died proving it.”


He's heartbroken. The last time he talked to the boy who had been his best friend all his life it had been in a fight. He'd never forgive himself for that.


Neither would I.


“He loved me more than I ever deserved. All we've ever done is hurt people while we were together Jayce, he was just the last innocent soul crushed under the weight of us. I won't let there be anymore.”


“Neither will I. This has to be over, completely. I won't contact you and you don't contact me or we both know it won't last. In school we'll just-”


“School won't be a problem, considering what happened to me they understand I don't want to go back there. They're letting me and Brie finish out and graduate with home learning. We won't have to see each other again Jayce. I'll make sure of it.”


I want to cry but I can't anymore. Me and Jayce, we both know... it's just not meant to be.


I stand up ready to leave but his eyes don't meet mine, I take his hand but he still can't bare to face me again and I don't blame him.


We're both so hurt and we know being together will only make that hurt grow and extend to more people around us, neither of us want that.


“I wish you so much love Jayce Thompson. There's not a person in the world that deserves it more.”


He doesn't look to me and I don't need him too but as I lower his hand back to the bed I feel him squeeze me, just for a moment, before I let go.


As I step out the door I glance back to see him. This would be the last time I saw the man I'd loved so dearly for a very, very long time.


Three years later..

I'm gonna give all you guys a week to process these chapter's 💔 Yes there will be a three year time jump and no Aleah and Jayce have not seen each other in that time 💔

The next upload will be the last of this book and its been a hell of a ride you beautiful people ❤

Please let me know all your thoughts in the comments, I love reading everything you write ❤📖❤