❛𝐁𝐑𝐔𝐓𝐀𝐋❜ ― 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤

𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬 - 𝐫𝐚𝐟𝐞 𝐜𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐨𝐧

@spdeygwen ty for requesting! 💞

kind of inspired by @okaysure_

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝐀𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐚'𝐬 𝐏𝐎𝐕:

My mouth dropped open as I just learned that John B, Pope, and JJ had stolen money from Barry, yes, the drug dealer Barry. "You guys are so dead," Sarah said with a chuckle. Me and Kie nodded in agreement. "We'll be fine, we just have to ignore Rafe, Barry, Kelce, and Topper at the party and it'll all be good," said JJ with confidence. Sarah made an annoyed face at the mention of Topper.

30 minutes later, me and Kie were laying on the hammock, talking about the party. "Hey Arabella, you think Sarah and Topper will fight today?" Kie asks, wondering about their breakup. Sarah cheated on Topper with John B a few days ago, and Topper was raging about it. "I hope not, we don't need any more drama going on, I just want to enjoy the rest of my summer," I answer with a sigh.

Kie leads me inside the chateau to get ready for the party. Sarah arrives 10 minutes later and starts curling her hair. We wear simple clothes, curl our hair, and apply light makeup. The boys were already at the party when we arrived.

The beach was filled with loud music, drunk teens, and food spilled everywhere. I immediately spotted Rafe staring at me and rolled my eyes at him. I couldn't stand the thought of him. He used to be nice, but ever since he beat up JJ and Pope, I didn't want to have anything to do with him. As Sarah went to go hang out with John B, me and Kie were left by ourselves.

Suddenly, we heard gasps and screams coming from behind a few trees. Kie and I ran over to see Rafe, Barry, Topper, and Kelce fighting with John B, JJ, and Pope. Great, just what we wanted to avoid.

People gathered around them, cheering for different people. "Oh my god, John B!" Sarah exclaimed as Barry knocked John B to the floor. We run to him, but right as I see his face, someone yanks me back by the neck of my shirt.

I turn around to see Kelce, his face filled with anger and inches away from mine. I felt my body fill up with anxiety, my heart pounding loudly inside my chest.

"You think you're so much better than us, huh? All of you pogues are the same, poor and worthless," he spat in my face. I immediately felt a burst of anger as I punched him on the side of his face, knocking him to the ground.

Gasps erupted from the crowd as I heard JJ and Kie yelling at Rafe and Topper, while Sarah, John B, and Pope were beating up Barry. Before I saw him coming, Kelce jumped on top of me, punching my face over and over. As the sounds of Rafe screaming at Kelce to get off me got faded, I felt myself fall asleep.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————

The faint beeps from all of the hospital machines woke me up as I saw John B, Sarah, Pope, Kie, and JJ sitting on the couch near my bed. "Hey guys," I muttered quietly, with a small smile on my face.

"Oh my god, Arabella, you're awake!" Sarah shouted as she engulfed me in a hug. The others all took their turn hugging me, saying how they were so glad I was okay. As soon as I was about to say something, someone knocks on the door.

"Come in," I say loudly as the door slowly opens. There stands Rafe, his eyes red and puffy, tears pouring down his face.

"What the hell? Get out of here, right now!" Kie shouts at him, getting ready to start another fight. "Hey, hey, I just want to talk to Arabella for a few minutes, ok? Please," Rafe says with desperation in his voice.

"You think we're crazy, huh? To let a kook, who just beat us up, to talk to her?" JJ says, clearly annoyed.

"I'm begging you, ok? I swear to god I won't lay a hand on her, you guys can be right outside." Rafe says, pleading with us.

"It's ok guys, let him stay. I'll be fine," I whisper, the energy draining from my voice. "Fine," they all say, saying goodbye to me as they walk out the door, leaving just me and Rafe in the room.

I look at him with anger, as I have since the day we met. I've never liked him, and I never will. "What do you want to talk about Rafe? I thought you hated me?" I say confused.

"I never hated you, Arabella," Rafe says, staring into my eyes. I have known Rafe for as long as I remember, and I've never seen him like this.

"Then why? Why beat up my friends, why beat up Pope, we did nothing to you guys. You weren't even involved, we took Barry's money, not yours," I say, my voice rising. He looks down as he mutters, "I got angry, ok? My dad kicked me out of our house today, and he always has to choose Sarah over me, no matter what. I couldn't take it anymore."

My heart fills with concern for some reason, as I look sadly at Rafe. My father never cared for me either, he left when I was a baby, leaving my mom to take care of me by herself.

"I'm sorry, I had no idea," I say to Rafe as I feel his gaze on me. His green eyes look deeply into mine as I feel myself look down as my cheeks heat up.

Rafe's hand cups my chin as he lifts it up, his thumb brushing across my cheek. I look at him, shocked when he presses his lips to mine.

The butterflies in my stomach are something I have never felt before. I find my arms going around his neck, our lips moving in sync. I hate to admit that this is my first kiss, you'd expect more from a 16-year-old, but I've just never found the right guy.

Rafe pulls away as we both smile, his gaze going straight to my lips. I chuckle and he strokes my cheek and says, "God Arabella, you don't know how long I've been waiting to do that."

I smile and lay my head on his chest as he speaks again. "You're so beautiful, you know that?" Rafe says as he kisses the top of my head. My smile gets even bigger as I drift off to sleep.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————

𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗶 𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗮𝗸𝘀: hey guys!! i finally finished this omg- so sorry about the delay, again!! i've been getting a lot of homework since i'm taking ap us history, but i will try to get the next part out in a couple of days! tysm for reading, please lmk if there are any spelling/grammatical errors!

- 1159 words -