Never Ending

| HANGOUT |

~ HARLEY POV ~ 

"And that is why we don't have sex at a young age." Mr. Cross finished. 

Everyone sighed in relief, nobody wanted to hear any more about that stuff. I gathered my stuff as the bell rang to mark the beginning of lunch. 

Over the years, Justin, Jay, and I have developed a friend group of eight. Lyla, the super pretty one who doesn't even wear any makeup, has dirty blonde hair and light blue eyes. Jay has grown to become the jokester of the group, pranking at least one teacher a day. Ethan, who usually goes along with the pranks just to get into trouble, has brown hair and brown eyes. Maddie, who is 15, a year younger than us, and is super smart, with light red hair and purple eyes. Megan is a mix of everything, she is amazingly pretty with brown hair and dark blue eyes, has amazing grades, loves to joke around with the boys, and is super athletic. Tom is the last one in the group. He and Megan have known each other since birth, he has blonde hair and light blue eyes, and is athletic and funny. 

"Hey, Harley! Urgh, that class was so weird." Layla exclaimed, walking towards me from her seat at the other end of the class. 

"I know right? I wonder how the boys are doing!" I responded and we laughed. 

Tom trudged over, looking confused. "You good? Or are you finally realizing the pain we girls have to go through?" Layla and I laughed again, but Tom didn't find it funny. 

"That was horrifying!" He squealed, "I thought we had it hard!" 

As we walked to lunch, the rest of the group joined us and started talking about after-school plans. 

"I have soccer right after school-" Megan started to say.

"We know, that's every day!" Ethan interrupts. Tom glares at him and tells Megan to continue. 

"Anyways, I have soccer until five, but can we meet up after that?" She asks. 

"That works for me! I can use that couple of hours to study!" Maddie says excitedly. We chuckle at her and enter the massive cafeteria. 

"Well, how about we go to my house at five-thirty?" Justin says after we get our lunch. I nod, at least it wasn't too far away from my house. Although am I sure that's a good thing? Then my father will have easy access to me. I shuddered. 

"Hey Har, you good? You've been zoned out." Tom asks me, and I nod again. 

Justin puts an arm around me. I love that Justin and I have that kind of relationship, where we can be close to each other in a non-romantic way. He is my best friend after all. _______________________________

"So, maybe you could come to my house early? I have nothing else to do." Justin asks me as we walk home from school. 

"I don't know... I'd love to... but my dad will probably want to see me before tonight." I answer. The truth is, I have to go home. I stayed out too late last night, and my dad still needs to punish me. 

"Oh come on, he'll be drunk anyway. He won't even remember not seeing you!" Justin exclaims. 

"I still need to go, I'll be at yours in an hour, 'kay?" I say quickly. 

"Okay." He grumbles. I ran to my house, setting my things down at the door. 

"I'm home!" I called. 

My dad comes down the stairs wobbly. "I s-stil-ll nee-eed-d to-o pun-nis-shh yo-ou-u" He slurs. 

He gets down to my level and throws his beer bottle at me. He kicks me in the gut after that. As soon as he's done, he grabs another drink from the fridge and goes out the door, leaving me hurt and bleeding. I limp to my bathroom that has my med kit in it and start working on myself.

 When I'm done with the medical stuff, I move on to showering and doing my makeup. After I'm finished, I pick out an outfit that you can't see my bruises or cuts in. I settled on a dark red long-sleeved shirt, jeans, and a winter hat. 

The outfit covers most of my injuries, except the bruise on my face that I cover with concealer. 

At four o'clock, I head over to Justin's. His house is only a few houses down from mine, leaving me to only limp for a few seconds. 

"Hey, Harley! Come in! My mom just made fresh cookamelt!" Justin greets me excitedly. 

Cookamelt was a special recipe that Justin's mom-Allison-makes. It's a chocolate chip and white chocolate cookie with melted marshmallow on top and a bit of it in the middle. The cookies are absolutely delicious. 

"Yum! Hi Allison!" I say. 

"Hi, sweetheart!" She responds sweetly. Justin and I talk and eat cookamelt in his bedroom until the rest of our friends come. 

They walked in but weren't surprised to see me there first. 

"Hey, guys! Allison gave us some cookies to eat while we talk!" Megan says, putting a plate of cookies on the table. 

"Okay, Harley, you need to come with me, I have an apple!" Apple was mine and Lyla's code word for 'I have to tell you something that might be good and might be bad!' I nod violently and follow her out to the balcony attached to Justin's bedroom, leaving everyone confused. 

"So? Tell me! Tell me!" I squeal, "Did you and Ethan finally get together?!" 

"No!" She screams, flushing red, "I have some dirt on Tom!"

Oh no. Tom was Megan's crush, and he obviously felt the same way about her, but they were both oblivious. Lyla told me that he admitted that he liked Megan and she got it on a recording. We went inside and I left to go to the bathroom.