To Have Loved [BxB] Book I ✓

Chapter 24

a/n: Look at me putting up a chapter when I said I would. I'd also like to clarify before anyone asks, Annabelle is Kayden's stepsister, she just hasn't come up much because she doesn't go to Antisto. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy the chapter and have a wonderful week if I don't post again sooner than that.

Christmas came and went, it wasn't all that spectacular. Kayden got a new laptop and phone, which he was happy about, but then again, he knew it was just because his mom didn't know what to get him and she'd probably had Greg find something expensive so she could pass it off as meaningful when it was really about as imaginative as getting him a new calendar or some pencils. It wasn't that he didn't like it, it was that anyone would like it, so really, his gift had nothing to do with him.

He was in his room curled up playing a game of solitaire on the floor when his mom opened his door without knocking. "Kayden, sweetie, I just wanted to let you know that you'll be going over to Aunt Erica's house today. Annabelle is over at a friend's house and Greg and I are going out for the day."

"Okay." He said, hardly looking up from his cards.

He wasn't upset about it, he liked his aunt. She always asked him for updates on his life and they sometimes talked for hours over milk and cookies. She was the kindest woman he'd ever met and she seemed so content. She'd never married, she wasn't interested in it, and she always had foster kittens along with her two house cats.

"She'll be here in twenty minutes so make sure you have your things together."

"Mhm."

"Kayden, when are you going to start talking to me again?"

"When you start caring about what I say," He said simply, placing a red queen on a black king.

She didn't say anything else, and he didn't look up, he just heard her footsteps grow further away and creak down the stairs.

---

Kayden did eventually get his things together by the time his Aunt Erica arrived. He was just pulling on his shoes when he heard the doorbell ring and almost tripped over his laces to get to it.

"Hey, honey, how've you been doing?" His aunt asked and he immediately burst into a smile when he saw her standing there wearing one of her signature Hawaiian shirts unbuttoned with a white tank top underneath and black trousers with dark red boots. She always seemed to have a new tattoo every time Kayden saw her, and at this point, she had little tattoos all up her arms of cats, plants, and various lines from poems or songs that she liked. She was a year away from thirty but she never seemed to dress or act any particular age, it was like she was timeless and Kayden liked that about her.

"I missed you." He said quietly and she hugged him back, running her fingers through his mop of hair.

"You gotta get this cut at some point, it'll hang in your eyes." She said, but it wasn't in the way his mother would say it, it was said with a smile and he just shook his head to mess his curls up again as they had been.

"I like it long." He said with a shrug.

"Do you or do you just not wanna get it cut? 'Cause I can cut it for you, wouldn't even have to go to the hassle of getting an appointment with the barber and all that."

"...Would you?"

"Yeah, no problem, I'll just clean it up a bit, it'll be great, you'll see." She said with a smile and he nodded. "Alright, let's get going, I wanna be gone before Jess gets back...don't tell her I said that." She said and Kayden smiled, giving her a little 'scout's honor' sign.

"I haven't been talking to her anyway." He said after a moment as he stepped out the door to walk to her car.

"What'd she do?"