Book 1: Echoes Of The Past

Chapter 53 - Feelings Pt 2

**I actually wrote 'Feelings' as one part, but felt it was getting long when I was typing it all out, so decided to split it into two.

However, this section seems dramatically shorter than the former. Apologies.**

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"Something smells good in here." Shannon announced, walking back into the kitchen. He had now changed into a cut up Sabian cymbals t-shirt and some royal blue track pants with signature Hunter Green and red Gucci stripes down the sides.

"I know." Ivy grinned.

"You did a good job." He walked over to Ivy and slung an arm around her shoulders.

"Oh, I didn't make this. This is all your daughters handiwork."

Ivy looked at Lilly, who shuffled awkwardly on her feet, looking at her Dad.

"You should give her much more credit, Shan."

"I'm impressed Lilly. I appoligise for earlier. I shouldn't have snapped at you like I did." He reached out and gave her a hug. Once he pulled away, Ivy managed to grab one of Shannon's hands and stroked it lightly with her thumb.
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*Later*

Ivy had told Shannon that she needed to leave because she needed to get her apartment ready for her brothers arrival later on.

She had invited both Shannon and Lilly to come to dinner with herself and Bryce. She had also mentioned that she would be inviting Jared and had seen Shannon's jaw clench as soon as she had said it, but had to remind him of how close Bryce and Jared had been growing up, and how long it would have been since they had seen one another.

As she was about to leave Shannon's, she managed to pull Lilly to one side and quietly had a word with her to encourage her to tell Shannon about stealing her Mum's card to pay for her plane ticket.

The longer she left it to tell him, the worse it would be when he found out, and for him to find out instead of her telling him, would be far worse. Lilly had promised Ivy that she would try to.

Ivy let herself into her apartment and knew that she also needs to catch up with Jess. She had so much had to tell her and to also catch up on from her as well.

Jess had told her that she had been on a couple of dates with Ronnie, the singer from Red Jumpsuit Aparatus and they had seemed to go well, so Ivy had wanted to catch up with her about that.

The fact that she and Shannon had broken up, then started seeing one another again, Joey inviting her on a date tomorrow, Nick sexually harassing her at the work event and Shannon's revelation to her about having a daughter and being married, would all be good fodder for Jess to write her own soap opera!

As she let herself into her apartment and closed the door behind herself, shd heard her phone go and fished it out.

Jared: Sure, I'd love to come tonight! Count me in. Would be great to catch up with Bryce like old times.
     I presume my brother will be there as well?

Ivy rolled her eyes at the last comment. She wanted this evening to be a civilised catch up between old school friends and not a bitchfest over her between the two brothers.

She replied:

Ivy: Great. I'll let Bryce know when he arrives. Not sure where we're eating just yet. Jess should be coming along too.
     Shannon is going to let me know. He's had some stuff come up that he needs to deal with, but hopefully he will be able to make it.

She hit send and then decided that she needed to go and take a shower as she hadn't had the chance to yet. After that, she desperately needed to sort out her spare room for her brother's arrival. She hadn't had many guests and therefore her spare room had become more of a dumping ground for stuff she had still yet to unpack despite having lived there for nearly 5 years now.

On climbing out of her shower, she found that she had a few messages to respond to and started to feel a little overwhelmed, instantly starting to realise why Jared had employed Emma to help him out, and she became a hell of alot more appreciative for everything she did in her day to day life.

The first message was a very snarky response from Jared about his brother.

Jared: What's Shannon managed to do now?

She decided to ignore it as she wasn't in the mood for his bullshit, which was risky as she had seen first hand through Shannon what the consequences of that could be.

Next was Jess.

Jess: Sure, I'd love to come tonight and meet Big Brother Kapinski. Is he hot?😏

Ivy laughed. Her friend just couldn't help her flirtatious side coming out.

Ivy: Luckily for you, he's very happily married 😊. I'll let you know about where and when later.
     Also, I may need your help in skillfully becoming a bouncer between Jay and Shannon. 😫

The final message was from Joey. She felt really guilty about everything that had been going on and with her lack of communication with him when he was so clearly trying.

Joey: Would you be up for Japanese tomorrow evening? I've been told Katsuya has very good recommendations.
    I could book us in for 8. Let me know your address and I can come pick you up. 😊 Xx

Ivy rarely had the chance to eat Japanese and it was actually up there with being one of her favourite cuisines. Someone must have been giving him inside info and that person must be Jess. But why? As far as Jess knew, she was happily still seeing Shannon, which to some extent was true. But was the 'happily' part also true?