𝐑𝐔𝐍𝐀𝐖𝐀𝐘 𝐊𝐈𝐃𝐒// 𝒋𝒋 𝒎𝒂𝒚𝒃𝒂𝒏𝒌

²⁹

While  Pope was in the nursing home talking to his mee maw the group was downtown, the boys were in the van while the girls walked into one of the shops and grabbed a slushie. The moment they jumped out of the van they started gossiping.

"Basically Pope is mad at me cause I'm not in love with him." Kiara said and Sarah and Vi almost started to laugh.

"At least he's not choking you and trying to kill you cause you're not." Vi said and the girls looked at her worried, but when they noticed her smile, they also smiled awkwardly.

"But why did you go?" Kiara stopped walking making the girls stop also.

"Cause I thought that he was noticing where things were going and that he finally understood, and he really just wanted to talk, I didn't think he was going to try and murder me."

"Good thing that i asked Topper to check on you."

"How did you know?" Sarah shrugged her shoulders.

"That's a secret I'll never tell."

"Wait you asked Topper to go? Does John B know you're talking to him?" Kiara asked and Sarah shook her head. "Does JJ know about Rafe?"

"No Kie. JJ will never know about Rafe." Kiara shook her head. Knowing that secrets never really stay secrets.

"You are really not going to tell him? Seriously?"

"Yes? Why would I? You know how he gets, and as you can see I'm perfectly fine."

"You should just tell him, that's not okay." Kie said and Sarah shook her head, knowing better than to tell her friend what she should and shouldn't do.

"Vi, you decide if you should tell him or not, but i think that it's better that he doesn't know. There are some things that they just wouldn't understand and hearing something like that will make him want to kill Rafe, and we don't need to save yet another one of them from prison." Violet pointed at Sarah and nodded.

"Exactly." Kie just rolled her eyes not understanding why she couldn't just tell JJ, it was a very big problem. The guy tried to kill her. But what Kie wasn't putting into a perspective was what else was Rafe capable of doing to her friend, if she goes around telling everyone what he had done to her, Rafe had already killed someone, what makes Kie think that he wouldn't kill again? While Sarah and Vi were laughing at something Vi said, Kiara was quiet. She was starting to understand why it was better for Violet not to say anything and was finally starting to see how strong her friend was, a guy who has killed before was literally choking her and from what Topper has said to Sarah about the incident made it sound like Rafe was only a minute away from killing her, and yet here she was, laughing with her friends, drinking a slushie, and making it seem like everything was perfectly fine.

"Did you thank Topper?" Sarah nodded.

"Of course I thanked him, I put him through so much already, and you'd think that that is the crime of the century."

"All of this crazy shit is happening and Pope's giving me the silent treatment." Kiara said finally snapping out of her thoughts. "You and JJ seem to be alright." Kiara said with a smile and Violet nodded.

"Yeah, cause I'm kind of keeping a secret from him, and it's not a small one. How'd you think he'll react if I tell him?" Kiara and Sarah started shaking their heads.

"No." Was all that Sarah said and the three of them nodded, before jumping in the van. Vi ruffled JJ's hair while passing him and all of them sat in the back.

"Let's go get our boy." JJ said and John B started the van. Just as they pulled up next to the nursing home, Pope jumped the final stair and walked into the van with a big sign. The girls' laughs seized as they all looked at him.