Golden Hearts | Rafe Cameron

40

July 11

Rafe fell asleep at my place last night, and thankfully no one in my family walked in during that time. We would have been busted if they did. I headed downstairs to get breakfast for both Rafe and me, only to be met by my parents sitting at the kitchen table.

My mom warmly smiles at me when she sees me coming down to the kitchen. "You went to bed early last night," she says. I didn't go to bed early; I just had Rafe over.

"Yeah, I was pretty tired," I say, pulling out two sandwiches and spreading butter and cheese on them. I'm about to grab two glasses and pour juice when my dad looks at me curiously.

"Why do you need two glasses?" he asks, looking up from his computer.

I pretend to be confused and say, "this one's dirty, so I thought I'd put it in the dishwasher again," lying, which my parents seem to accept.

I pour juice into one glass and take my breakfast up to my room. I make sure to lock the door behind me before placing the tray with breakfast on the bed. Rafe smiles when he sees that I brought breakfast for him too.

"We'll have to share a glass so my parents don't suspect anything," I say, laughing a little.

"It's okay," Rafe says, taking one of the sandwiches.

We eat breakfast in silence while a movie plays on my TV in the background. It's actually quite nice not to talk much in the morning since I'm a person with a pretty bad morning mood. So, I love this.

"What's happening today then?" Rafe asks after finishing his breakfast.

I shrug. "I actually don't know," I say. "It's been a while since I hung out with Sarah, so maybe I'll hang out with her if she's free."

Rafe nods. His phone pings twice, which initially makes him ignore it, but he looks at it when it continues to ping. He sighs loudly, and I see that it's messages from Ward.

Rafe looks up at me, an irritated look on his face. "I have to go, my dad wants me home. He's apparently worried that I'm somewhere with you and threatens to come over here if I don't show up in five minutes. He also said I can't leave the house after 11:00 p.m. because apparently, he doesn't trust me," Rafe says, getting up from my bed.

"Okay, no problem. I understand. Maybe we can talk on the phone sometime instead," I say, getting up too.

"Yeah, maybe," Rafe says, walking up to me to give me a quick kiss on my lips before going out through the balcony door. "Goodbye," he smiles.

"Bye, Rafe," I say, smiling before closing the door to my balcony behind me.

I clean up all the dishes and take them down to the kitchen so that my mom won't complain about me having all the dishes in my room all the time, which is something she often complains about.

My mom isn't at the kitchen table when I come down, but my dad is. My dad clears his throat when he sees me. "Adeline," he says.

I turn to him, looking a little nervous as I have no idea what he wants. "Mhmm?"

"Can you explain to me what this is?" he holds up a picture on his phone, which I have trouble seeing from such a distance, so I walk closer, and when I see what the picture is of, I freeze. It's a picture of me with the Pogues last week. Who took it, and why? How did my dad get it?

"You know how I feel about you hanging out with the Pogues, right? Haven't you learned what I've said?" he says firmly. "What do I usually say?"

"Don't hang out with the wrong people because they will only turn you into a bad person, and we don't want that. Reputation is always important, and we must always live up to it," I say in a bored tone.