Seasons Changing

Even Sunny Days Have Rain

About twenty minutes had passed when Julia and Laurel rejoined us. We walked up to them to hear the verdict.

Conrad walked beside me and I reached for his hand. He interlocked our fingers. 

"I've... decided to pull out of the sale." Skye runs up behind Julia and hugs their mom. 

The words had barely left Julia's lips before Con pulled me in for a hug. 

"Don't celebrate so fast. We still need to convince your dad to buy the house from Julia" Laurel announced as she took her phone out presumably to call Adam. 

••••

I was on my way to take out the trash and Conrad was coming from the opposite direction. He held the bin open for me as I put my bag in. I smiled and started to walk away. 

"Can we talk about last night?" "Last night was low-key a blur. I-I don't even remember much after Milo" I lied. Scared to know his truth. "You were right. I never should have ended things like that. And the fucked up thing is I thought I was doing the right thing by you." "I broke up with you" I emphasized, "I knew you were going through a lot. I didn't want to be more." "But that is no excuse. And I hate the thought of you looking back at the night we spend here, and regretting what we did". 

The pain that was in his face hurt me. 

"There's nothing you could do that would make me hate anything that we've done". "If I could go back, if I could... do things differently, I would". "Con it's okay, we both hurt each other a lot." "And I don't ever want to hurt you again." "You won't. I think that you hurt yourself more when you hurt me if that makes sense." "Sadly". 

He stared at me. Every time he does it truly makes me feel like the only person in the world. Then he looked away. I followed his gaze to a car. 

"I-I think that's my dad's car" he told me as he took my hand and guided me inside.

We met everyone else inside and they followed us as we quietly walking into the living room to hear. 

"Thanks for coming all this way to back me up" Adam tells Laurel. "Oh, I didn't come here to back you up, I Cam to back up the boys. You can't let them lose this house, Adam". "Well it's done. Julia sold it." 

"Actually, I um, I changed my mind." Julia said coming from a different room, "Hi". "Okay, well, let's get something straight here. I'm not letting them lose anything. This has been out of my hands since the start. So don't go making me look like the bad guy here" Adam told them.  "I'm not trying to make you out to be anything. I'm trying to help you" Laurel told him. 

Conrad attempted to go to the kitchen but Jeremiah stopped him. "Let someone else try to solve a problem for once" he told Con. 

"So what? You're just gonna dissolve the trust and gift the boys the beach house?" Adam asked Julia. "No she can't do that. She has a child of her own to consider." "Yeah well I'm not gonna squander their trust to buy this house, and frankly, I'm surprised that you would support that." "When did I ever say that?" Laurel asked him, "I just want you to move some money around to buy it for them." "What?" "Fair market value, terms negotiable, of course." Julia chimed in. "I think I'm gonna go now cause that's not happening. End of story." "Uh, you know what? I have a question for you. Why is it that those boys having been trying harder in the last three days to save this house than you have in the last several weeks?" Julia asked Adam. "Adam". "No, shut up Laurel, you don't get a vote I know Suze made you feel like this house is part yours but it's not". 

Conrad didn't hesitate to finally join the battle.

"Where do you get off saying shit like that?" "Con..." Adam paused when he saw the rest of us join in, "Did you really think railroading me would change my mind?" he said towards Laurel? "Excuse me but fuck you" Laurel says at him. Lucas and I chuckled.