𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐁𝐋𝐄𝐌𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐑，𝗃𝗃 𝗆𝖺𝗒𝖻𝖺𝗇𝗄

𝗌𝗂𝗑𝗍𝗒 𝗍𝗐𝗈

𝐒𝐎, 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐌𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 be wondering what happens after you find the lost city of El Dorado, get blown up, two of your parents die and you're stranded in South America with a sack full of gold.

Well, let me catch you up.

First, you catch a ride back home and you sleep for, like, three weeks.

And when you finally get back you make peace with the family. Or not, in Kiara's case.

Big John's death was really hard for Phoebe Madison. She had spent the last few years with one person and now he was gone.

So, while everyone reunited with their families, mine left. I couldn't blame her though. She didn't want to stay and be reminded of her lifelong friend every day.

And besides, I still had my sister, my boyfriend and my friends.

After all the loose ends are tied up, the gold.

"Twenty pounds." The salesman spoke up as he weighed the gold on the scales.

"And that translates to?" John B trailed off, excitement written all over his face.

The man couldn't contain his smile, "This is money. A whole lot of money."

The Pogues couldn't contain their happiness as they all jumped around, hugging one another. My boyfriend pulled me even closer to him, kissing the top of my head.

We found an ATM so we could see how much money we had in the account. The Routledge hovered over it, "Moment of truth. All right. The pin is 0-0-0-0. Enter."

My eyes widened, "You're kidding." Riley scoffed.

The boy frowned, "What?"

"Tell me that's a temporary pin," Olivia spoke rather desperately.

"I thought nobody could guess." The brunette shrugged in defence.

Pope couldn't contain his irritation, "You need to change that immediately."

"I'm sorry." He apologised quickly as the receipt printed, "Here it comes. That's me. That's me."

JJ jumped away from me as he lunged for the paper, fighting John B for it, "Let me read it."

The Routledge managed to get a hold of it, everybody crowding around him.

I rolled my eyes at the two, "It's not even the money. It's just the receipt."

"Okay. Okay. Our joint account balance after paying JJ's restitution at 10:04 a.m. on Tuesday," He spoke slowly, JJ gripped my hips in anticipation.

"Oh, come on, get on with it!" Cleo rolled her eyes.

"Our joint account balance is one point one million, seventy-two thousand, five hundred and forty-nine dollars." He read out, a grin overtaking his lips.

The Maybank stood back in shock, "You said mil?"

"Million?" I giggled.

"With an M?" Pope questioned, "That'll do it!"

The group erupted in cheers once more, Kiara jumping into my arms first. I moved around to hug every single one of my friends until I reached my sister.

She pulled me into a loving hug, one that felt a lot more meaningful than with the rest, "We did it." She whispered in my ear.

I exhaled deeply, letting go of a shaky breath, "We did."

After pulling away from my sister, I looked to the back of the shop to see my boyfriend standing alone. I made my way over to him and wrapped my arms around his neck, knowing he was probably feeling overwhelmed.

"Look, this doesn't mean we're Kooks. Just means we have a little money now." I smirked.

His eyes darted from my eyes to my lips, connecting them quickly, "I love you. And I'm now gonna take you on a real date."

Before I got a chance to reply, Kiara's voice called us over, "Hear me out. Rally truck with yellow LEDs
to replace the Twinkie for right now."

John B immediately shook his head, "No. I'm not getting rid of the Twinkie."

"But with solar panels, maybe?" JJ added.

Olivia nodded, "If it's in the budget."

"And a bigger boat," Cleo called out.

Pope cut them off, "Guys, hold on. Hold on. It's not like we can all go off and buy houses or anything. I mean, split between all of us, that's about $100,00. Minus what we owe Barracuda Mike."

"Let him try and take this. I'll mess him up." JJ hummed causing me to roll my eyes playfully.

"Just gonna say it. I don't wanna piss off the drug dealer." Olivia spoke up.

"Listen, if we divide this up, we're all gonna blow it," Pope said, sending JJ and me a pointed look.

I scoffed in disbelief, "Why are you looking at us?"

He ignored me as he continued, "But maybe if we pool our money together, we can create something with actual economies of scale."

"Like what?" Milo asked.

"You remember the island." He asked, causing everyone to nod, "I mean, it was our own island and we built everything from basically nothing, right?"

I hummed as I leaned into my boyfriend, "It was perfect."

Cleo nodded, "The best life."

"That whole island just to ourselves. All of us together. I think we can have that again. Right here. JJ's property is going up for auction, right? So let's buy it back. A lot of land. Deepwater access. Unless any of you are planning on going back to school, we're gonna need a place to work, a place to stay and live. I think we can have both of those things here. First things first, we get the land, right? And then we could build, like, a surf shop. And then maybe we can make our own dock. We can all live in the house." Pope made all of his ideas clear to the group.

I shared a look with JJ. Pope was the mastermind. He saw not what it was, but what it could be.

𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄
hi guys
it's been a while but i've finally got this chapter out
i have a lot planned so be ready!
i'm still really torn up about jjs death and idk how i'm gonna use that in this book as of yet because i love hayley and jj so much so let me know your thoughts
xoxo