Yeah, I Hate You Too, Sweetheart.

Chapter 31 - Laila

Laila

         Somehow by the grace of God I managed to sneak back up to the vacation house and through the kitchen, up the stairs, even though Kim and Laurence's guests were all filing out to the driveway, getting ready to leave.

  All I wanted to do was go and cry somewhere where there wouldn't be a chance that anybody would see me. Especially Maggie. I doubted I could stand to see that girl right now.

  So instead I kept on walking down the second floor hallway and stopped outside a door towards the third floor staircase. Gnawing on my lip, trying to keep from bursting into tears all over again, I raised a hesitant hand and rapped on the door as quietly as I could.

 "Come in."

I let out a sigh of relief as I heard my mother's calm, quiet, and reassuring voice float through the door. A voice that had always never failed to make me see reason or to feel better in some way or another. A voice that had always never failed to make me see reason or to feel better in some way or another. I hesitantly opened the door and peeked inside, hoping that my mother was alone. Thankfully, she was.

  Mom was sitting in the comfy looking easy chair beside the small fireplace in the room, her legs tucked up underneath her, reading a book with an engrossed look on her face. 

  I stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, not wanting to interrupt Mom or her reading, but I only had to wait a minute or two before she looked up.

  "Mom?" I said slowly, unable to keep from crying now. "Before you say I told you so, can you please... just not say anything?"

  I half expected Mom to just go off on some rant about how I should have been more responsible or how I shouldn't have fallen so easily, but she didn't. Instead, she simply closed the book in her grasp before tossing it aside and opening her arms for me. 

  Mom was opening her arms for me just like she had when I was little and I'd gotten a scraped knee from falling off my bike. And I, like the almost-sixteen year old that I was, rushed straight into her arms with a sob, curling myself up in her lap, burying my head in her shoulder.

  "Laila, honey, what happened?" Mom asked as she rubbed my back in small, soothing circles.

I couldn't find it in myself to answer, so I just shook my head. 

  I didn't think she needed me to say it aloud to know that something had obviously happened with Justin. And I was glad that she didn't pester me with any more questions, because I doubted I could take them right now. 

   All I wanted to do was just cry my heart out and forget everything that had just happened.

Maybe there was some part in the deep recesses of my mind that knew Justin had been telling the truth and that it really hadn't been what it looked like. But I was so caught up in crying that I really couldn't form another coherent thought about that, anyways. 

  When I finally stopped crying - God only knows how long later - I felt like I was about to drop off to sleep, I was that exhausted.

  Mom hadn't said anything the entire time I'd been crying my eyes out, and I was grateful for that. The last thing I wanted was to be hounded. 

  "We'll get a flight out in the morning, yeah?" Mom said comfortingly, catching me off guard with how quiet the room was.

  I stared up at her, my eyes wide and blurry. "B-But, Mom - ?"

Mom gave me a look, her eyebrows raised. "Are you telling me you want to stay?"

  "No, but - "