The Lake House

Chapter 7: "I'm so sorry you had to find out this way."

{ Warning: Sad chapter ahead. Get some tissues. }

Shawn's POV

I drive the both of us back home in complete silence. I didn't turn on the radio. Chloe wasn't humming her favorite songs. It was quiet.

As I'm driving, I'm contemplating on how to tell her everything. We've been through hell and back and now the pressure's thrown on me to reveal it all to the one girl I never want to lose. How is she going to react?

I'm scared to death that I might lose her again. She's my best friend and it's been so nice to have her back in my life. But what we've been through together might affect that. I know it took me a while to get over everything.

"Are you okay?" Chloe asks. "I'm not trying to sound selfish or anything but you haven't looked at me once this whole car ride. Which is weird because you always look at me."

I chuckle, "uh, I was just thinking."

"About how you're gonna spill the tea?" She questions as I nod. She seems to be in an okay mood. Hopefully she stays that way.

I park in front of my lake house as we get out. She starts making her way inside my house but I stop her.

"We're not going in there," I say to her as she gives me a confused look. "We're going up there."

I watch as she looks up into the trees. There sits our tree house that her dad built. But of course, she doesn't remember it.

Chloe's POV

"Did I mention I have a fear of heights?" I say to Shawn once we're in the tree house. "I know we're not that high up but every time I look down-"

"Don't look down," Shawn says, pressing his hand to my cheek. It instantly warms me up while calming me down. How the heck did he do that? "I know you were scared of heights, but we got through it together."

I nod before looking around. It was a nice tree house if I'm being honest. It was roomy and there were blankets and pillows. Plus, there was the perfect sized hole on the roof to look at the stars. I'm guessing we used to come up here every night?

"I'm really sorry none of us has told you anything," he begins. "It's a touchy subject, especially with what you've been through with your parents."

"I just want to understand why it's a touchy subject," I respond. "Shawn, I haven't known you for long but I know that you're an amazing guy. And I care about you. There has to be a reason why I'm so driven towards you."

He smirks, "is it because I'm a singer slash songwriter who's sold out stadiums and-"

"No," I cut in, rolling my eyes. "You're the perfect gentleman and you have the biggest heart."

He smiles, making my heart melt, "alright Chloe. We're doing this right here, right now."

"Um..."

"Me telling you everything, silly," he says as I blush. Would it be that bad to do it right here, right now? ... Unless we already have. In that case, ew. "Maybe we should get some food."

I stop him from getting up by taking his hands, "Shawn, I've been waiting since the day I got here. Just spill it."

He lets out a deep breath, "this isn't easy for me to do Chloe, you have to understand."

I nod, "I'm not going anywhere."

"Well I guess I should start from the beginning," he begins. I suddenly feel like a little kid sitting cross-cross applesauce and folding my hands. "We met on February 1 when we were seven years old."

My mouth drops open, "we've known each other for 12 years?!"

He nods, "plus, it was your birthday." Of course he remembers. He's the perfect guy. "But yeah, we met at the age of seven when both our parents bought these two houses. They were the best of friends."

"How did you know that? You were seven," I question.

"My parents told me," he answers as I nod. "Anyways, I would say we were forced into friendship but we became friends in our own way. We were weird children..."

I chuckle, trying to think back to when I was younger. I remember being a goofball but my memories with Shawn are still a blur.

"You and Aaliyah were the best of friends too," he continues. "Whenever you two were playing with dolls and having tea parties, Ashton and I would go on adventures in the mystical jungle."

I roll my eyes, "you guys are lame."

"Getting back to the point, we did everything together since we were always... Together," he explains. "We cried every time we split up. And as time grew on, I started teaching myself how to play guitar while you were the lead singer of our band."

I chocked on the air, "me? A singer? What was our band called? Cats being run over?"

He rolls his eyes, "you have a beautiful voice Chloe. You just have to embrace the fact that you can sing and do some vocal exercises. You'll be singing like me in no time."

"Lies, moving on," I say as he shakes his head.

"This is the depressing part," he goes on. His bright face immediately turned dull and sad. "We uh, we got together at one point. Like we dated without knowing we were actually dating. We kissed and made out and we were basically being newbie teenagers with too many hormones."

"What are you saying?" I ask, scared to know the answer. I still don't remember any of this and now I kind of don't want to.

He opened his mouth a few times but nothing comes out. I tried to follow up what he was saying but I couldn't figure it out, "we had sex at the age of 13 and you got pregnant with our baby."

This time, my mouth didn't drop. Nothing dropped except my heart. I don't care that I had sex at 13. I don't care that I got pregnant. But I know the rest of this story. Not because I remember but because there is no trace marks to ever having a baby. I don't have stitches on me anywhere. That only means one thing.

"We lost our baby?" I ask, trying to hold back my tears. He slowly nods as the wall in my body breaks to a billion pieces. The flood of tears inside me poured out of my eyes.

Shawn pulls me into his chest, "I'm so sorry you had to find out this way... We didn't see it coming and we couldn't do anything about it."

🌲

{ Author's Note: I'm sorry for the sad chapter but unfortunately, this is life. You go through highs and lows. But just remember to love one another and live your life. :) ... And the next chapter will be the rest of the story. }