Discover Me {a Why Don't We fanfiction}

Chapter Thirteen

Ashley's Point of View

Corbyn walked over to the kitchen, opening the fridge and bringing out some fruity ciders. He came back and joined us at the table.

"We should show Ashley the pool." Jonah suggests, taking a sip of his coffee and putting down his cards.

"Sure." Corbyn says, standing up from the table again, handing both Jonah and I a cider.

"Pool? How fancy do you guys get?" I laugh, and so do the boys.

"We've got a skate ramp too." Corbyn says as he draws the modern-looking curtains aside to reveal a huge glass door. He opens it, and he gestures for me to go first, so I do.

The view was incredible- extremely breathtaking. I looked back at Corbyn and Jonah, who were smiling at me. We went over to the pool, and I sat down on the edge, dipping my legs into the water. The boys joined me, and we sat there, sipping our drinks in the almost-complete darkness, with only the pool and the tired city lights to illuminate us on top of this incredible hill.

X

Ellie's Point of View

"What's even happening?" I ask, my voice caught in my throat with fear. I was crouching down next to Maria and Zach, who both seemed to be unconscious and freezing cold, with a few scratches here and there. I looked over to Jack, hoping for him to comfort me, but he looked as worried as I felt.

"Jack, you brought your phone with you, right?" Daniel says from down on the ground next to Tea.

"Yeah, who do I call?"

"Oh, I don't know." Daniel says sarcastically.

"Daniel, that's not helping!" Jack complains, and Daniel rolls his eyes.

"Call the boys. Or better yet, the ambulance. Or the police."

"Okay." Jack says, and I walk close to him as he pulls out his phone. I hug him, and he hugs me back, exhaling. "This is so damn stressful." He whispers, and I nod as he holds me closer to him. I could hear his heart beating and his gentle breathing, and I let go, against my will, so he could look call for help. "Are you kidding me?" He says. "There's no service!"

Daniel looks up at him, afraid. "Someone go, run to the house. We need to call for help!" Daniel says, his voice breaking.

I turn to look at Jack, and both of us were about to start speaking, but only awkward sounds came out of our mouths.

"I'll go back up to the house. I won't be long." I glance over at the dead flashlight Jack and I had been using, and the broken flashlight Tea had dropped when she fainted.

"Tea will be fine, just get an ambulance for Zach and Maria." Daniel says, and I nod, even though he probably couldn't see me in the darkness.

I begin to jog up the hill, thanking my younger self for applying myself to so many sports. I wanted to run to my full extent- to get my sadness and anger out, but to also call for help faster- however I knew I would grow tired, so I stayed jogging at a steady pace.

Maria had been one of my best friends for such a long time, and now she was unconscious on the side of a road. And from what I briefly knew of Zach, he was super sweet and funny. Neither of them deserved to be in the situation they were in.

I could feel tears streaming down my cheeks, which encouraged my legs to pound off of the thick asphalt roads faster, and I could see the huge house in the distance, the lights shining out of the rooms resembling the finishing line.

What if it had been too long? It had been almost two hours, and nobody knows how long they had been down there. Imagine if we hadn't been curious about where they were. They could've been unconscious on the side of the road for ages. I didn't even want my mind to go to the dangerous thoughts of questions starting with, 'what if?'.

But one question really stuck in my mind. What if I hadn't asked that stupid dare? Then Zach and Tea wouldn't have gotten mad and went upstairs. Therefore Daniel and Maria wouldn't have walked in on them changing clothes and misunderstood what they were doing. Then they wouldn't have been left alone to talk it out, soon deciding that they wanted to do something nice together to forget about their accidental circumstances. They wouldn't have just... left like that. They wouldn't have walked down this dark, dangerous road with absolutely nothing but each other.

They wouldn't have ended up like this. No matter what horrific thing had caused them to be in the state they were now.

Was it all my fault?

Finally, I reached the house. I ran inside, frantically searching for the others.

"GUYS? GUYS, I NEED HELP!" My voice cracked in the middle of my screaming, and I could feel the tears flowing down my face again. I couldn't find them anywhere. I looked upstairs, and downstairs. In every. Single. Room.

It felt so terrible, like I had left a trail of helpless tears in each room.

I had no idea where they were, so I ran into the loungeroom, and tried to look for my phone. Or any phone. But I couldn't find anyone's, so I bolted to the one place I knew there definitely was one- Zach's room.

Where had Tea found Maria's purse? I flipped up every doona cover, all the clothes on the floor, and I began desperately shoving things off of shelves and desks, when I found something silver and shiny on a bedside table- a phone? Who even cared if it was Maria's, it was a goddamn phone.

But when I reached for it, it was a lot thinner than a phone. It turned out was a necklace, and when I reached for it, a note fell to the floor. I picked it up.

Congrats Zach*! So proud of you and the boys. Here's your dog tag, for good luck. Not that you'll need it!

Much Love,

David and Candice :)

(*you'll find out why it's Zach's necklace and not Jack's later)

Good luck. I held onto the necklace, squeezing the metal with my hand, and I decided to slip it over my neck. I didn't care that it belonged to Zach- it was good luck, and Zach and Maria needed luck right now.

I continued my search for Maria's purse, when I found it underneath a hoodie. I pulled out her phone, and thankfully, it was alive and had service, but just as I was about to type in 911, I heard laughing. I stuck my head out of the open window, to peer down at a pool, where three people were sitting and talking.

"GUYS!' I call from two stories above, and they all look up at me immediately.

"Ellie?"

But before I could tell them anything, I heard sirens.

Police sirens. Ambulance sirens.

Hopeful sirens.