it's so lonely here

Soon

Ethan's POV
I was scrolling through twitter when I came across a picture of Emma with some fans. At first glance, the photo was cute, they were all throwing up peace signs in an Apple store, but then I started to read the comments. Everyone was talking about how it looked like Emma got beat up, many pointed out that she had a black eye. Soon my notifications became flooded with people tagging me in the photo or directly tweeting at me, in hopes I knew what happened. I zoomed into the photo and sure enough under her right eye was a deep line of purple. It looked like she tried to cover it with makeup but smeared it in one spot. My first thought went to the party and I wondered if someone hurt her. God I'd fucking kill anyone that hurt her. I didn't want to jump to conclusions though, that wouldn't get me anywhere. I decided that my best bet was just to facetime her and ask. She wouldn't lie to me, and if she did I'd be able to read her face. I opened up her contact and clicked call.

God Emma, please answer.

The screen opened up to a smiling Emma, "Hey cutie," she giggled into the phone. "Hey youu," I replied, "I need to ask you something." Her smile quickly faded and she became very serious, "What is it?" she looked down at her hands. "Hey hey, no it's fine baby," I said, making her look up at me, "it's not what you think. I was just going to ask if your eye was okay. I saw that you have a bruise on twitter." There was a pause and I tried to read her face, hoping I could figure out what she was thinking. "Oh," she laughed, "yeah I'm just a clutz. I tripped walking up my stairs last night, that's actually how I shattered my phone." A wave of relief washed over me. "Thank god," I said, "I swear Emma if anyone would have hurt you I would've killed them." She let out a small laugh and then quickly changed the subject. Deep inside something felt off, but I wasn't going to push her and I had no reason not to believe her. I mean, I could definitely see her falling up her stairs, she is one of the clumsiest people I have ever met. "So how's Jersey?" she asked. "Great, I always love spending time with my family. We've just been hanging out at the house mostly, but that's one of my favorite things. I'm excited to see you tomorrow," I winked at her, resulting in an over dramatic eye roll. "Oh I'm sure you are," she replied, "I can barely wait to see you." "The wait is almost over, I'll be in tomorrow morning," I assured her. "Okay," she signed while laying back on her bed. "Everything else good?" I questioned. Ever since her meltdown before I left I couldn't help but worry. "Yeah, everything is great, just chilling with all my friends," we both laughed as she spun the computer around. "Wow there's so many, you forgot to tell me you were having a rager," I joked. "Well I only invite my friends so it's no surprise you were unaware," she retorted. I grabbed my heart and made a pained expression, "Wow em, that one hurt." We joked around for the next few hours, I honestly loved our little back and forth conversations. She never failed to make me laugh and I was so worried that when I asked her to be my girlfriend all of that would stop. She really is everything I could ever dream of. "Hey E," she whispered, "I'm about to fall asleep." "Okay," I responded, "I'll see you when you wake up." She softly smiled while her eyes grew heavy. "Do you need me to pick you up tomorrow?" she sleepily asked. "Gray has his car parked there so he can just drop me off. Sleep in, I'll come wake you up," I told her. "I'd like that," she breathed. "Goodnight Em, I'll see you soon," I softly said, fully knowing she had fallen asleep. I ended the call and laid back into my bed and closed my eyes. I was going to be with Emma in less than twelve hours and I couldn't wait.

Emma's POV
I suddenly woke up to a video blaring from my laptop. I must've rolled onto the space bar, resulting in Pauly D's voice screaming out of the speakers. "What the fuck, what time is it," I thought. I shut my laptop and grabbed my phone to check the time, 4 in the morning. "Ethan's coming today," I remembered. I jumped out of bed and decided that I should clean up before he came. I picked up my apartment and then went into the bathroom to freshen up. I still had yesterday's 'clothes and makeup on, except I looked much worse. My hair was messy and less than half of my makeup remained on my face. I decided that a shower would be my best bet in fixing this mess. I hopped in the warm shower and was greeted with flashes of pain radiating from my cuts. I looked down at my arms and sighed, the bruises were still there but fortunately my cuts had faded to a puffy pink. I quickly washed my body, cringing as I swiped over each arm. I washed my hair and grabbed my towel to dry off. Once again, I was face to face with myself in the mirror. I was actually sad for the girl that stared back at me, she was hurt and broken. Tears started forming in my eyes but I pushed them away. Ethan was coming today and I was not going to let his homecoming be focused on me. Plus, he didn't know about any of this, he thinks I just tripped up the stairs. God, I hated lying to him, but I had to protect him, I didn't want to be a burden. I brushed out my hair and walked over to my closet. I chose an outfit similar to the one yesterday since it was good at hiding my battered body. I put on a black turtleneck and an oversize red hoodie with leggings. I didn't waste any time with makeup since he already knew about my black eye and plopped myself back in bed. It was 6 am and I was exhausted again. I buried myself in my covers and fell back asleep. The next time I woke up Ethan would be here. A smile formed on my lips, I couldn't wait.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: shorter chapter but I'm updating super soon, like tonight!!! Just need to finalize it. Let me know what you are thinking so far!!!

Word count: 1145