Mutual

Chapter twenty three

I walk into the house, sweating profusely. I'm admittedly a bit nervous about telling the boys that me and Brook are now in a relationship. Well, I say nervous, I'm fucking terrified. Brook seems so calm, sitting on the sofa and tapping his lap, motioning for me to sit there. I sit down and lean into him. I'm pretty sure the boys and Kathryn will be supportive, but I'm so anxious. I can be 99.9% sure they'll be happy for us, but that 0.1% is always gonna niggle at me. I love them, but how can I be sure they love me? They could act like they do... I need to stop thinking about this. Of course they do, why wouldn't they? I go to move off of Brooklyn's lap as I'm hurting him but he pulls me back on.

Brooklyn: "No, stay."
Me: "Why? There's all this settee space."
Brooklyn: "Yeah but everyone's going to come in in a second, and the more room for them the better. I'll text the group chat and let them know they should come in here."
Me: "Wait.."
Brooklyn: "Why..?"
Me: "No, doesn't matter. Ignore me."
Brooklyn: "No please, go on. Is something bothering you?"
Me: "I was just going to say why do we have to do it the moment we get in? Can we just chill for a few minutes and watch some shitty tv?"
Brooklyn: "Yeah, course. That's fine." He switches the tv and some old presenter starts rambling about Brexit. He flicks through a few more channels, and much to his annoyance, they're all talking about Brexit. He sighs and turns the tv back off. "Who bloody cares about Brexit?"
Me: "Theresa May. Politics."
Brooklyn: "Well I wish they could hurry up and decide what's happening."
Me: "Yeah they don't need to broadcast every day about how nothing is happening. Do you wanna text the group chat now?"
Brooklyn: "I can do, but only if you're ready?"
Me: "Yeah, go for it."
Brooklyn: "Sure?"

I nod quickly. I love how he cares so much for my opinion. He's genuinely adorable. I bury my face in the crook of his neck and wait whilst he texts them. My phone dings in my pocket, notifying me he sent it. He wraps in strong arms around my small frame. He's so comforting. I hear footsteps padding through into the room and then I feel a dip in the sofa.

Sonny: "Is she okay?" I feel Brook nod against me. 
Rye: "I'm going to get everyone else as I don't think they've seen the message." I feel Brok mouthing something and I push my face into his neck further.
Kathryn: "Y/N, are you okay?" She sits next to me and also wraps her arms around me. 

After a few moments, she releases her hold on me and I look up. Flipping heck, it's bright. I blink a few times and smile at her and Sonny. The others trudge into the room and sit down.

Me: "Don't worry, I'm okay. Me and Brook have some news actually. Do you want to tell them, Brook?" I grab the chain round my neck.
Brooklyn: "Well, I asked Y/N to be my girlfriend."
Rye: "And she said yes?"
Me: "I said yes."

Everyone erupts into cheers and congratulate us. I look at Jack and I swear I see a look of disappointment flash across his face. He masks it quickly and reaches over to pull me into a bear hug. He whispers in my ear about how he is really happy he is and pulls away, beaming at me. All signs of disappointment have vanished. Did I imagine it? probably. Jack often shows the majority of his emotion through his facial expressions, and maybe I read it wrong. I see Kathryn and Sonny whispering to each other in rapid succession. and I start to worry a little.

Me: "You guys okay? You seem very... agitated?"
Sonny: "No we're okay. We just didn't want to steal your thunder." Kathryn lightly slaps his arm.
Me: "Steal our... thunder? No it's okay, we don't mind. Just tell us."
Kathryn: "Okay fine, we were gonna tell you tomorrow, I promise."
Rye: "Tell us what, exactly? And why would you tell us on our last day?"
Me: "Last day? What do you mean?"
Brooklyn: "Oh shit, tomorrow's when we go back home to our family's isn't it?"
Me: "You what? Tomorrow? Why didn't anyone inform me? ¿Qué significas?"
Jack: "It's the 22nd tomorrow, we leave on the 23rd Brook. It's our last day together."
Rye: "Yeah. And me, Sonny and Kathryn were discussing that we should have an early Christmas together."
Me: "Oh that could be fun! Let's do that! How is that stealing our thunder?"
Kathryn: "That's not the news we were going to tell you. Sonny asked me out the other day when were on our date. We wanted to tell you together on 'Christmas' as like a surprise for you guys." She finger quotes.
Me: "Whaaaa? You got a boyfriend before me? I don't even think you saw that coming!"
Kathryn: "No I didn't actually." She laughs.
I climb off Brooklyn and tackle Kathryn.
Me: "That's for not telling me, bitch."
Kathryn: "Sorry, bitch." 

Laughter fills the room.

~~~

A/N

Hi! I didn't want to not update tonight, so... have a chapter. It's a bad one, kind of a filler but it's decent to say I just wrote it within the last half hour. 

I have a slight plan for the next few chapters, yet still no idea where I want this book to go :/ 

The next chapter will jump back a few days, kind of like a flashback? It will either be out tomorrow or Saturday. Depends when I finish it I guess. 

There's some drama coming up, so keep an eye out!

Love and peace, Hannah x