~COMPLETED~
Ellody Brown, a high-school girl who happens to be Zach Herron's best friend since childhood, hasn't told Zach how she feels about him. But what happens when feelings for someone else come in between them? Ellody struggles with anxiety...
PREVIOUSLY: "Thank you. I still think you and Zach would be cute, by the way. You still like him, right?" she asked. Ellody's heart did a flip, mind racing back to the photo of Corbyn, Zach and Ellody in the hammock. His arms around her, their faces pressed against each other's.
"Yeah, I think I always will."
~
The yelling started just minutes later, and Ellody could hear every word. The second it started, she told Christina she had to go and that she'd talk to her later. If she survived her mum. And, eventually, Sienna.
"Well, first of all, it's illegal, and second, you pulled your little sister into it! Ellody would never do something like that without your pull!"
"She needed to break out of her shell a little! Her life is so straight forward, she needed to shake things up a little!"
"Ellody can live her life however she likes. And if she wanted to shake it up a little, she could go ice skating, or travel the world! Without breaking the law, Sienna!"
"You've raised a homebody!"
"If she wanted to be anything else, she'd change! You're not in charge of her! And this isn't about Ellody, anyway. This is about you lying to me, breaking the law and not planning to inform me about any of it!"
There was a pause, and Ellody knew Sienna had started to cry.
"You have no idea about half of what happens in my life, mum," Sienna burst, sobbing loudly. There was another pause.
"You know what? I really don't, and I'd like to start knowing! Grounded for a month. Give me your phone."
"I bought that phone! You have no right to take it away from me!"
"You wouldn't have been able to buy the phone if I didn't drive you to work the last two years!"
Ellody covered her ears with a pillow, knowing where this was going and not wanting to hear it. The pillow did nothing.
"Look, Sienna. What you did was illegal, and you should be counting your lucky stars that you weren't caught. Illegal activity doesn't always mean that you get grounded and have your stuff taken off you. It can mean being imprisoned, and I don't think you quite understand what that means. Jail time, Sienna. Jail. Like, where grown men go for murdering their wives. Where grown women go for drowning their kids. Jail is a scary place. Please, promise me you will never do anything like that again," she lectured. Ellody's eyes widened, imagining Sienna being carted off to jail. Ellody would go to court, maybe be fined... she wasn't old enough for jail time yet.
"If you haven't noticed, I didn't get caught. I don't break the law to get caught," Sienna added dryly. Ellody bit her lip, wondering how their mum would react to that. Please don't yell. I've heard enough.
"That's not the point. If you were caught..." her voice became muffled, which meant they were speaking in low voices so that Ellody couldn't hear.
Her phone rang, vibrating on her bed. Corbyn's face lit up her screen, shirtless and grinning with the bright blue sky of the beach behind him.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
