Trying To Save Hope

Chapter 7

We pulled into the driveway to see that my mom and Lilly were home from the dentist appointment. We walked into the house to find my mom walking around the kitchen making chicken and rice for dinner. Rose ran upstairs looking for Lilly as I set down my car key and turned to my mom.

"Hi mom, how was the dentist?" I asked as she turned to acknowledge us.

"It was horrible, your sister has somehow managed to get herself 4 different cavities, how does that even happen we don't have any candy in this house?!" She exclaimed, as she bustled around the kitchen. I shrugged my shoulders as an answer to her question. "Now we need to make another appointment to get them filled in, anyways how was softball?"

"Oh it was pretty fun, Nick and Leah tagged along, oh and Rose has her first game coming up soon so she's pretty excited about that." I answered, she nodded her head as she listened then turned to Leah.

"Hi Leah, you staying over tonight?" Leah nodded her head yes. My mom gave her a sympathetic smile. Leah's parents are constantly fighting and she tends to stay over when it gets bad, which is often, she's become a part of the family since she started staying over. She tries to hide it but I can tell it sometimes get to her. She's told me before that she just wishes they would get the divorce which would constantly be thrown around when  they were fighting. I feel awful for her and wish they could just give her a break, y'know. "Well dinner is almost ready, I'll call you when it's ready." She said as she shooed us out of the kitchen. We began to walk upstairs towards my room when we stopped in front of Lilly and Rose's room.

"4 cavities Lilly, really?" I asked teasingly, she simply shrugged her shoulders at me, "how does that even happen?" I questioned, curious to know what had happened. 

"None of your business," she answered in an incredibly bratty tone. I rolled my eyes at her and turned to leave when Rose piped in, "she has a secret stash of candy!" She told me gleefully, a look of triumph in her eyes at the fact that she had just possibly gotten her sister into trouble.

"I DO NOT!!" Lilly yelled angrily at her tattle tale for a sister.

"Yes you do I saw you and when I asked for you to share you wouldn't." Rose said calmly, knowing  that it would rile Lilly up even, like I've said before Rose is a smart ass. Lilly stamped her foot and threw her pillow at Rose and started screaming again. I turned to Leah, "c'mon it's gonna get bad really quick."

"Shouldn't we step in or something?"  Leah asked apprehensively, I turned to see the twins beginning to throw random stuff at each other, then back to Lilly, "nah, they'll figure it out." Then left the room, Leah following quickly behind when a barbie doll nearly took her head off. We proceeded to my room and once we got in I flopped into bed.

"Today has been to long!" I complained, looking up at the ceiling as I said it. Leah took a seat on the floor, "no kidding." She agreed once she got settled. We sat in a comfortable silence, save for the screams coming from the other room. I finally grew bored decided to speak up and break the quietness that had seemed to engulf

"So Leah, we haven't had a chance to talk in a while, anything interesting happen to you lately?" I started. She thought for a minute and shrugged her shoulders, "not really anything newsworthy," she finally answered.

"Okay, new tactic," I tried again, "are there any guys your interested in?" I asked as a joke, but as I said it her face burnt bright red, I quickly turned over and looked at her in excitement. "There is a boy, who is it?" I demanded. She looked down at her lap her face still glowing a bright crimson.

"Aiden," she finally conceded.

"Oh my gosh, like our Aiden?!" I nearly shouted in excitement. She simply nodded in response to the question I had asked. In case you wanted to know, Aiden is another one of our friends, we started talking in like 8th grade when Nick had decided to befriend him because he didn't really have any other friends and since then we've all become really close.

"You guys would be adorable, I'm like 96% sure he likes you back!" I exclaimed, excitement oozing out with every word. She finally looked up and smiled at me, "do you think so?" She asked excitement beginning to take place in her voice as well as mine.

I nodded my head and said, "pretty sure, and now I'm going to make it my job to get you two together." Leah beamed up at me, after that her face took a more serious expression.

"Can I ask you something?" She questioned the seriousness in her statement becoming very clear. I squinted at her, wondering how she could go from giggling teenage girl, to serious young adult in the span of 3 seconds but I simply shrugged and answered, "okay, shoot."

"You have to be completely honest since I was honest with you, okay?" She started off.

"Oookay..." I answered wearily.

"Are you and Zack okay, the way you guys acted around each other was really weird, and it's not only been that one time, it almost seems like you're uncomfortable around him, are you sure everything is okay with him?" She questioned, not breaking eye contact with me as she said it. I flinched inwardly at the question, trying not to reveal myself.

"No Leah everything is fine between us, like I said it was just a tiny little fight, nothing you really need to worry about." I lied to her. She looked at me trying to decide if I was being truthfully, I guess I was convincing because she smiled again and said, "okay I just had to make sure, y'know." I nodded trying to push back the guilt that had began to eat my insides.Leah had been honest with me right off the bat and every day I was feeding her a new lie, and I wasn't just lying to her I was lying to everyone I cared about. As we sat there the guilt continued to eat at me until I finally made up my mind.

"Leah?" I started, gathering the courage to finally tell someone about the problem I had been dealing with for so long.

"Yeah?" She asked wearily, sensing the fear in my voice.

"I-" I began to say then trailed off, the fears started to get to me again, if I were to ask for help from her I could be putting her in danger... "I-" I tried again but was cut off by Rose bursting into the room.

"Mom says dinner is ready," she announced then left. Leah was still looking at me, many questions burning in her eyes.

"Never mind," I muttered, "it's not important." She looked at me and then decided to just shrug it off, I then got up from my bed and led her to the kitchen to eat dinner.

A/N

What's that? Could it be, an actual update?! Yes it indeed is an update, I'm really sorry for being so slow with my updates, I get so distracted by other stuff, I hope you guys can forgive me. So, what did you guys think of this chapter? Not much happened, sorry about that I wanted to write this one to further develop Leah character (she's not as oblivious as we thought) and introduce a new character into the mix, you guys will get to meet Aiden a little later, maybe next chapter I don't really know yet. Thank you for reading and don't forget to comment and vote and all that fun stuff, see you next time, bye! :)