𝗦 𝗧 𝗔 𝗡 𝗟 𝗘 𝗬

𝗦𝗛𝗥𝗨𝗚!

3𝙧𝙙 𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙤𝙣 𝙋𝙊𝙑!

after telling everyone what happened and showing them the video as well, the boys sat in silence for a moment to process everything.

'so you were like physically pulled down?'

she nodded at sam, biting her nails.

'are you like, good?'

'yeah i'm good, my face hurts a bit but that's it, everything else is fine.'

they nodded and james led down, putting her head in sam's lap and closing her eyes.

after another moment of silence, conversation started again.

jake took regular glances at james, scanning her injured face. even with the deep cuts running from her forehead diagonally to her chin and the smaller incisions scattered around, he found her stunning, he just wished he could tell her.

james was almost asleep, curled up sideways and resting in sams lap, when sam shushed them.

'it just got so quiet!'

'you didn't hear that thud like footstep right as you were saying be quiet? or was that just me? like i'm being for real i heard like a-' corey hit the side of the tent, imitating the noise.

'i just thought it was-'

'yo shrek, shrek you see anything?'

he made shrek look back and forth, making james chuckle as she stirred from her nap, sitting up and wincing when she rubbed her bruised eye.

'wait say what you said earlier about shrek's face with corey.'

suddenly, colby let out a yell because there was a bug inside the tent, and everyone hit the inside of the tent dramatically.

they went back to the question colby asked, james laughing loudly as corey made the exact same face that shrek did, calling it the 'dad shrug.'

they sat and talked for hours, until sam asked the question that james was dreading.

'jay, what did the wiccan mean earlier as we were leaving? she said you were like a lot more involved in this or something, right?'

all eyes were on her and she tensed slightly, pulling her phone out and keeping her eyes on it as she began explaining.

'uh so basically, where i lived back in arizona there were a lot of abandoned places and the number slowly went up just because of like old farms and stuff that no one wanted to take care of when the owners like died or left. so, eventually, my group of friends and i decided to go and start exploring around these places and stuff. we'd have days like especially in the summer where we'd just run around and do the craziest shit, run from the police, sit on train tracks and wait for the trains to come and then jump out of the way at the last minute, because it was an adrenaline rush you know?,'

she took a deep breath, tapping something on her phone and biting her lip lightly in anxiousness.

'so, one day we decided to start recording our little adventures, just for memories and things to look back on. when i moved to LA i decided to put them together in a little kinda short film movie thing, and you guys can watch it instead of listening to me go on if you want.'

they all agreed in silence, and james set her phone down, leaning it against the entrance of the tent before clicking play and leaning back.

the group watched as james appeared on the screen with 6 other people, loads of videos of them all together having loads of amazing experiences.

some of them would be james filming, but the majority of the videos were just various people from the group holding the phone, james in the background and making many appearances.

the screen showed them sat on train tracks at sunset, skateboarding through the streets and swerving around cars, narrowly avoiding the weirdest kinds of people, or homeless ones in abandoned barns and sometimes warehouses, similar to the jewellery one sam and colby started out at.

the four boys watched in awe as a younger version of their friend jumped fences and expertly manoeuvred through decaying buildings away from police or locals, basically cheating death in most situations.

after 45 minutes, the video ended and james grabbed her phone, shoving it into her pocket and playing with her sleeves.

'so, yeah. i guess that's it, i just wasn't sure if you guys were gonna think that i was like stealing your thing in a way if i ever made that kinda stuff public so i just didn't.'

'brother that was sick! you're like a badass, j! you literally outran death in all of those situations, what the hell!'

'you should make a youtube channel bro, and like post that and do a kinda story time thing of all your experiences.'

james hummed, contemplating the idea.

'yeah, maybe.'

'where are those people now? if they're down they could come here and do an exploring video with us or something!'

james swallowed, looking down as tears welled in her eyes.

'oh uh, they're- they're dead. all of them died in a car crash. it was a party that i was supposed to go to and i'm always designated driver but i didn't go and they got a ride with a guy that they didn't know was drunk, they crashed and the car was completely totalled, no one survived. i always feel like it's my fault because if i'd have gone then i would've driven and everything would be okay. but, now they're dead and i'm never gonna see them again.'

she held back a sob, closing her eyes as tears leaked out of them silently.

all of the boys looked at the girl, their hearts breaking. there was nothing they could do for their best friend and she was crying, they didn't know how to make it better and it was saddening them.

'hey, hey i'm sorry. i didn't mean to bring that up.'

sam comforted her and pulled her into a side hug, rubbing her arm.

she hugged him tightly back, pulling away and rubbing her eyes.

'i'm sorry, i didn't mean to make this sad.' she weakly chuckled, situating herself back in her spot.

conversation was on the subject of james and her friends for a bit before they were talking nonsense again. jake bought her into his side and she cuddled into him.

'you know it's not your fault, right? you didn't know what was gonn happen.'

'i know, bub.'

he ran a hand through her hair and she snuggled into him, drifting off to sleep quickly. sam, colby and corey all smiled to themselves and each other, they knew that jake and james were practically made for each other and they had to get the two together by the end of the year.

𝙛𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙧