Growing Up

Zara Hood

"Well now you have to tell us how it happened," Harper urged.

- flashback -

"CALUM THOMAS HOOD PUT ME DOWN RIGHT NOW!" I screamed as Calum three me over his shoulder.

"Nope! You lost at FIFA and we had a deal. Loser gets thrown in the pool."

I was spending the night at Calum's house since my dad was working the night shift again. His parents had gone out to get groceries, and his older sister Mali-Koa was over at a friends house.

"Calum!" I shrieked, but it was too late.

He threw me in the pool with no hesitation.

"YOU BITCH!" I yelled, splashing water in his direction.

He chuckled and reached out his hand.

"Let me help you up," he offered.

An evil grin made it's way onto my face as I gripped Calum's hand.

"Oh God," he breathed after seeing my expression.

I pulled him in with me and there was a big splash next to me.

"ZARA!"

"That's watcha get, meany," I teased.

I was about to tease him again when I noticed that he was struggling to keep his head above the water. I quickly swam over to him and pulled him into the shallow end.

"Are you okay?" I worried.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm okay," he coughed. "Thanks for helping me."

"No problem," I said.

He stared at me for a bit, which made a blush creep onto my face. He got closer, which seemed weird to me.

"Can I- nevermind."

"What, Calum?"

"Can I kiss you?" he asked in almost a whisper.

I nodded and sure enough, he did. I was confused. I never thought of Calum as anything but a friend. But here we were, kissing in his pool. I pulled away and my blush reddened.

"I don't know why I did that," Calum admitted.

"It was probably just a "in the heat of the moment'' thing," I reasoned.

"Probably. Hey, you aren't gonna tell Luke about this, right?"

"No of course not!"

"But I did. I told Luke and he was the only one that knew until now," I said, finishing my story.

"Holy shit," Sierra said.

We talked about it a bit more until we decided to go to sleep. I quickly texted Ash that I would be spending the night before I fell asleep.

My eyes fluttered open and I was greeted by the sunlight hitting my eyes from my bedroom window. I looked over to see the spot where Ashton usually was empty.

"He probably got up early," I told myself as I sat up. I reached over to my nightstand and grabbed my wedding ring before slipping it on.

"Mummy," A small voice said from the doorway.

I looked over and saw a little girl who was around four. She looked a bit like Callie, but had dark brown curls and chocolate colored eyes.

"Daddy says breakfast is ready."

I looked at her questioningly before standing up and walking into the kitchen. I expected to see Ashton sitting at the table with his usual dimpled grin. But instead, someone else was sitting at the table.

"Morning, darling," he smiled as he got up and kissed me on the cheek.

"Cal?"