Kissed by Team Crafted //tc 3

I'm Late

~Jason's POV~

"Jerome, Rene, we have something to talk to you about," I stood beside Ryan and Ian. I'm sure we were all racking our brains, trying to come up with the right words to break it to them.

"Team Crafted is dead. I'm sure we're pretty much all aware of that, right? It would be ridiculous to deny it any longer," Ryan started. "We can't stand the thought of trying to stay here, and put together all the shattered pieces of our group. It's like we have a fallen-down fifty story building made of glass, and a bottle of Elmer's glue to put together the building again. Impossible. Are we going to stay just a few more nights, until the funeral? Absolutely. But after that, adios!"

"Way to put it lightly," I sighed.

"It's nothing personal. Dude, we love it here. But I think, and they think-" Ian gestured in our direction, towards Ryan and I- "That it would be best to go our separate ways, create a new chapter in the book of our lives. Separately."

"Again, way to put it lightly," I huffed.

Jerome just looked at us, his expression hard to read. Was he mad? Upset? Annoyed? He looked us up and down, and finally said, "That's fine." We were shocked, think I think I can safely say so. Even Rene let out a small, stifled gasp.

"What?" Jerome snapped at Rene. She recoiled in her seat. "We weren't going to stay together forever, were we? Better now than later. In fact, let's all pack our bags now. Right this instant. I'll drive us to the airport. I'll move to China, Rene, you can have Australia, Ian-" Rene reached out a hand to Jerome, to comfort him, but he smacked it away. "No. It's cool. Now's a great time to drop that 'breaking up' deal on everyone. Let's do it. The funeral's on you guys, and I'll go take a vacation to Neverland," he retorted. He pushed his way past us, our gazes all turning to him as he stormed up the steps. We watched in shock as he slammed the door to his room shut, and we heard a held-back sob through the crack underneath the door.

~Nicole's POV~

"Are you all coming on the twentieth? To Mitch's funeral, you know?" Hannah asked. I shrugged.

"We never knew him personally, so-" Kyle cut me off.

"Yeah," he decided. I looked at him in shock. "Just out of respect for him. Even if we never knew him personally. We were given the chance to say good-bye; we should take it."

"Good," Hannah smiled. "I think you made the right decision. I still... I still can't believe he's gone, you know? Sure, he made a lot of... bad decisions, but he was only human. It's not... really his fault."

"You guys have a point," I agreed. "How much money do we need to bring? For the sweatshirts?"

"I think the invitation said fifty bucks, right?" Kyle asked. Hannah nodded.

"If I had a cup of water, I would've spit it out all over you guys right now," I said, and I was only half-joking. "It's my lucky day if I find a penny on the ground. Even if it's heads-down."

"We could help you," Hannah reminded me. I perked up a little at that.

"Really?"

"Really," Hannah replied with a smile. "And if worse comes to worse, I'm sure Adam has some spare change lying around. But you didn't hear it from me." She winked at the end of her sentence.

~Adam's POV~

There were two weeks until Mitch's funeral. You would think that's a long time, but Jerome said they needed extra time to make some sweatshirts, that Mitch had been designing. I was only excited for this funeral; not because Mitch was dead or anything, but that he was kind of getting closure.

I feel bad for everything, and clearly he did; I know I sound like a hypocrite, but I'm ready to move past all that, even though he can't.

I know, I'm late.