Chapter 8: The Secret Confessions

"YOU DID WHAT?!"

The pink haired devil screamed on the top of her lounges. She was inflamed, shocked, and probably angry at her oldest friend.

"Now, now, hear me out! I know what you're thinking, but there's a reasonable explanation."

"Dude! You just rejected your crush! REJECTED!!!" She grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him frantically. "Do you want me to spell that out for you!? I'm not good with English, but I know how to spell rejected and I am not that dumb!"

Sean sighed. "I just..." But, as a matter of fact, Milly was right. Yesterday, Sean just rejected his crush. Well, he knew his crush was talking about him, but he just didn't know how to respond, what might happen next, so he just pretended that he didn't know it was him. "Okay, I was gonna tell him, but I couldn't."

"Okay, you know what? This is probably not my problem. I know you're not ready for these kinds of things yet." Milly tried to calm down, but something inside her just makes her want to burst again. She mumbled to herself. "I just... feel bad for..." She tapped on the benches, staring at the flowers her boyfriend and his garden club did. It was one of the things that calmed her down. She breathed. "I need to ask you a question."

Hearing that, Sean turned to Milly.

"Do you want to be with Jake?" Milly said. "Do you wanna just... do everything with him and be with him forever?"

Sean was about to respond, but stopped. He did want to be with Jake. He did want to do everything with him and be with him forever, but something is stopping him from doing it. It's his fear. The fear of being in a relationship. What if it turns out bad? What if they break up? What if it doesn't work out? "...I don't know."

"It's a yes or no question." Milly tapped on the benches again. "You know Jake. You know that he'll never do anything bad to you. You're not ready for romance yet, tell him. Let him take you out on a platonic date or whatever. Just let him know that you feel the same way. I'm so sorry if I'm forcing you to confess to him it's just- I just-It's just..." she put both her hands on her friend's shoulder and immediately wrapped her arms around him as she sobbed dramatically. "I don't wanna see you both suffer in romantic drama! You're too young! I JUST WANT YOU TO BE HAPPYYY!"

Sean tapped his friend's shoulder. "Okay, okay, there, there, Milly. Calm down." he rolled his eyes, but on the inside, he thought about what Milly said and he sighed. "Okay, fine. I'll think about it."

Milly sniffed and held Sean tighter.

***The bell rang.

It was time for rehearsals, but Hailey didn't show up yet. The unknown number called her yesterday and the worst part was: it was Drew. Out of all the people that could haunt her, it was Drew. Freakin' Drew. Why did it have to be Drew? She was about to tell Zander, but would he really take any chances in the fact that his sister was gonna visit the person who manipulated their friend last year and bullied them for years?

Of course not.

The first person that was on her mind to tell was Jake, but she didn't want any drama. Anything that happened last year, cannot happen this year again.

She went outside to an alleyway Drew told her to meet her in. Hailey looked around for him and spotted a magenta haired boy in the corner, holding his phone and smirking at the aqua haired girl.

Hailey glared at him and stomped towards the rich boy.

Once Drew saw her coming, he waved. "'Sup, music frea-"

"Okay what do you want now!?" Hailey spatted, ready to punch the magenta haired idiot.

"Woah, woah!" Drew surrendered. "I wasn't here to pick up a fight, lady."

"Then what are you here for?! Bringing Jake back to your 'friend group'? 'Cause he's not interested!" Hailey crossed her arms.

Drew stayed silent for a while, then scoffed. "Okay, I'm gonna pretend you didn't say that. Wow, you're even more feisty than the last time I talked with you and your little club."

"Yeah and this time I'm ready-"

"So, do you wanna go somewhere together?" Drew interrupted Hailey. He smirked at her, then winked.

Hailey's fists dropped. "What?"

"So, I realized you're not as bad as I thought." Drew put his phone in his pockets. He scoffed sarcastically. "Even though you yelled at me."

Hailey's eyes widened. "Huh?"

"I wanted to apologize by taking you out. It'll be a secret for now. I know how your brother will react if you just announce that we're going out."

Hailey kept quiet for a moment. Then, she finally spoke, "Drew, what's going on?"

Drew put his hand on the girl's shoulder. "Look, I'm sorry for everything I've done to you and your little club. It was... wrong of me. That's what I wanted to tell you." He put his hands onto his pockets once more. "I know you're not gonna forgive me that easily, so I want you to take you out. And I promise it's not a joke." Drew chuckled. He sounded so... sincere that Hailey (on the inside) believed him, but it wasn't gonna take one apology just to make the girl accept it.

"What if I reject you?"

Drew shrugged. "As long as you accept my apology."

Hailey glared at him.

Drew smirked. "So, will you go?"

***

***

Sean walked to the soup aisle in the grocery store: Milliot Mart. He picked up some Ramyun noodles and put it into his basket.

While walking across aisles and picking up some grocery items, he thought about what happened today. He thought about the incident in the music room. Zander yelled at Hailey for being late; it wasn't like her to be late. Her face looked like she saw a ghost, though.

Then his mind darted onto another topic and then he thought about what Milly said earlier in Elliot's garden: "You're not ready for romance yet, tell him. Let him take you out on a platonic date or whatever. Just let him know that you feel the same way."

He shook the feeling off his mind, but he couldn't seem to get it out. Mostly Jake. How did he just reject him like that?! How-

"Sean?!"

Sean heard a familiar voice yelling after him. He turned behind him to find the peach haired boy waving at him hysterically. With that, he pushed and dashed towards the black haired boy. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh! I'm just doing groceries." Sean laughed. "What about you?"

Jake shrugged and chuckled softly. "I just agreed to do the groceries today- without my brother this time." he mumbled. "I have a lot of stuff on my mind lately."

Sean didn't respond to the last comment. He pretended not to hear it. "So, are you done?"

Jake slapped back into reality and turned to Sean nodding. "Oh yeah. Let's go to the counter."

While walking to the counter, Jake noticed Sean using his phone while walking. He looked at his friend's basket to find out there were only 5 items. Jake didn't want to spend so much time in line for so long so once they were at the counter, Jake stopped him.

"Hey, you don't have a lot of items, I can pay for them."

Sean's eye widened in surprise. "What?! No, I can't ask you to do that for me. I'll pay for my items, don't worry."

Jake laughed. "Oh come on, I insist." Jake grabbed his basket. When Sean accidentally touched the tip of his finger, his face turned red- but he tried to ignore that.

Sean pulled his basket away from his friend. "Uh, no." He practically almost scoffed and laughed at the same time. "I'll do it."

Jake did the same thing. "No! I'll pay for it."

This went by for a long time until the lady who was checking their items looked at them as if they were crazy strangers. Jake didn't even notice that she already scanned his items.

With Sean distracted, Jake pulled the basket out of his hands. "Miss, can you include these too?"

Sean glared at me. "Jake--"

"Hey." Jake interrupted him and gave the black haired boy a quick smirk. "I insist."

Sean stopped as Jake said those words. His face turned red with flusteredness. Too flustered, he didn't try to fight back anymore.

"Okay that'll be $27.40!"

Jake smiled. "You got it!"

***

After the grocery store, Sean decided it would be best if he could walk with Jake. Jake told him not to, but he said it was 'revenge' for letting Jake pay for his items. And of course, Sean gave in. He did kind of want to do this with Jake anyway.

The peach haired boy groaned. He didn't like carrying groceries. But... it was better than his brother trotting along with them.

Sean sighed. "You know, you really didn't have to pay for my things."

"Yeah, well, I insisted. Also, I knew you wanted to walk with me so I figured 'why not' since I didn't wanna wait forever."

Sean looked at Jake as his expression changed. "You could've left though..."

"I wanted to stay. You're my friend after all."

Jake saw Sean's face die down, like something he said made him a bit upset. Jake was about to ask why; until he noticed they were already next to his house.

"Well, looks like I gotta go now." Jake saw him make that ridiculous fake smile. Sean turned back. He was about to go, but his friend stopped him.

Jake put his groceries down, looking at his friend sympetically. "Sean, are you okay?"

"Er... yes? What do you mean?"

"Well, I noticed that you seem a little down." Jake scratched his head. "Was it something I said?

Sean kept quiet for a moment. He put his groceries down as well. Then, he looked at Jake; his hands together. He inhaled. This was it. It was now or never. It doesn't matter anymore. Sean felt his hands sweat. "Remember when you said you had a crush on someone? And when you said if it was me, I said no then you left?"

Jake raised a brow. That was oddly specific. He thought. But it was true, Jake was just about ready to confess to him; until he knew Sean was in love with someone else. "Uh...yeah."

"I may have... lied..." Jake saw his face turn into a bright shade of red and he was turning away from his crush.

"Oh..." was all Jake said. He didn't understand, until he repeated it over and over in his head. Sean lied about saying he didn't like me... What does that- Then, he blinked, he stared at Sean like he just saw a million stars in the sky. "W-Wait that means you-!"

"Yeah." The black haired boy chuckled, rubbing the back of his head.

"I'm in love with you Jake."

Yayyyyy

I am so sorry for not uploading so much!- It's been pretty hard to write as you can see. ;-; So few things:

First of all, added Drailey! Do you guys like Drailey? If not than I have another idea in mind. I can always just do it if you guys don't like it.

Second, yesterday was Jakey boys birthday! Yaaaaay! This was kind of a late birthday gift to him. :3

And I hope you enjoyed the cliffhanger of the confession! ^^ I'm kind of excited to do the next few chapters now hahaha! Anyway, thank you all for reading. bai~