Chapter 4

I lay in bed staring at the painted black ceiling. The sun shone through the small window above my bed, its rays of white illuminating the settling dust in the air as it lit up the red wall opposite me. There was movement upstairs and the random clink of bottles being thrown around could be faintly heard. The guys were cleaning up the aftermath of last night's party. If I waited another 10 minutes I would be able to get out of cleaning, unfortunately, if I waited another 2, I'd probably go crazy from the millions of thoughts running through my head.

I slid my legs off the bed and pushed myself up, grabbing on to the bed post to stop my groggy form from collapsing. I sighed loudly in the under-furnished room and padded my way through the small corridor towards the bathroom. The uncarpeted concrete floor under my feet was ice cold, and the musty scent of last nights beer and sex lingered throughout. Both Leon's and Jesse's doors were open slightly, whereas Vince's door was fully closed, as was the bathroom door. I reached out and twisted the handle, only to find it locked. I did a mental eye roll and slammed my palm, flat against the already dented wooden door.

"Yo, who's in there?" I said, trying the handle again. The disgruntled whine that came as a reply told me it was Jesse.

"Not much of a morning person." I mumbled to myself, smiling slightly, knowing Jesse probably had an excessive amount of alcohol and was probably clutching to the toilet bowl heaving his poor soul out.

"Who in this house is?" Vince's low rumble behind me caused me to jump and spin around.

"Don't DO that!" I clutched my chest with one hand as though I had a heart attack, and punched him in the shoulder with the other. He laughed and took a step back to steady himself from my shove.

"Watch it girly, not all of us slept as well as you probably did last night."

I stared at Vince with my brow raised and turned to walk off when there was a shuffling behind the bathroom door and it swung open. Jesse popped his head out, looking slightly flushed; his eyes red, puffy and him looking quite shocking overall.

"Had too much to drink again, bro?" Vince leaned against the wall behind him with his arms crossed across his chest, and chuckled.

Jesse groaned and looked at me with almost pleading eyed. "I think you should use the upstairs bathroom."

I smiled and ruffled up his hair, eliciting another groan from him. He closed the door and it clicked locked again. I turned around to face Vince again and shook my head, amused; he rolled his eyes still smiling.

"So, what's the damage up there?" I motioned towards the stairs leading into the upstairs main hallway.

Vince shrugged and slipped his hands into his jeans pockets. "Haven't gone up yet. Kept thinking the longer I stay in bed, the less I'll have to clean up."

"Then why are you up?"

"The same reason you're up; couldn't sleep." We both chuckled quietly. Vince looked at me up and down and gave and approving smirk. "How'd it go last night?"

My heart stopped in my chest. I knew I'd be asked that question sooner or later today, but I still hadn't thought of something to say. Vince looked at me, waiting for an answer, but I tried to avoid the question quickly. "I should get up there before Letty comes down to look for me." I smiled a blatantly obvious fake smile and ran up the stairs into the kitchen before Vince had time to say anything.

Mia was already at the stove whipping up something to eat, with Letty sitting on the counter top next to her yammering away. Leon sat at the kitchen bench with his head down, reading a magazine, twirling his car keys around his finger and was humming to the music that was coming from the living room. Dom was holding a large black plastic garbage bag, that made clinking noises as he walked, making it clear that it was filled with empty bottles. From what I could see, they had already cleaned most of the mess, and were just starting to enjoy the day. Dom picked up the last piece of garbage in the kitchen and threw it in the bag. He saw me and nodded his hello before he walked out the back door, slinging the bag over his shoulder.

"Cassie! What's up girl?" Letty screamed with joy when she noticed me standing there. Her face lit up with excitement, waiting for me to spill everything that happened the night before. She hopped off the bench and leaped towards me, slinging her arm across my shoulders and pulling me towards her. Mia looked at me with just a big a smile that Letty had on her face, also gleaming with anticipation.

I heard Leon shift in his seat as he tried to keep his focus on the magazine, or something other than the conversation that was about to happen. He was almost as nervous as I was, and I could sense it. I did a mental grimace and forced a weak smile onto my face.

"Uh... I... not much... happened..." I trailed off as I looked over to Leon who was now hunched over in the seat, staring blankly at his keys.

Letty took a step back and eyed me up and down. She raised a brow and looked at me dead in the eyes.

"What?"

"What happened last night? Why are you pausing? Why do you look kinda... different."

I laughed nervously and walked over to the fridge and pulled out a soda bottle. "How do I look different?"

Letty looked me over again and smiled. "Well, for one, that's not your shirt." She said, waggling her brows.

I looked down at what I was wearing, and saw I was definitely not wearing one of my shirts, but a black men's t-shirt; Leon's. When Leon had got back to the house after everything that had happened the night before, there was no way I would have been able to get to my room without being seen by somebody. Leon had offered to let me stay in his room and I had taken one of his shirts. Later on, after the party had died down I snuck back into my room. I was mentally kicking myself for not getting changed after I had woken up. Letty jumped towards me and grabbed the hem of the shirt and tried to pull it up.

"HEY! HEY! What are you trying to do?" I said laughing, and trying to pull away from her grabbing hands.

"Making sure you're wearing underwear. C'mere!" She grabbed me by the waist and pinned me up against the fridge. I could hear Mia laughing behind Letty, and she was soon joined by Dom who had walked in to the chaos.

"Damn Letty, it you wanted to jump Cassie, you could at least wait until the two of you are alone." Dom said between laughing spurts.

Letty spun her head around and gave Dom a warning glare, before facing me again. She lifted up the shirt, smiled and let me go. "Well, damn, I was hoping for a good story today," she shrugged and grabbed the soda bottle I was still holding and took a swig, "whose shirt is that... it looks familiar." She scrunched up her face as the words passed through her mind.

I pulled at the shirt, biting my lip as I thought of what I would say. "There was some... trouble last night." I paused and watched Letty's reaction. She blinked a few times as the words registered. I took a deep breath and continued, "I came back early, and I didn't want to be seen so I snuck into Leon's room... after he came to get me." Letty's jaw clenched as she turned to look at Leon who was looking up at me. Everybody was silent in the room. I looked around at everybody quickly. Dom was sitting at the table with his arms crossed over his chest, staring silently at me. Mia was looking between Dom and Letty, waiting to see which one of them would react first. There was some shuffling from the room behind us and Vince and Jesse walked in. They took one look around the room and straight away knew something was off.

Letty clenched her fists and I saw her take a deep breath before she looked back to me. She grabbed my wrist and pulled me away from the kitchen, and out the front door. The door slammed closed behind us, and we both walked further out onto the lawn.

"What happened last night?" Letty grabbed my wrist and pulled me down onto the lawn. She crossed her feet under her as she sat across from me. I did the same and sighed.

"He offered me a job," I pulled a blade of grass out from the soil and played with it in my fingers. "But there's a catch; I have to go to New York... and I'd have to cut off all contact with you." I said flatly and straight to the point. The more I said in the least amount of words, the quicker the conversation would end.

Letty turned her head and focused on something on the other side of the road. "Did you take it?"

"No, of course not!"

Letty smiled weakly and looked back at me. "Did you at least think about it?"

I shrugged and looked down at the grass in my hands. "I kinda did, somewhere between New York and me having to cut you out of my life completely. But, I made my final choice when he slapped me."

There was a slight pause before she burst out. "He did WHAT?!" She waved her arm around above her head, "I'm gonna kill that fuck. Who does he think he is?"

"Letty! Letty! Calm down! Relax, please!", I grabbed her arms and pinned her wrists to the floor in an attempt to get her to calm down.

"How can you tell me to relax? How can you be so calm?" She said quietly.

"What am I gonna do, Let? Seriously. I'm weak and he can do so much damage."

"Fuck him!", she grumbled under her breath. "Well then, what do we do now?"

"Now, we forget about him. Forget he ever existed and get on with our lives."

"That's going to be easier said than done." I just nodded and gave Letty a reassuring smile that things would be ok. "Whydd you call Le? I mean, why not Mia, or Jesse, or Vince, Dom, or me?"

"Because, I knew how you'd react. Exactly like you just did; you'd shout and probably end up throwing punches. Same with Dom; nobody would get out of there alive if Dom went," I shook my head, smiling at the thought of how much they would do if somebody hurt me, "and Vince, who knows what, or who he would be doing. Jesse wouldn't have known what to do, and he'd have probably freaked and told one of you guys which would lead us back to my first point. And Mia, well, Mia would ask a lot of questions and she'd worry. Le's the calm one out of everybody. I knew he'd come, no questions asked, and he wouldn't cause a scene." I finished with a smirk.

"Ok. Good enough reason."

As we finished up, we heard the flyscreen door creak open. We both turned to face a very serious looking Vince. He shuffled his feet a bit and scratched the back of his neck. He motioned towards the house and shuffled in the spot a bit more, "Cass? There's somebody on the phone for you."

"Who is it? Can it wait?" Both Letty and I stood up and brushed the back of our pants off.

Vince did a shrug and nodding motion, "I really think you should take it." He took a deep breath and headed back inside. I looked at Letty and shrugged and we both quickly headed inside. Everybody was sitting in the kitchen doing there own thing as Dom handed me the phone.