I was irritable all day, finding myself annoyed by the slightest of offenses: people walking slowly in the halls, probably innocent glances that I took the wrong way, accidental nudges as I walked, everything. The more I thought about it, the more I thought my decision to meet with Lydia and Haley was a bad idea.

I had agreed to meet them only because of Harry's nudging, after they had taken me by surprise. I was certain that if they were to have asked me when I was alone, things would have gone in a very different direction.

Fidgeting in my seat of my last class, I anxiously waited for the bell to ring so I could leave the slowly compressing room; I felt like I was being suffocated in here, and I needed to speak to Harry so I could get through this ordeal.

Finally, the bell rang and announced the end of class. I sprang up from my seat and practically ran out of the room, desperate to get to Harry. Thankfully, I found him arriving at my locker the same time I did, relieving some of the anxiety that had slowly built up from the last time I saw him.

"I don't want to do this," I told him immediately, coming to a halt in front of him. He sighed as he leaned down to press a kiss to my cheek.

"Why not?" he asked as he pulled back.

"They don't deserve it, first of all," I started. He gave me a disapproving look. "And, I don't need them as friends. I'm perfectly happy spending all my time with you."

"You need other friends, Joey," he told me gently.

"I thought you wanted me around all the time? Won't this take away from that?" I reasoned, trying to get him to agree with me so I wouldn't have to do this.

"Yes, of course I do, but it's good for you to have friends other than me," he said.

"You don't," I pointed out before I realized how harsh it sounded. I opened my mouth to apologize but he waved me off and shrugged.

"I never really have, and that's fine, but you're used to having a lot of people around you. At least just give them a chance? For me?" he pleaded, his lips splitting into an adorably wide grin, showing nearly all his teeth. How could I argue with that?

"Fine," I conceded, frowning at him.

"Thank you," he said, grin stretching, if possible, farther across his face as he took my hand and kissed my palm before we started down the hallway to leave.

Our car trip home was quiet, but not uncomfortable. My mind was spinning with what they could possibly say to explain themselves. I had a hard time believing that I could trust Haley; she had hardly seemed sincere at all and didn't have a good history of making apologies and meaning them.

Lydia, on the other hand, seemed a little more heartfelt as she spoke to me. She had always been the softer of the two, more likely to apologize and feel regret for her actions.

A thought occurred to me as Harry pulled into my driveway to drop me off.

"Why don't you come with me?" I asked excitedly. Alone, this would be miserable, but with Harry, it would maybe be bearable. And, to be honest, it would probably turn out better for them if he was with me, forcing me to be nice.

"I don't think that's a good idea," he replied, deflating my short-lived hope.

"Why?"

"It doesn't really have anything to do with me," he said, shrugging and looking at me apologetically.

Actually, Harry, it has everything to do with you, I thought. He didn't know that, though, and I hoped to keep it that way. He didn't need to know the awful things they had repeatedly said about him, or the crude remarks Colt had made to me.

I knew he would blame himself for my loss of friendship when it was in no way his fault; those people had made their choices, and I had reacted. There was nothing he could have done to prevent it.

"I wish you would," I said sadly, clinging to the shred of hope he would change his mind.

"I know, I'm sorry," he replied, squeezing my hand softly. "I'll be here after, if you like."

That made me feel better. I could get through this interaction, which was sure to be annoying and infuriating, with the knowledge that he was waiting on the other side.

"Okay, thanks."

He smiled softly at me before leaning across the console to give me a lingering kiss.

"You can do it," he said softly after he pulled back and peered into my eyes.

"If you say so," I said skeptically before grinning at him and pecking his lips one more time. I opened the car door and hopped out. "Bye, Harry," I said, shooting him a reluctant smile.

"Bye, Joey," he called. I closed his car door and ran inside to drop off my backpack before grabbing my keys and heading back outside. Harry's car was already gone from my driveway as I climbed into my car. I immediately started my car and backed down the cement, knowing if I hesitated, I wouldn't go at all.

The drive to the coffee shop seemed to take no time at all, much to my disappointment. I hadn't even had time to collect my thoughts and get control of my emotions before I found myself climbing out of my car and heading inside.

The familiar smell of roasting coffee and freshly baked pastries hit me the second I walked through the door. It had been a while since I'd been here; it had been our favorite place to do homework and stuff on the weekends before our falling out. I wasn't surprised to see Lydia and Haley seated in the bit wrap-around corner booth- it was where we always sat.

I made sure to keep my disapproving expression on my face as I made my way over to them- just because I was here didn't mean that they were forgiven. They'd have to work for it, if I even chose to forgive them at all.

Harry would be terribly disappointed if I didn't.

I threw myself into the booth roughly, sitting across from them, delineating our opposing sides clearly. It was me versus them, and I was not feeling very forgiving at the moment. I didn't say anything as I stared across the table, waiting for one of them to speak first.

Lydia looked like a nervous wreck across from me, chewing on her lip and twisting her necklace around her fingers as her eyes darted back and forth between me, the table, and Haley. Haley, who I was surprised to see, looked nearly as nervous as Lydia. Her short blonde hair looked distressed, like she had flipped it around several times to distract herself.

"Hi," Haley said sheepishly. I had never seen her look so disheveled. Lydia flashed me a nervous smile.

"Hi." I stared at them both, unwavering in my hard gaze.

"I'm really sorry," they both blurted out at the same time, shooting each other tense looks and letting out small, nervous giggles.

"You've mentioned that," I said harshly. I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned back in the booth, away from them, trying to look intimidating.

Lydia's eyebrows pinched together. "I know. But I really, really am sorry, Joey. I don't know what else to say." She looked sad as her eyes searched mine bravely. I turned my expectant gaze to Haley.

"I'm so sorry, too. We were assholes and we shouldn't have waited so long to apologize but... I don't know. We're here now," she said. Her attempt at an apology was appreciated even though I still doubted her sincerity.

"Why now?" I asked.

They both shrugged, their faces twisting up in regret and apology. "We miss you. And I know we should have come to you sooner after we heard what happened but we were idiots," Haley replied.

"What happened, specifically? Because I can think of several occasions that warranted an apology but got nothing," I said coldly. Lydia winced.

"Everything... what Colt said to you at the party-" Lydia started only to be cut off by me.

"So you did hear what he said and you still didn't do anything? Not only did neither of you apologize, you didn't even acknowledge it!" I could feel myself getting angrier as I thought back to that night that felt so long ago. The searing hatred I had felt for everyone at that party was returning and burning through my body.

"I thought maybe you guys truly didn't know, which I could have gotten over, but now that I know you did... god I don't know. That's tough." I glared at them both.

Lydia looked close to tears, which was a bit pathetic in my opinion, because we had barely even cracked open whole collection of issues.

"I don't know, Joey... we just weren't thinking. We were at the party having fun and... I don't know," she finished unspectacularly.

"You mean you were being selfish," I supplied, cocking an eyebrow at her.

"Yes," she said lowly, dropping my eye contact and physically drooping.

"And you?" I said, turning once again to Haley.

"Same thing, I guess. Too busy having fun to bother," she admitted, looking ashamed. I was surprised she had owned up to it at all.

"Okay. So what about Colt beat the living shit out of Harry? And your boyfriends probably helped, honestly," I continued. They both shook their heads frantically.

"No, they didn't! Please know that- we were all out to a movie together when Colt did it. We had no idea he was going to until after it happened," Lydia explained, her eyes wide as she pleaded with me to believe her. I stared at her for a few seconds before Haley spoke.

"I swear, we didn't know he was going to do that," she said honestly. As much as I didn't want to, I believed them.

"Okay fine. But again, after it happened, neither of you said anything to me."

"We never saw you..." Haley said quietly.

"Bad excuse, I'm not hard to find. You could have if you really wanted to." That was not a good enough reason for me to accept.

"I know," Haley conceded. "I don't really have an excuse for anything. It was just so weird, Jo. After all these years of us being a group, you were suddenly gone. You had changed and we had stayed the same, so I don't know... we didn't know how to handle it."

My hard gaze softened a little at her words. I still didn't accept their excuses, and they weren't forgiven yet, but for the first time I could see their side of the story. To them, it seemed like I had suddenly outgrown them and left them for someone else. Which may have been true, but it probably wasn't fair.

"All I can say is how sorry I am, Joey," Lydia added. "I'm sorry and I miss you."

"We miss you," Haley corrected, smiling softly at Lydia before daring to smile at me. "You don't have to forgive us now, but can we at least work on it?"

I signed and glanced back and forth between them, feeling my frown smooth out of my face.

I'm proud of you.

Harry's voice drifted through my head, making my heart pound a little harder simply at the memory, encouraging me to be the bigger person and forgive them. I sighed in defeat.

"Yeah, alright, fine," I said. "You're forgiven."

Looks of elation presented itself on both of their faces as they sucked in a happy breath, relief clearly coursing through their bodies.

"But! If either of you do something like that ever again, or blatantly ignore me when something like that happens, I'm done," I warned, raising my eyebrow sternly. They both nodded vigorously.

"Oh, of course! It won't, Jo, I swear!" Lydia said, grin stretching across her pretty face.

"Yeah," Haley agreed, nodding in assent. "Never again, we promise."

I finally allowed myself to smile. It was a small, careful smile, but a smile all the same. Despite my reservations about them, I believed that they really were sorry and missed having me around. And, deep down, I couldn't deny, I had missed them too. Harry had, of course, been right.

If they would keep their word and not screw up again, however remained to be seen.

They both continued to grin at me from across the table, clearly ecstatic to have succeeded in their goal. We spent the next hour catching me up on everything I had missed since our fall out had started. I wasn't really surprised to learn that nothing had really changed; they were both still with their boyfriends, Colt was still a man whore and a dick (no surprise there), and they still spent most of their weekends partying.

As much as I missed them, I didn't really miss the things they were describing. I had spent plenty of weekends partying with the same people, and I was pretty much over it, but I had chosen to give them another chance, so I guess that's how it would be.

After a while, we decided it was time to leave. As good as it felt to have a fresh start with them and have caught up with them, I couldn't ignore the nagging feeling in the pit of my stomach: I missed Harry. I felt a little ridiculous, because I had literally just been with him an hour ago, but I couldn't help it. Even when I was busy doing other things with other people, I was constantly being drawn back to him, yearning to be in his presence again.

I said a brief goodbye to Lydia and Haley, waving casually before either of them could try and hug me. Yes, they were forgiven, and yes, we were starting over, but I was still plenty cautious around them and nowhere near ready to be accepting any hugs. They pranced off to their respective cars as I climbed into mine.

I couldn't help but grin at the thought of seeing Harry again shortly, and looked forward to telling him about my little reunion. He would be proud of me for accepting their apology, and that made everything I had just experienced worth it.

Thanks for reading! What did you guys think?! Was she too soft on them or not hard enough?

On an unrelated note, I've been thinking of the posting the first chapter of 'Resolution' just to see if people think I should continue with it; if I did, would you guys read it? :) x