Chapter 12: I'm falling for you

The soft material underneath me made me think that I was still on Zak's sofa. My eyes were closed, and my head hurt.

As my eyes flickered open, I saw three heads on top of me, blocking the blinding white light from scorching my eyes. Though, they seemed like shadows as my eyes adjusted to their faces.

Zak, Summer and Vince.

"Are you okay?" Vince's voice seemed so far away, yet I knew he was riight above me.

I sat up and immediately felt a hand on my back as if to support me. Tingles shot through on that area where the hand was, along with warmth that saved me from the cold air-conditioning.

"Hey," Zak gave a feeble smile.

"What happened?" I croaked, trying to remember the series of events that happened before.

Maybe whatever that had happened was a dream after all.

"You fainted," Summer said, giving me a sad smile.

So it wasn't a dream.

My head snapped up as I looked at my brother. The one who was suppose to protect me, not hurt me. Not lie to me about my parents. Not keep secrets regarding our family.

The anger I had once felt gave rushing back to me. I ignored the lethargic feeling I felt and gave the deadliest death glare I have ever tried mustering in my whole life.

"You're a selfish person, y'know that?" I spat, "a caring brother wouldn't have kept something so huge from their own sister who lost her parents at the mere age of two!"

"Lyss, listen. I didn't know how to tell you, you were just too you-"

"Don't you dare. Don't you dare say I was too young! What about when I was thirteen? Fifteen? Sixteen? Eighteen? Goddamn it Zak! I'm nineteen now! You had so many years to tell me but you had to let me find out this way?" I yelled.

Summer and Vince were now looking back and forth at whoever was talking. If it was Zak, they'd watch Zak. It was almost as if they were at a Formula 1 race just moving their heads to look at the race cars passing.

Zak was now silent, as he processed whatever I had said. He placed his thumb and pointer finger on the bridge of his nose, before squeezing it in frustration.

I looked at him for just a few more seconds, before sighing and looking away.

"Can we go?" I turned to Vince.

Vince looked at Zak as if asking for approval, and Zak nodded.

I stood up with the support of Summer and we left the office, no one speaking a word.

The whole car ride was the same as it was when we were on the way to Zak's workplace.

Everyone kept silent. I could feel Summer on the backseat fidgeting and moving around in the uncomfortable silence. But so much so, I appreciated the silence.

Vince ever so often looked at me from the corner of his eye. I could see him do that from my peripheral vision as I looked at the blurry images of houses and planted as he drove.

---

The fact that I didn't have a room for myself sucked because I would have to be in a room with somebody when I wanted to be alone.

I thought about staying in Summer's room, but she kept fidgeting as if restraining from asking me what had happened.

Then I thought about going to Vince's room, but of course, Vince was in there and he'd probably talk me into telling him what had happened.

Finally, I decided on finding Joseph.

"Joseph?" I asked as soon as someone picked up the phone.

"Lyssabelle? Hi," he replied.

"Can we talk?"

"About?" he asked and you could practically hear him furrowing his eyebrows.

"Just... About the house. We sort of need some money..." I lied, knowing Joseph would be willing to meet me because of that.

"Sure."

Standing up from the couch, I headed over to Vince's room. Just before I was about to knock, the door swung over which caused me to jump.

And of course, me being me, I tripped over air and fell forward.

I closed my eyes preparing myself for the impact, yet it never came. Instead, I felt a strong pair of hands on my hands, hoisting me upwards into a standing position.

"Already falling for me?" Vince smirked, as if to lighten up the gloomy mood I had.

"You wish," I retorted, "Could you drive me to Joseph's place?"

"Who's Joseph?" he asked, rather rudely, but I shook off that feeling and explained.

"He's my father's friend, and apparently in the letter I found, he knows the truth on my they left."

"So will you drive me there?"

"Not until you say you're falling for me," he smirked.

I stared at him with wide eyes, before rolling them and sighing, "I'm falling for you."

He heaved a sigh of relief, somehow and nodded. A ghost smile was tugging on his lips, but I turned away.

Finally when I wasn't talking to Vince, I could feel the tingling sensation on my waist. The area where he touched.

"Summer! I'm driving Lyss to someone's house!" Vince yelled right beside me, and I winced.

Gee, he's loud.

"Okay!" she shouted back and I shook my head.

"You guys are going to irritate the neighbors," I commented.

Vince shrugged and spoke, "they already hate us anyway."

Vince guided us to his car and I followed. He opened the passenger for me and I didn't bother hiding the smile that broke out.

"So where is Joseph's house?" Vince asked as he buckled himself in.

"Uhm, forth avenue on high street."

"High street? Is he rich?" Vince asked, flabbergasted.

"Yep. Very."

"Sweet," he said and started to drive off.

I starred out at the blurred streets like how I did on the way home from Zak's office.

"So," Vince spoke after a while, breaking the peaceful silence, "I broke up with Vanessa."

I broke up with Vanessa.

That's what he said right? And that indirectly meant that he was single, whih shouldn't matter to me but he was single.

"Oh."

Great, Lyss. All you could say is oh?

Something bubbled up inside of me, something I couldn't quite explain. Tingles could be felt in my stomach, and when I sucked it or mentally tried to stop it, I couldn't.

It felt as though I was suddenly injected with a huge amount of oxytocin.

A smile tugged at my lips but I restrained it from breaking free without knowing the true reason as to why I wanted to smile.

"You're not going to ask why?" Vince turned his head to look at me for a second or so, before turning back to face the road.

"No?"

I figured Vince wouldn't want to talk about it, since they were together for about a year or so. They seemed quite intimate with each other.

The image of them together was disturbing in my mind, so I oushed it out of my head. After all, they're not together anymore.

Vince's grip tightened around the steering wheel and I nodded. He seemed a little agitated, probably from the break up.

At least there was one good news today.

Suddenly, a feeling rushed over me as I watched him drive. A feeling so weird yet thrilling, it was impossible to ignore.

It was then I realized, maybe what I had said earlier, was true.

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Author's Note: I find that this wasn't my best, and I'm so sorry about that. Nevertheless, I hope you'd still love this chapter as much as the others.

So what do you think? xo