Irene's POV

"Break up?" I repeated, blinking at him.

"I think it would be for the best," he said, his eyes finding it difficult to stay on my face. They strayed once again towards the school building to the right and then to the parking lot exit to the left. He sighed before he looked at me again, a pained expression on his face.

"Nathaniel, what is going on?"

He'd been acting strange during the weekend and even weirder today at school. He didn't talk to anyone, he would space off in the middle of classes, the teachers would ask him questions and he wouldn't know what to reply... I even felt as if I was working alone in Biology; I had to cover for his part of the assignment.

"Does this have to do with you and Val?" I asked and his jaw clenched. "You haven't talked to her all day; you don't even look at her..."

"She did something over the weekend and it was too much this time," he answered coolly. "Too much."

"Do you want to talk about it?" I suggested.

"No!" He snapped at me. "Sorry." He sighed and leaned on a nearby car for a second before its alarm started blaring. Nathaniel jumped away with a hand over his chest and we had to move to another part of the parking lot in order to continue our conversation.

"Look, I'm trying to do the right thing here..." he began once we found a spot away from the noise and from the few students who had yet to leave the school.

"By breaking up with me? Is this how you make amends?" I asked. "When I called you over the weekend to ask if you wanted me to come by, you said no and that you would make amends. Were you planning this back then?"

"What? No! I mean, not then, but yes..." He sighed once more and pinched the bridge of his nose. His tempo was no longer hectic when he spoke again. "I mean, no, not when I said that, but I've been thinking about it for a while. I really like you, Irene..."

"You are breaking up with me because you like me?" A hysteric giggle left my lips.

"I'm letting you go now because I really like you; I like you more than I've liked any other girl," he said, sincerity in eyes and voice. "But my family will have to move again, I know we will, and if you and I keep being together, it will be harder to say goodbye. If we do it now, it will be easier to move on; maybe we'll even salvage our friendship. I'm trying to do the right thing by you."

"You are right," I uttered after a few minutes of silence between us and wrapped my arms around me. "You are perfectly right. It would be better if we ended it now before... Before one of us fell in love," my voice shook at the last word. Would he notice? Could he tell?

"So... You agree with me?" Nathaniel asked, his brown eyes narrowing slightly.

"Yeah, yeah, I totally agree. It's not like I planned us to spend Christmas together," I tried to make it sound like a joke.

I had planned for us to spend Christmas together.

No just Nathaniel and me; I'd planned for our families to meet. My older sister was coming back from college so what better time to do that? I couldn't wait for her to finally meet my boyfriend; I'd bragged so much about him over the phone, I'd probably given her a headache. She had not complain about it though; she was happy I'd found someone.

I knew that Nat would have a family dinner on Christmas; we were too. But I also knew the Reeds didn't have plans for the day after and neither did my family so I'd planned to invite them to our restaurant and introduce our parents to each other. I'd spent hours this weekend making up interesting meals for our get-together and making a list of items to buy for Nathaniel and his family for the holiday.

"And we can stay friends?" He asked hopefully.

"Of course we can... buddy," I patted him once – more like a slap – over the shoulder.

"Irene, I..." He began, but I cut him off:

"I have to go now. I have to do my homework so I'd be free to help out at the restaurant. There's a birthday party there tonight." Another lie he didn't seem to catch up on.

"Oh... Okay, sure, go," he said and gave me an awkward wave, one which I returned just as stiffly. "See you tomorrow."

"Yeah, at school. See ya. Thank you."

"Thank you?" He repeated with a raised eyebrow.

"For doing the right thing by me."

Not that it made being dumped by the boy I loved more bearable.

*****

Vallery's POV

"It will take a Christmas miracle for Nat to forgive me."

"It would take several Christmas miracles for him to forgive you," Raiden corrected through the receiver. "And a few Easter ones and you might need help from the Tooth fairy. What were you thinking, Val?"

"Not you too!" I groaned and turned to lie on my stomach, the mattress soft beneath my body. "I called you because I need support, Rai."

"I am not going to support you about this," he objected. "This is by far the worst thing you've ever done to your brother who just happens to be one of my best friends."

"I know, but I meant no harm..."

"And I know that; you've already explained to me. I still can't understand how you could think it would work out in the end." He sounded absolutely dumbfounded and I imagined him running a hand through the back of that red hair of his. "You know Nat better than anyone else so you must've also known what his reaction would be."

"I didn't imagine it would be that bad," I admitted, "but yeah, I had a pretty good idea."

"So why did you do it then?" He shouted exasperated and then said 'sorry' – probably to someone else since his voice sounded away from the receiver.

"I just told you why I did it; that's why I called you," I reminded him.

"Well, your reason sucks," he informed me flatly and I frowned.

"My reason was good and so were my intentions; I may have made a slight miscalculation on how far I could take it."

"Slight?" He repeated and I rolled my eyes. I had to speak though; communicating through gestures and facial expressions was useless over the phone.

"Big, okay? Happy?"

"No. I would be happy once you apologize to your brother."

"I tried that, Rai. He doesn't want to speak to me, remember?" I didn't even try to hide the irritation in my voice; we'd been through that already. As a matter of fact, we'd been through that on Sunday, today before school and we were now, in the afternoon, still on the same topic.

"Then make him listen, Val. I can't do that for you, especially not from all the way here. And I shouldn't have to; it's your mess, clean it up."

"I'm better with making the messes than with cleaning them up," I noted and twisted in my bed so I could see through the window. The snow was falling slowly and forming a gentle blanket over the rooftops. I shook my head; 'a gentle blanket'- how poetic! How Nathaniel.

"Nat spoiled you too much by covering for you," Raiden's voice reached my ears, devoid of any reproach.

Way to criticize someone, Rai!

"You used to cover up for me too when we were neighbors," I teased. "Or have you forgotten that?"

He laughed and I smiled. He had a very delicate and pleasant laughter; nothing like my own outburst which could deaden a herd of wild elephant drummers.

"You used to do the same for me," he noted. "That is when you weren't trying to kill me."

"When have I tried to kill you?" I asked, sitting in my bed and I placing the pillow between my back and the headrest before leaning on it.

"You pushed me in the river that time our families went camping together," he reminded a bit mordantly.

"How was I supposed to know you couldn't swim?"

"Because I shouted 'Vallery, don't you dare push me in the river; I can't swim' before you did it?"

"I don't remember," I said innocently although I did remember that day; he really had shouted that but the river was shallow and I was a pretty good swimmer; I intended to get him out just seconds after I'd pushed him in and I did.

"You actually grinned before you did that," he reminded me flatly.

"Well, you shouldn't have splashed me with glue the week before," I scolded. Over an hour of washing my hair with almost no result and that on the same day I'd already taken a shower was grounds for almost drowning someone; totally justified, especially when you didn't intend to drown them for real.

"So you do remember?"

I smirked.

"Maybe."

"You were being mean to me; that was why I used the glue on you," Rai said and I furrowed my eyebrows.

"Maybe you were being mean to me first," I suggested although by the life of me, I could not remember what had lead to him reciprocating by emptying a glue tube over my head.

"Maybe; I don't remember."

We both laughed at his admission and I could still hear the jolliness in his tone as he said:

"Look, I have to get back to work. Jimmy and Big Joe are out so it's just me and Ty in the service-station and he's a bit distracted because he got in a fight with his girlfriend again."

"Anything serious?" I asked, hoping to keep him on the phone a little bit longer. Listening about other people's quarrels was much easier than dealing with my own problems.

"Nah, Alex is pretty cool; she's just a bit of a handful... Kind of wild. Reminds me of you actually," he added. "I can't believe her parents let her live on her own."

"Wait, how old is this girl?"

"She was seventeen when she came here. She lives in her uncle's apartment but he works away from here and he uses it once per month or so. Her older cousin also visits, but she pretty much lives unsupervised. Well, used to; Ty moved in with her."

"Lucky her," I exclaimed. "I'd love to live away from mom and dad; just me and..." I closed my mouth so fast, my teeth clashed.

"You and Nat?" He guessed.

"Yeah," I admitted, brining my knees to my chest and wrapping my arms over them.

"Look, Val," Rai began after a sigh. "Give him a few days to calm down then tell him what you told me. All of it. And don't forget to say 'I'm sorry'; you tend to skip that when you try to apologize. Just be honest with him. Nat will forgive you one day, but you have to be patient."

"I'm not good with being patient, Raiden."

"You should've thought of that before you married your brother to a guy. And a blond, really? You know Nat prefers brunets."

I laughed, appreciating his attempt to lighten the situation a bit.

"Well, Hunt's natural hair color is brown; does that count?"

"Hmm... Nope," he replied, popping the 'p' and I giggled. "Be nice to him, give him space, then say you're sorry," he repeated his advice back to being serious. "Then wait, Val; that's all you can do."

*****

A/N: So what do you think about Irene and her POV?

Was Nat right to break up with her and do you think his only motive was to end their relationship before it got too far?

Also, did you enjoy the Here We Go Again reference? Raiden was mentioned in that story so I thought I'd mention Ty and Alex here since they all know each other and live in the same town ;)

Speaking of Raiden: what do you think of the boy?

He has a very small part in Hunt Me Down but he'll play a bigger role in the sequel. I did mention before that I'm planning a sequel, right? :P

Please support this chapter with your VOTE and have a great time wattpading!