[ 3 ] 2014 

-

"There's a bunch of moving trucks taking all the furniture and everything else Calum left behind."

-

Harley avoided everyone at school that day, and it was very difficult for her to do so.

Niall and Andrea were being paranoid, thinking Harley would be capable of hurting herself because Calum was now gone. The last thing they wanted was for her to hurt herself on their watch. Though Harley relentlessly assured them she would not throw herself off a cliff, as Niall put it, they still didn't seem convinced. Michael and his friend Dieter were also keeping an eye on her, trying to help her cope with her grief by keeping her distracted. Their method consisted of telling bad jokes, singing dirty song lyrics in German and Dieter telling her stories of his childhood growing up in Germany and Mexico. Apparently, his father was German, while his mother was Mexican, making him a mixed person with double nationality.

Harley had to admit the stories were interesting, but she preferred to be alone.

Dempsey and Paúl were no real help either, and Harley didn't want to third wheel with them. They were always together, and she thought there was probably something going on between them. It was clear to her that they really liked each other.

When the final bell rang and she was dismissed from her english class, she kept a low profile so that the other cheerleaders wouldn't see her. If she was spotted, then she would have to attend practice and her plans would be ruined for the afternoon. 

Now that her family had been in Sydney for a while, she knew the neighborhoods quite well. There was a movie rental store two streets away from her school, right next to the super market, which was where she would get everything she needed for her movie night with Ashton.

She made it out of St. Genevieve's without being spotted and walked alone to the store, in between small crowds of students who complained about homework and extracurriculars. 

Harley entered the movie rental place, went to the children's section, and grabbed all the princess movies she could find. On her way to the register, she saw there was an aisle with action movies and she spotted the Fast & Furious movies on one of the shelves. She thought Ashton would really enjoy them because of the various sports cars they used. Even though they were much different than the ones he was used to seeing in the sixties, Harley figured he would still like them.

Harley made it home an hour after classes ended for the day. 

She had a grocery bag with different kinds of sweets, chips, and ice cream to snack on. The movies were all stuffed into her backpack that slung on her shoulder. 

As she walked up the cement path that led to the front door, she noticed there were no cars in the driveway. Her father was surely at work, and her mother was probably running some errands or at the exclusive country club their family was a part of because of Aaron's job. Harleen was normally home by the time Harley and Billy got back from school, but since Harley had skipped out on cheer practice, she had gotten back before her mother. 

The seventeen year old got her keys out of her pocket and unlocked the front door, pushing it open. Since she was the only one at home at the moment, she dropped her keys on a small table by the front door and locked it behind herself. She then trudged up the steps that led up to the second floor and made her way down the hallway to her bedroom. Once inside, she shut the door and locked it. Harley set the grocery bag on her bed and went over to her desk in one corner of the room to grab her laptop. It was a small electric blue colored laptop that she grabbed in her hands and returned to her bed with.

Before putting the movie into the disk slot, she called, "Ashton..."

He appeared in her bedroom within seconds. It was the handsome apparition of a boy who had died in 1963, and though having him living in her bedroom was probably not something normal, to Harley it was nothing out of the ordinary. She was used to this kind of thing by now.

A smile formed on his lips when he saw her; Ashton was always happy to see Harley. His hazel eyes looked to the small stack of movies and the grocery bag on her bed. "Looks like you're ready for a party, doll." He commented.

Harley shrugged her shoulders. "I just want to eat...and sleep...and forget about everything."

"I wish I could help you eat all this stuff. It looks pretty good." He added, making her crack a small smile. "But the dead don't eat."

"You just sit and relax." She said to him, gesturing to her bed. "I'll put in the movie and let the Disney magic begin."

"Which one are we watching first?" He asked as she picked up one of the boxes, the one at the very top of the stack. It was the movie The Little Mermaid, and it had princess Ariel on the front cover, from the scene where she was sitting on a rock and singing.

She took a look at the stack of movies as well, thinking a bit too hard about which one they should see first. She thought of following the time line in which the movies were released, but then she decided that was probably too much work. Instead, Harley had grabbed a random movie box without even looking at the title. "We're going to watch Beauty and the Beast." She read the name off to him after she looked at it.

Ashton got all the snacks out of the grocery bag and set them on the night stand next to her bed to give them space to lay down together. Harley placed the dvd in the disk slot of her laptop and hit play. Then she plopped down on her bed with her laptop on her lap, and Ashton soon joined her.

-

"Wow," Ashton observed with annoyance. "That Gaston is such a nosebleed."

She found it adorable the way his attention was fully immersed in the movie. It had captured his interest from the beginning. For Harley it was a different story. She had seen every princess movie, some even more than once, and she knew the story by heart. Rather than focusing her attention on the movie, Harley was more focused on eating her snacks. She was snuggled close to Ashton, her arm draped over his torso, and her head rested on his shoulder. In her other hand she held a piece of chocolate that she was eating.

They were very near the end of the movie, with Ashton's hazel eyes glued to the screen in suspense, when Harley felt her cellphone vibrate in her blazer pocket. Thinking it could be Calum, she got it out as quickly as possible. Her eyes glanced at the caller ID to find it was Niall.

She was going to send the call to voicemail, but figured that if he was calling her and not texting her, then it was probably something important. 

Pausing the movie for a moment, she told Ashton, "Sorry, Ash. I have to take this call."

He nodded. "Go ahead."

Ashton had never seen the movie and was curious to know how it ended, but thought he could wait a couple of minutes while Harley talked on the phone. After all, spending time with her, watching movies together like that almost made him feel like he was normal, like he was actually alive. He hadn't seen a movie with someone in fifty years.

Harley hit the answer button her her phone's screen and brought it to her ear. "Hey Niall." She greeted him tiredly. During the movie, she was very close to drifting off to sleep. But Ashton's commentary during it kept her fully awake. 

"Hey Harley." He greeted her with his Irish accent. "You should probably come to Calum's house as soon as you can. And by that I mean right now."

"Why?" She asked. 

"Andy and I came to check on his house, to see if he was back...but we found something else." He explained to her. By the tone of his voice, Harley knew it was something urgent. The background noise to the call was full of loud noises, something like trucks backing up and other machinery. Harley wondered where they were. Her eyes darted to her balcony and she could see outside, the street was virtually empty. They were obviously not home. After a short pause, he continued to explain, "There's a bunch of moving trucks taking all the furniture and everything else Calum left behind."

Now Harley got up from her bed. Ashton's hazel eyes watched her curiously, especially after the abrupt way in which she got up.

"Did you ask them if they know where Calum is?" Harley said into the phone, her words desperate. And also hopeful that they might finally find out where their friend was.

"No." Came Niall's reply. "Andy thought we should call you first."

"Wait for me. I'm on my way." She pleaded.  

Niall agreed and they ended the phone call. Harley stuffed her cellphone into her red uniform blazer's pocket and turned to Ashton with an apologetic look on her face. "I'm so sorry, Ash. Niall and Andrea said there's some activity going on at Calum's house, but he's nowhere to be found. We want to check it out." She explained to him. She knew Ashton well and she knew he wouldn't be upset at her for it, but she still felt bad about leaving him there alone. "I promise I'll be back as soon as I can and we'll finish watching the movie."

"Don't worry, doll." Ashton reassured her with a smile.

Harley quickly leaned in and kissed him on the lips before saying goodbye. "Thank you for understanding, love." She said, and she hurried off towards Calum's house.

-

She practically ran the distance to his house and made it there in under thirty minutes. Harley arrived out of breath and panting, but the moving trucks were still there, to her luck. Niall and Andrea were there too, waiting on the sidewalk by their car that was parked nearby. They weren't directly in front of the house, but the place where they had parked allowed them to subtly keep an eye on the house. 

Andrea eyed her with concern. "What took you so long, Harley?"

"I don't have a car." She reminded them, trying to catch her breath. She didn't have a very good condition for running, like her brother did. The only sport she participated in was cheerleading, and she rarely showed up to the practices. And even when she went, they hardly did any running.

"That's right." Niall crinkled up his nose. "We should have gone to pick you up. Sorry."

Harley shook her head to reassure them. "Its fine. It really wasn't too long of a walk or anything. But have either of you asked if they've seen Calum?"

When both shook their heads, she left them to walk over to the men by the moving trucks. There were four loading a sofa into the truck while one of them was supervising. Others were on their way with smaller objects such as chairs. He was an older man, which was probably the manager of everyone else. When he noticed Harley standing there, he turned his attention to her. "May I help you?" He asked her politely.

"I was just wondering what is going on here." She told him nicely.

"We were hired by someone named Calum Hood to take everything in this house and store it in a warehouse. He said he was moving away, and considered selling the house or renting it to another family. But he just wants the house empty by next week." He explained to Harley, taking a look at his clipboard once more to make sure they were on track.

Harley looked over then man's shoulder, her blue eyes searching the outside of the house. "Is he here?" She asked.

The man shook his head. "No. I never saw the guy personally. He contacted us over the phone and said the gates would be unlocked. But there's no one in that house. No staff, no security guards, no one living there."

"Do you know where he is?" She asked another question. "I'm his friend and I need to know he's okay-"

"We don't give out personal information about our clients, young lady. If he's really your friend, you can call him personally and ask him where he moved." He told her. Then that meant, that he did know where Calum was, but the information was private. Though Harley still felt like something wasn't right about everything. She felt a small sense of relief that he was at least okay enough to request his furniture to be moved.

The older man left Harley standing there by herself and went to talk to some of his workers.

She narrowed her eyes at them suspiciously. That was when something caught her eye. On one of the moving trucks, she saw the name and phone number of the moving van truck company. 

Harley jotted the information down and told herself she would look them up on the internet later. She thought the information might help her find where Calum had gone.

She returned to Niall and Andrea to give them the news. "Calum isn't here." She sighed in defeat. "But it looks like he called to have all this things moved to some warehouse. The only ones I know of around here are the abandoned ones downtown. I don't see why he'd want to take them there though." She explained to them.

"Maybe its a clue." Niall said in a hopeful tone, his blue eyes widened. "Maybe he wants us to go there to find something."

"We should go there." Andrea suggested.

Both Harley and Niall agreed.

-

The three arrived at the beginning of a long line of old factories once known as the furniture district. Now they were only a bunch of abandoned buildings no one used anymore. They drove down the long line of worn down buildings until Harley saw one she recognized. 

It was one where office furniture was made, and it was the same factory warehouse where she and Calum had once gone. 

"That one!" She pointed it out and Niall hit the brakes on his car. "I'm sure his things were brought here."

The Irish parked the car right out front in a parking lot that had been for important workers of the factory and some for loading trucks. It was late afternoon and it was beginning to get dark in Sydney. The sky had a pinkish tint to it, but Harley thought the darkness that was coming with the night could benefit them. They could hide easier.

They walked up to the front entrance where there was a sheet of paper and the door was chained shut.

Property of Calum Hood the paper read in large red lettering.

Harley's hands reached for the metal door handles and pulled on them, but they were chained together, and didn't allow her to open. The chains clanked against each other, making  a lot of noise that seemed to get someone's attention.

From around the corner of the building came, calling out to the three of them. "Hey! What are you kids doing out here? Leave that alone!"

He picked up the pace of his stride as he turned the corner, startling the three of them. Niall, Andrea, and Harley raced towards the car they arrived in and got inside. Before the security guard could do anything to stop them, they left the premises. Niall sped off down the street in a direction that led back to the residential areas. On the lonely street into town, they passed several moving trucks heading towards the old factory building. They were the same ones Harley had seen out front at Calum's house. 

Harley wondered why he wasn't returning to Sydney.

There had to be something more to his sudden decision to leave.

-

this is probably the longest update i have written for this series. 2.7K words. normally, i write about 1.5K words. this is almost the double of that. but i was feeling inspired. thank you all so much for reading.

does anyone know steppm12? she was the american reader who won the conest, and she hasn't contacted me. if she doesn't contact me by saturday morning (in 2 days), i will have to give the book to someone else. 

thank you all so much for reading.

question of the day: what do you think happened to calum? i obvs already know bc im writing this. but i want to see what you all think. do you think he left on his own, lke his letter says? or do you think something else is going on? im not gonna answer the question of the day this time bc i dont want to give anything away. another mini question of the day: how would you feel if the boys read your fanfics? tbh, i would probably cry and be embarrassed forever. not because writing fanfiction is bad, but because im naturally a really shy person. haha. let me know in the comments!

but thank you all so much for reading. it means a lot. and thanks to those of you who have purchased the book. i was very excited to see that some people actually bought it. i thought i was going to get zero sales and that i was going to be friendless and alone. haha. but no. you all are super amazing, and i love you to death. and you are soooo amazing. i already said that. sorry.

but yeah, have a blessed day.

-clary xx