Bianca

Love.

Merriam Webster dictionary definition: an intense feeling of affection.

My dictionary definition: a concept that's nothing but a whole load of bullshit.

You can fight me on this all you want. You can try and change my mind and insist that love does exist, but doing so would only be a wasted effort. Because I simply don't believe in it - at least not the way most people portray it.

The type of love I'm talking about here is what most people refer to as true love. They say it sends sparks through their body, makes them feel like they're floating on cloud nine, gets them on this undeniably addictive high.

And that's usually the part where I'd laugh and call them crazy and tell them that it won't last - it never does.

After everything I've seen and from what I've experienced myself, I can gather one thing: true love just simply doesn't exist. I'd read something somewhere, probably from the tumblers Id always looked at, or the quote accounts I always followed on Instagram, but it was a sentence that I'd always used to define love, and found that's always what I referred to.

"Love is wanting more for someone than they want for themselves."

And so far, everyone always wanted more for themselves.

I used to be naive. So mind-numbingly naive that in hindsight, I should have hired someone to smack the sense into me.

Because as much as I'd hate to admit it, I used to believe in love, absolutely smitten with the concept of it. With the idea of growing old and creating a family with that one special person, your counterpart.

But the thing is, we don't even know what love is. How would we know? We're kids. Our idea of love is what makes us do stupid things at 1:00 in the morning or what makes us become infatuated. Our idea of love is what gets our heart broken and make our eyes tear and what makes our bodies quiver and our minds scramble.

Love sucks.

I should know.

My parents thought they found love when they were younger. And now? I can't remember the last time I saw them stand to be in the same room.

I thought I found love. But now my heart is broken, held together with nothing but a whole shit load of tape and glue.

It broke my brother and my mom and even me.

Love destroyed my family.

But we're healing.

And I refuse to let it affect me again.

Chase

Love had never been on my mind. Not really.

It was never a big deal and the concept of being romantic and sweeping a girl off her feet was just this grand absurd idea. Girls were girls and I was just someone that hooked up with a few. I mean, after all, nothing better than a good fuck, right?

I preferred my version of no complications. It was simpler and it was how I liked it.

I used to think that love was stupid, despite what everyone told me. Love was just this thought floating in space, a kite drifting aimlessly through the wind, without any anchor.

I thought it was crap.

But I've seen it.

It's real, I swear it.

I saw it in the way my family stood by each other in such dark moments. The way my mother looked at my father and how my father looked at my mother. The way my parents loved me and my sister without waver, loving and supportive no matter what. The way that they acted around each other, with such admiration and love.

When we came back, I was happy to leave behind what I didn't want to remember.

Not everyone tells every chapter of their story and I guess, coming back, I thought that I knew it all. That I had known every word memorized by heart.

And then I saw her, and it stunned me just how much I hadn't known. This book isn't even finished yet and the story already has too many twist and turns.

I didn't know a thing.

People always say that you don't know what you have until it's gone. But that's complete and utter bullshit. Because the truth is that you knew exactly what you had. You just never thought you'd lose it.

I never thought I would. But look where that got me. I've lost a shit load of things I want back.

I'm going to figure out everything.

I'll get it all back.

I swear it.

Xander

My life was easier before I'd gotten myself involved in something. And that something just happened to be love.

That evil son of a bitch.

I'd never had problems before I encountered love, I'll have you know. Life had been easygoing, fun, humorous, wild. I hadn't a care for the world.

And then I fell in love and my entire world flipped right upside down, I swear it. All the sudden, I couldn't care enough. My every breathing moment had been filled with her, and everything about her. My heart belonged to her, held in her hands and I didn't even think she knew it.

I was whipped.

And then I fucked it over.

I hadn't meant to, and I didn't even know that I had right away. But the moment I did, I felt like I'd been shot. Because I'd done something so out of the ordinary, so incredibly unbelievable to my mind and yet no one else held the same surprise.

And it ruined everything. I'd hurt the person I loved, and I couldn't seem to do anything about.

And so I ran.

But now I've got to fix things up, I have to make up for the mistake.

I just have to.

•(Slightly edited)•

A/N: It's the same for the most part, just rewritten to sound a little smoother. And I've added in Xander's POV as well.

So here are a few of my plans as I rewrite:

I'm definitely involving more of the secondary characters into the book, because I want some more Dylan, Ava, and Ellie. I haven't even included them all that much which is bullshit because they're such important people to her, but I've spent so much time focusing on Chase and Xander that I've pushed them aside.

I'm also going to be clarifying more about Bianca's family history and what happened, though I'll still be choosing to keep you guys in the dark about some stuff. I'm going to clean up that area because I feel like it's really murky.

I'm also adding more flashbacks! So far, I've only had a few, but I feel like they'd be a fun element to add, since it's important to the story about what the boys have missed.

I'm also reinforcing their characters a little more. My original plans were that Bianca was the bad girl in school as Chase had become a goody two shoes. But as much as I'm fine with Chase's characters still holding wit, I'm reinforcing the idea that Bianca is indeed a badass. She gets herself into trouble and she's quick tempered and can be a bitch sometimes, but I've gone soft on it.

Not to mention what I've done between Bianca and the boys. Bianca and Chase had like what, seven almost-kisses? And yet they never ever talking about any of them and continued on like they never existed, which is absolutely absurd and is going to be fixed immediately. Not to mention that there's lots of confusion about Bianca and what she's feeling with Xander. And if I'm confused, then you guys probably don't get it either.

Speaking of Xander, I'm giving the poor kid some more chapters. Xander wasn't originally going to be such a big character but the moment I threw him in he instantly became entangled with everything. So, it's important that I include him as well, seeing as he's a part of this story, too.

I'm also going to moving some things along. I am continuously dragging on this story and it's not doing anybody any good. Things were slow, and at this rate, it could've easily been over 100 chapters. I put in random things just to write and most parts could've been easily done out with. We'd been forty chapters in and nothing had happened, which was really bothering me. Forty chapters and it's only covered a few weeks, which is crazy.

I'm also including more school scenes, seeing as they are indeed in high school, and it's pretty important. Which means you'll be getting to bitch over Kiley among a few other characters. School scenes also means being introduced to more of Bianca's friends, which I'm excited about.

I'm also going to add stuff from the boys' away time. I mean, they were gone for awhile, so what was going on when they were?

Thanks for walking through everything with me and still holding hope out for this book, it means so much for me.