Warning here: brief mention of a father suffering with a gambling addiction and the impacts on the family during this chapter.

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Tatum never moved so quickly in her life.

She threw on her actual clothes and ran to the bathroom, panicked thoughts going through her mind. How could she be so careless? How could that be the way Kinsley found out? That was the last thing Tatum wanted. She wanted her friend to understand. She wanted to go about it in a way that would make Kinsley okay with it. She didn't know how she was going to do that, but she thought she would have some time to think through it more.

Kinsley was her best friend. How could she do this to her best friend? This was the only person who had stuck by her for years and accepted her for who she was. She didn't mean for this to happen with Brady. He was the last person she ever expected to fall for. She needed to talk to Kinsley.

Tatum didn't bother to knock on the bathroom door— what could she see that she hadn't already? Brady jumped as she swung open the door, dropping his toothbrush in the sink as he stared at her in question. "Tatum, what the hell?"

"I may have made a very, very bad mistake," Tatum panted, which was an insane understatement.

He tilted his head at her, gravely asking, "What did you do?"

"Hypothetically, what would you say if I accidentally answered your phone when Kinsley called because I thought it was my phone and I told her that I just hooked up with someone and she instantly realized it was you because I had your phone," Tatum rushed out all at once, not taking even a second to breathe. She held her breath as she waited for his response. Wincing, she added, "And then I hung up on her without saying a word."

His eyes bulged from his head and he keeled over as if in physical pain. "You what—"

"Hypothetically!" Tatum all but screeched, flailing her arms around.

"You hypothetically what?" Brady shouted the correction without missing a beat.

She cried out, throwing her hands up. "God, it's not hypothetical, I really did it!"

"You don't say?" he quipped sarcastically, gripping the bathroom sink like a lifeline. "Oh fuck, she's gonna kill me. She's gonna kill us."

"Which one of us do you think she's gonna kill first?" Tatum asked feebly, shifting her weight back and forth on her feet.

"I don't think she'll be picky, Tatum."

"Oh my god," Tatum groaned, feeling incredibly nauseous. She turned around and walked out of the bathroom. "We need to go. We need to go talk to her right now."

"That's a bad idea. That's a very bad idea," Brady stressed, following her instantly and stepping in front of her. "She needs time to cool off."

"Come on, give her more credit than that," Tatum argued firmly as she shook her head. "It's Kinsley— she's more hurt than anything else. I knew this was off-limits. I knew this would hurt her. I need to make this right."

Tatum went to move past Brady but he gripped her forearm. She paused in question, tilting her head at him. His voice was quiet as he asked, "Don't... you don't regret this, do you?"

She sulked slightly, feeling incredibly guilty. Tatum cupped his cheek and leaned up, pressing a chaste kiss against his lips. She kept her hand on his face as she told him, "This is the one thing I'm not questioning right now."

Brady grinned at her, giving her one more kiss before turning around. He grabbed his keys from the hook on the wall, nodding his head towards the stairs. "Come on, I'll drive."

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Tatum wanted to run so badly as she stood outside of her dorm room.

It felt like she was a dead man walking. She hated when she was in the wrong. It was an awful feeling to know you messed up. It was a terrifying feeling of dread to so desperately want to make things right when you were the one who was in the wrong. Her stomach was filled with knots and she so desperately wanted to just fast forward to the end of this conversation so that she didn't need to live through it herself.

But she had to do this.

She had to face this and pray that Kinsley would forgive her.

Before Tatum could stop herself, she lifted her hand and tapped her first against the door.

The door swung open.

"Kinsley—"

Her voice was clipped and distant as she said, "Don't talk."

Kinsley turned away from the door and headed inside their dorm. Tatum felt like her breath was sucked out of her as she followed her inside, physically biting her tongue to not speak. God, she just wanted to explain. To apologize. To make things right.

Her friend paced slightly as she tried to find what she wanted to say. Tatum sat down on the edge of her bed, waiting for Kinsley to speak first. She wasn't even going to think about saying a word until she knew what Kinsley was thinking.

"For years, you've been my person. We both struggled in the friend department. Both a bit too quick to anger. Both a bit too stubborn. But that didn't matter, not with us," Kinsley stated in a short voice, arms crossed over her chest. Tatum desperately wanted to speak up, but she stayed quiet.

"I've never found something to not like about you. All the flaws you were so worried about never mattered to me. All that mattered to me was that you've always stuck by me when I've needed you. Well, guess I found something to not like," Kinsley drawled bitterly, her tone as cold as ice and full of venom. "I mean, am I supposed to be happy that you're fucking my brother?"

"No, god, of course not," Tatum assured her desperately. "I... I was going to tell you."

"Oh, were you?" Kinsley asked in a disbelieving voice, tilting her head mockingly.

"I- I tried to not care about him. I tried so hard to ignore everything. I looked so hard for things to go wrong and for him to say something to drive me away because I didn't want to do this to you," Tatum rambled firmly, her words all blending together as she tried to get everything out. "But eventually... I- I stopped looking."

Her voice was slightly softer as she quipped, "You don't say."

Tatum breathed out in exhaustion, trying so hard to find the right words. "Kinsley, it's... it's really hard to not care for somebody when they care about you."

"I know," Kinsley scoffed bitterly. "When I first met you during move in, I tried so hard to not like you."

Tatum squinted her eyes. "What?"

"I had been through so much shit with my family that I couldn't take it anymore," Kinsley explained tightly, shaking her head. "But there you were. And you cared about me. You... you could just tell when something was bothering me. But you never made me talk about it. You'd let me put on some random movie and act like I was forcing you to watch it so I'd be distracted. You've done that for me for three years now. You just got me. After a while, I stopped looking for reasons to not like you. I trusted you implicitly."

"And I'm so sorry that I broke that trust," Tatum stressed firmly, incredibly touched by Kinsley's story. "I... I never meant for this to happen."

"Oh, so, since you didn't mean to, it's fine?" Kinsley questioned in a grim voice.

"Of course not," Tatum denied as she huffed out shortly. "But... I—"

"You wanna say something," Kinsley stated knowingly, all of her defenses up and ready to go.

"No, I—"

"Just say it."

"Kinsley."

"Tatum!"

"I feel like you always have one foot out the door!" Tatum cried out finally, groaning immediately after she said it. "You're my best friend, Kinsley. But part of me always felt like you didn't trust me. I guess I just... I wanted someone who didn't seem like they were expecting me to screw everything up. Well, guess I still did that."

Silence filled the room and Tatum was really regretting saying anything. She should've just taken the hits and hoped that Kinsley would forgive her. But it would only be half of the conversation that they needed to have. Kinsley had secrets. It wasn't an issue that Tatum didn't know them. That would never be an issue. But Tatum didn't want that to hold Kinsley back from being her friend. And sometimes, it felt like it was Tatum's fault. In this case, it was. But it felt like Kinsley was always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Tatum couldn't keep going like that.

Kinsley had a contemplative expression on her face and Tatum knew that this was the moment that could define how would be going forward. All cards were on the table. This would either be the moment Kinsley let her walls down, or built them up so high that Tatum would never even conceive of trying to break them down. Tatum wanted Kinsley to trust her. She wasn't sure she deserved it, but she wanted that trust. She just hoped Kinsley saw something in Tatum still worth trusting.

"My father has a really bad gambling problem," Kinsley told her slowly, swallowing thickly. "He was so desperate to help Jamie that he couldn't see he was losing more money than he was getting back. I could always tell growing up that it was a problem. I just didn't realize it was that bad until it was too late."

She leaned against her desk, crossing her arms over her chest. "I saved up for college for years. I needed money that I had never even dream of having. But I saved every paycheck. All the change I'd find in the couch. Money from any odd job I could get my hands on."

"And then I went to go add some money from babysitting to it one day. But it wasn't there," Kinsley told her with a mirthless laugh, eyes looking distant. "I just knew. I knew what happened to it. I went to my Dad and I've never felt so betrayed. He tried to gamble it so they could get money for Jamie. He said the plan was to pay me back with what I had since he was so sure he'd win that much. He lost every single penny. All of it. It was gone. I had to take out such an insane loan that I'm gonna be in debt until I'm old enough to collect Social Security from a retirement home on Mars."

Tatum didn't dare say a word. She didn't even know what to say to all of that. Her mouth had gone dry and she felt guilty in a way that didn't even make sense. Everything about Kinsley suddenly made sense. If Tatum had gone through that, she would probably isolate herself from everyone she ever met. She hated that Kinsley had to face that alone. She wanted to protect her friend from things that hurt her. Instead, Tatum became yet another thing that hurt her.

"After that, I couldn't stay," Kinsley finished, but Tatum could tell there was still a piece she was leaving out. "I had to get out."

Tatum wasn't known for having a way with words. She didn't always have the right thing to say or know the perfect way to comfort someone. But she didn't need to think. This was Kinsley. This was her person. She didn't need to think about it. Before she could second guess herself, Tatum took a step forward and wrapped her arms around Kinsley in a hug. She waited with bated breath as she waited for the other girl to react.

Kinsley paused for a moment Tatum was worried she got it all wrong. But before she could pull away, Kinsley placed her arms firmly around Tatum. She sagged with relief that her friend didn't pull away. Tatum rested her chin onto Kinsley's shoulder. She tried to figure out if this was helping or not. She didn't know if she was doing any of this right. 

"We've never been too good at this, have we?" Tatum asked with a watery laugh, trying to make the hug as comforting as she could.

Kinsley held onto her tighter. "Actually, I think we're getting pretty good at it."

Tatum closed her eyes as she held her friend. She wondered what could have been if she met Kinsley earlier in life. She wished she could have prevented all this pain from happening to her. Kinsley was one of the best people she knew. She was inexplicably caring and fiercely loyal. Tatum only wanted the best for her. It broke something inside of her that she couldn't even trust her own father after everything that happened. Kinsley was the last person to deserve all of that.

"I love you," Tatum told her in a wobbly voice. "And I'm so sorry that I didn't tell you about this."

The girls pulled apart and Kinsley gave her a sincere look that made Tatum feel considerably better. Tatum continued, explaining, "I genuinely didn't even realize that things were escalating the way they did. If I did, I would've talked to you first. I swear. It just... it sort of happened all at once."

Kinsley tilted her head. "I sort of had a feeling that was happening, if I'm being honest."

"Seriously?"

"I know you," Kinsley told her with a simple shrug. Tatum let out a surprised laugh, relief flooding her body as Kinsley pulled her in for another hug. "And I love you too."

Tatum couldn't help but smile, incredibly thankful that the conversation went the way it did. The tension left her body as she allowed herself to soak in the embrace. Tatum would always need Kinsley, and she was inexplicably grateful that she wouldn't be losing her friend over this. Honestly, she was even more relieved that she wouldn't need to choose between the two. It was a thought that had terrified her the second she hung up the phone with Kinsley. It wasn't something Tatum would know how to do. Not anymore.

"So... are we okay?" Tatum asked as she pulled back.

Kinsley nodded. "We're okay. I'm not gonna lie and say all is... fine. But we're okay."

"So, are you okay with..." she trailed off, worried to even say the words out loud. Kinsley paused, pulling her lips in contemplatively.

"Call Brady in from the car."

Tatum gave her a questioning look. "How did you—"

"Just text him," Kinsley told her as she sighed, crossing her arms over her chest.

Tatum pulled her phone out, texting him as she glanced up at Kinsley unsurely. She waited a moment before sending it to see if Kinsley would change her mind, but she didn't. Tatum saw the text bubbles pop up for a moment before disappearing. Part of her wondering if she would hear tires screeching out of the parking lot of the dorms in a few moments. But instead, she heard footsteps approaching the room.

The door to their dorm swung open slowly. Brady stood with uncertainty all over his face, his eyes darting between the two girls as if something was about to explode in his face. Tatum nodded at him encouragingly, trying to subtly gesture for him to walk into the room. Kinsley stared at him with an expression that Tatum couldn't read. And then she was heading towards him. Brady's eyes widened slightly and it looked like he was about to recite a hastily rehearsed spiel.

But before Brady could even open his mouth, Kinsley was hugging him.

Brady's eyes darted to Tatum in alarm and she nodded in encouragement, motioning for him to hug her back. Kinsley held her brother at the waist, hugging him tightly. He seemed slightly unsure of himself as he placed his arms around the top of her shoulders, looking wildly confused by what was going on.

And then Kinsley was crying.

Brady glanced down at her in concern when he realized, pulling back slightly and placing his hands on her shoulders. "Hey, what's going on?"

"I'm sorry," Kinsley cried, shaking her head desperately. "It was my fault. It was my fault. I did this."

"You know that's not true," Brady told her lowly, dipping his head down. "You can't blame yourself, all right?"

Kinsley nodded, wiping at her face. "I know. I just... I missed you."

"Yeah, I missed you too, idiot," Brady teased as he pushed her head playfully like she was a child.

"Oh, fuck off," Kinsley scoffed, swatting at his hand like one would with a pesky bug. Tatum couldn't help but smile at the scene, feeling relief flood over her despite some slight confusion.

Tatum assumed their conversation was referring to everything that happened with their family, but it felt like she was missing something. Part of her wanted to let herself wonder what they were talking about, but she stopped herself. It wasn't her place to pry. Besides, this was a win. She was with Brady. Kinsley knew. She and Kinsley worked things out. Kinsley and Brady even seemed to reconcile things. This was... good.

So, that was that.

All was well that ended well.

Right?

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Brady and Tatum being absolute disasters of human beings >>>

RIP Sirius Black you would've loved Kinsley Parker.