“She doesn’t deserve it.”

I looked at Jordan. “Why not?”

“I mean sure, what you did to Raymond was awesome. He deserved it.” Then he looked at Declan. “But does she really have to deserve this?”

“Yes, better now or never.”

Somehow Jordan and Bennett talked Raymond out of telling someone that I gave him a big fat bruise (Jordan’s words, not mine).  How they did it? I don’t really want to know, much less care. When they came back with Jordan fawning over my bruised up hand like some sort of trophy, Declan took them out of the office to have a talk. At first they were whispering, then there was muffled yelling. The yelling paused when Bennett poked his head inside the door to assure me that everything was fine, and then closed the door for the yelling to start again. Just when I was about to go check on them myself, they all went back inside the office. It ended up be two-to-one, Bennett went with Declan, while Jordan was against it.

Well, he still is.

“But deserve what exactly?” I asked them.

“Nothing, because you’re not getting anything,” Jordan told me before turning to them. “Can’t we get her something else? Like a pony?”

“A pony?” I repeated in disbelief. “What am I, six?”

“What do you want then?” Jordan asked me.

“A unicorn, or a pegasus, or both.” I thought about it then decided. “I want both.”

“So a unisus?” Bennett said in confusion.

“Or a pegacorn,” Declan offered.

“Well either one, Bennett could get it for you,” Jordan assured me in confidence.

We all looked at Bennett who shrugged. “I don’t know. You’re going to have to ask science for that one. Probably make a hybrid between a horse and a bird, then surgically adding a horn on its head. But that’s a bit… sick.”

“I’m just surprised you’ll be into something so… girly,” Declan said honestly.

“And what’s wrong about being into something girly, aren’t I a girl?” I snapped. “Besides, why not have a unisus or a pegacorn? it’ll be awesome. And how can either one be girly?”

“Well here’s nothing girly about a horse, there’s nothing girly about a horn,” Bennett began. “But put them together, and you get a unicorn.”

“And then put on some wings and get an alicorn," Jordan finished. "Which is the real term you guys, get your facts straight.” 

"We're going to ignore that last part," Declan said before sighing. "But man, I really miss that show. It sucked when it ended.”

All of us started to hum the HIMYM theme song together.

“But back to the conversation,” Jordan said. “We can’t do it!”

“Yes we can!” Bennett and Declan said mockingly in unison as if they were in Bob the Builder.

“Um, yeah I think so,” I said, given it is two against one, three if you counted me.

“I’m serious,” Jordan said, his face looking as serious as his statement, which seemed really unnatural on him. “Are you guys actually willing to let her-“

“Jordan, I know you’re scared,” Bennett told him calmly. “But it won’t be like-“

Jordan narrowed his eyes at his friend. “I thought we promised never to say her name again.”

There was a long pause until Bennett mumbled out, “I’m sorry.”

“You know, I’m okay with a treat to some lunch or something,” I said awkwardly, not liking the tense argument the guys were having with each other. “Whatever Declan wanted to show me, it can wait another time. I mean really, it’s-”

“Naomi, cover your ears,” Jordan ordered me.

I gave him a look of disbelief.

“Do it.”

I muttered something under my breath then covered them. Of course, I wasn’t actually going to do that. It only looked like I was covering them tightly so I couldn’t hear anything, but I was barely touching my ears.

Jordan looked at the guys with a dead serious look. “I want to kiss Naomi.”

The car suddenly swerved to the right before Bennett put it back on the lane.

“WHAT!” I exclaimed along with the other two.

“Naomi, I told you to cover your ears,” Jordan actually scolded me.

“Even if you were trying to check if I was hearing into the conversation or not, you can’t just say that!” I exclaimed at him.

“I had to see if you were eavesdropping, now I know.”

“This will only make me want to the conversation even more now.”

Jordan muttered something under his breath. “Bent, park the car for a second.”

When Bennett reluctantly did, Jordan looked back at me and said, “Naomi, get out of the car.”

“Oh you’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Don’t take it personal-“

“It is!”

“Just do it.”

I got out of the car and waited outside for a couple of minutes in the cold. They let me back in to have the heated air in the car greet me. I can’t say the same thing with the tense atmosphere between the guys. Bennett started the car again and went back to driving.

“We’re letting you see it,” Jordan muttered to me.

“Really?” I said, not even bothering the slight excitement in my voice.

“Yeah really,” Jordan said in defeat. “I don’t like it, but two against one, right?”

“Look, if you really don’t want me to see whatever this is, I won’t.”

“It’s alright. I just got a little… over-protective, that’s all. But I do think that’ll it be nice sharing it with you.”

“Okay, you guys have to tell me. What is it? What’s this thing you want to show me?”

“Not what,” Declan corrected me. “Where.”

“And we’re already here,” Bennett said.

The car was driven into an alleyway, the usually dirty, scary and dark alley that you don’t want to go into late at night. Then he slowed down when he neared a slightly smaller building between the towering brick buildings surrounding it. Declan, Jordan and I got out of the car as Bennett parked the car inside a small garage that connected to the building. He closed the garage door that Declan opened for him and reunited with us.

“C’mon, it’s cold out here,” Bennett told us.

We walked up to the door next to the garage. I looked around the alley, not liking the feeling being here, even if I knew I was safe with the guys. Bennett then pressed the doorbell to have it the rectangular base suddenly pop open to reveal a deeper compartment which held a keypad. Bennett punched in the code and with a small beep, he opened the door.

“This is a pretty bad part of town,” I said cautiously. “What’s the point of a keypad when someone can easily knock down the door?”

“Anyone can go through the door if they want, but I’ll feel bad for them,” Bennett said. “The keypad only deactivates the security system.”

None of the guys seemed to be walking inside, so I thought they were waiting for me to go in first. I was about to enter through the door when Declan suddenly yanked me back by collar just as I saw something whizz in front of me from the left.

“Well, almost all of it,” Bennett corrected himself.

“What was that?” I demanded.

“Tranquilizer dart,” Jordan answered as he went inside first, followed by Bennett and Declan. I was reluctant to try to go back in, but I did anyway. “It’s a back up trap, we always have to wait for it to past by before we can go. It’s funny when Declan always falls for it.”

Declan touched his neck, probably remembering it. “I always forget about the stupid thing. Luckily, it only knocks you out for a couple of minutes. Whenever it’s released or any of the traps were sprung, the system sends us a notification and we can find out who it was.”

As if on cue, there was a small chime from all of their phones in unison, which they ignored.

“Usually it’s some petty thief or something,” Jordan continued then pointed at a dart board that hung at the wall to the right. “When the dart is shot and no one is there to take it, the dart will just hit the bulls-eye and reload. Then again, it’ll hit the bulls-eye at the opposite wall of the room.”

As he said this, I watch in amazement as the dart slipped into a small compartment and the bulls-eye covered it up, waiting to let the dart to fly again. Nervously, I stepped out of its flight path, not wanting to be a victim of it like Declan was. Then my eyes tore away from it and I got interested to the room itself. Well, if it was interesting in the first place. It was an abandoned room, with peeling wallpaper, boarded up windows, creaky floorboards, a few chairs and tables covered by white blankets. The room was so dusty that if I sneeze I could make a dust storm by it. No, the room looked so old that if I sneeze the whole place will fall apart.

“So a security system all for an empty room?” I asked them.

“Not all things are what they appear,” Bennett told me.

Before I could ask them what he meant by that, Declan walked up to a dusty bookcase at the other end of the room. He pulled down two books like a lever then one more on a higher shelf. The bookcase shifted slightly and Declan started to move it to the right showing a simple door.

I nodded in approval. “Alright, moving bookcases from book levers, classic.”

“The security system reactivates once we go in, deactivates when we leave, and reactivates again once the door closes. All of this was set up by none other than moi,” Jordan said proudly with a proud smile to go with it.

Declan opened the door with a small key and took a step back for me. I looked at the door then back at him.

“This is what you want to show me, what I deserve?”

“Yup, now how about you see the rest of it?” Declan asked me.

They all gave me reassuring nods and smiles. I took in a deep breath and let it out before walking into the door, only for it to get taken away.

The guys strode past me as I stood there planted to the ground. I was lost of words, lost of everything.

“Welcome to the base.”

It was later explained that it a two-story studio apartment warehouse was the building that the guys called the base. It was slash of brick and wood, having a near glass ceiling and floor-to-ceiling windows. The first floor held the usual living room, kitchen, game room and other rooms, while the second floor was their own private rooms. Already I saw a flat screen TV, too many game stations to list, a ping pong machine, a pool table, and so much more. I looked up, seeing a staircase, leading up to a balcony second floor inside the building, held back with a railing.

“When we first saw this place, it looked just as bad as the room you just saw,” Bennett explained to me. “But then I bought it and renovated the place, also creating that fake wall to hide it. This was all a couple months back when we knew each other, but didn’t say anything. We usually hang out here afterschool and during the weekends, better than anywhere else.”

“It’s called the 3M HQ, named after-“

“The book, The Three Musketeers,” I finished for Jordan. “The place where the musketeers, not the main three, but all of them were stationed in a building called Musketeer Headquarters.”

“You’ve been studying,” Jordan said. “Well we don’t call it that though, it sounds lame. We usually just call it “the base” or “our place”.” He looked at me. “Our place.”

“Our place,” I repeated, smiling to myself. “It’s beautiful,” I paused then added, “If you ignore that it’s messy.”

And I’m not kidding. Pizza boxes, burger wrappers, plastic bags, and empty soda cans were strewn all over the place. There were also stacks of video game cases, jackets and shirts were hung everywhere that looked like a hook, cardboard boxes filled with who knows what were near the corners, mysterious stains or an army of crumbs were on the floor, and so much more that an OCD person would faint at first sight.

“Yeah, it is,” Jordan said with pride. “Well you can’t blame us guys, messy is in our nature.”

I looked at Bennett. “Messy can’t be in yours.”

“But laziness is,” Bennett replied back. “I’d hire a maid or well, a disaster cleanup service, but I don’t want to risk the chance for someone to give away their location.”

“This has to be cleaned up.”

Jordan smiled at me. “Yeah, it should, shouldn’t it?”

I looked at the others. “Why is he saying that?”

Bennett and Declan once again looked away, whistling innocently to themselves.

I narrowed my eyes at them and repeated, “Why is he saying that?”

“I’m not telling her,” Bennett muttered.

Declan glared at him. “Well I’m not telling her either.”

“Don’t expect me to do it.”

“Then stop looking at me because I won’t do it.”

“No need,” Jordan assured them. “I will.” He looked at me with a smirk on his face. “We had a deal. The only way I’ll let you see this place, is if you clean it.”

“And you agreed to this without my say in it?” I demanded to the others.

“We thought you wouldn’t mind,” Declan said nervously. “It’s only a little mess.”

“A little mess?” I repeated in disbelief. “This makes Hurricane Katrina look like a little mess.”

“It isn’t that bad,” Bennett said. “I mean, once you quarantine the place.”

“How can you expect me to clean this all up?” I asked them, kicking a pile of clothes on the ground. I saw something in the pile, and with two fingers I picked it up.

“Hey, those are mine!” Jordan said, grabbing the earphones. “Declan said he lost them.”

I vaguely remember Declan admitting that he lost Jordan’s earphones a while back.

“How about you think of it like this?” Bennett asked me. “You have to clean the place for not listening to us when you were dating Parker.”

“I thought you guys forgave me,” I said quietly.

“We do,” Bennett assured me. “It’s just an excuse so you’d clean up the place.”

“And don’t tell me you still don’t feel bad about it,” Declan said.

I was silent for a moment, but then I let out a sigh. “Alright, I’ll do it. But I’m leaving only your rooms untouched. Bennett, go buy me some cleaning supplies. Then just leave me alone for a couple hours to do everything, I don’t want you to be in my way.”

“We have to do something anyway,” Jordan said before adding quickly, “Food. We were going to get food.”

“Which will take a couple hours?” I asked dubiously.

“It’s a lot of food,” Jordan countered.

Yeah, sure it is.

They went to the store, leaving me behind. I heard the shut of the moving bookcase and the small beeps of the security system turning off then back on as the guys left. I waited for them, awkwardly standing in place. With the whole “security system” I bet there’s some hidden cameras, so looking around is out of the picture. They came back a couple minutes later, already hearing them come back with Bennett’s car driving into the garage.

I went into the bathroom, after a couple of wrong turns with their arguing if the bathroom was two or three doors down to the right, whether they should count the first door or not. I came back all armored up for battle. I mean, not really, but wearing battle armor would be fitting for the battle I’m about to face.

“So, are you ready?” Bennett asked me.

I looked down at myself. I was wearing, along with my jeans an unwanted t-shirt by one of the guys who doesn’t mind it being dirty because I don’t want to sacrifice my own but is still pretty big on me. There were yellow cleaning gloves, rain boots (must I really explain?), and my hair tied into a ponytail to be held back by a bandana. I was armed with practically the whole cleaning aisle, okay not really but it feels like it. I have a broom, mop, vacuum, dusters, rags, spray cleaners, trash bags, this cute air freshener in a shape of a tree, and many other things.

“I’m ready for war.”

Bennett nodded awkwardly. “Well, I guess this place is in safe hands then.”

Jordan coughed and looked around the place. “But now really thinking of it, can you really take it on?”

“I’m the cleaner this place deserves, but not the one it needs.”

“Now we feel bad,” Declan said.

“I don’t!” Jordan piped up.

Declan ignored him. “Are you sure you don’t want us to-“

I raised a gloved hand at him. “No, I must face this alone.”

“You’re being really dramatic.”

I looked at him. “I’m about to face the villain I’ve been training my whole life with endless chores of washing dishes and cleaning my room. Now my time has come to defeat this monster for me and humanity.”

“Well don’t you want some backup?” Bennett asked. “You can’t save the world with a broom. You’re going to need at least two.”

“I think I got this,” I said, before reloading my water gun and turning around to face the final boss of the game. “Now leave me.”

I heard the slam of the door.

“No nevermind, don’t leave me,” I said in regret, knowing it’s already too late. I looked at the dump set before me that’s supposed to be called the base.

“Rome wasn’t built in a day. But this place should be cleaned in less than one,” I said to myself as I pulled down the gas mask over my face. “May the force be with me,” I said like Darth Vader, before taking a deep breath because its hard breathing in the mask rather than to impersonate Darth Vader and his need for inhaler.

-

With wobbly feet and arms that felt like they were going to fall off, I dropped the broom on one hand and a rag on the other onto the ground and collapsed on the couch. You wouldn’t believe that this used to be the base. You would do a double take and try to look for another moving bookcase with a messy room behind it.

The place was spotless, and it’s not because of my biased opinion since I put my blood (I accidentally gave myself a paper cut when moving cooking, sports, gaming and car magazines), sweat, and tears (alright, I may have teared up a little from the paper cut). But it was so clean, you can actually see the sparkles in the room. But what comes with a clean room comes with a price. I won the battle, but lost in spirit.

I don’t think it’ll be too bad to take a nap. So I let out a yawn and let myself drift off to sleep. Too bad I barely got a couple of minutes until I heard the bookcase slide open and the dramatic gasp after it.

“Guys, I think we need to look for another bookcase with a messy room behind it,” Declan told them.

I called it. I totally called it.

“Where are we? Narnia?” Jordan asked in disbelief.

“No, we had to go through a closet to get there,” Bennett said.

I heard someone snap their fingers. “We should have made it a closet, not a bookcase.”

I yawned, sitting up to stretch my arms a bit. “It’s about time you guys got back. You got food?”

“It’s, ‘do you have food?’” Jordan corrected.

I ignored him. “You got food?” I asked again.

“I was thinking of cooking something up,” Bennett said as he set a grocery bag on the ground. “For celebration of you-“

“Finding the place underneath all of the trash?” I offered.

“I was going to say- Okay honestly I was thinking the same thing,” he admitted.

“Well while you do that, I’m gonna go back to sleep.” I then fell backwards to the couch and put a pillow on top of my head to block out the light.

But I saw the light when Jordan apparently grabbed the pillow away from me. “Don’t sleep here.”

“Don’t worry, I washed it from the dust to the mysterious green stain under one of the seats. Where did it come from?”

“No comment. And I don’t mean that,” Jordan said. “C’mon, I want to show something.”

I let out a groan, already feeling comfy in the couch. But I reluctantly got up and then began to follow Jordan up the stairs to the second floor. Bennett and Declan didn’t say anything at first, but Bennett then headed into the kitchen while Declan plopped down on the seat and turned on the TV.

We entered into the hallway and suddenly stopped at the last door of the hall to the right. Jordan opened the door and let me inside first. It was a room, bigger than I expected it to be, really spacious. There’s was nothing special about it, only a small mattress with a simple cover and a desk.

“This is all yours,” Jordan told mean. “I mean, of course you can add stuff. I bet Bennett would give you an allowance for decorating the place. It needs some work.” He walked across the room and opened the curtains of a big window to let the light in.

I took a seat of the mattress and smiled. “Thank you.”

He waved it off. “We decided you can have the empty room in the car, might as well put it to use right?”

“I love it,” I said.

Jordan sat beside me on the bed.

“Jordan, could I ask you a question?”

“You’re already asking one, so why not?”

I chuckled, paused for a moment then asked, “Who is… she?”

The smile he was wearing instantly vanished at the question.

I shook my head. “I shouldn’t have asked that. I was just cur-“

“No,” he told me. “I would be too. She’s… nobody, really.”

“There’s no such thing as nobody. She’s somebody, somebody to you.”

“Alright then, she’s somebody to me, but a long time ago. Can we leave it at that?” He asked me, as if pleading me to end the conversation.

“Yeah, sure,” I said quietly.

“I’m not mad,” Jordan assured me. “It’s just a touchy subject, I don’t really want to go into it.”

“But we can always talk, right? If I want to talk to you, or you want to talk to me, we can, right?”

“Yeah of course.”

I nodded. “Alright.”

He got up and walked towards the door. “Go take a nap. We’ll wake you up when the food’s ready. It’s always good when Bennett’s holding the spatula.”

“Okay,” I said as I lay down on the bed. Jordan was about to leave when I stopped him.

“Now that I know this place, with the gang stuff and all, will I-“

He let out a chuckle. “Not yet, wait until the time comes. Until then, just relax and enjoy the view.”

Before I could say anything else, he closed the door behind him. I looked up the ceiling and sighed.

“Now what?”

Now let’s talk about the ships you all have: Domino (Domi and Naomi), Bennomi, Jordomi, Decomi, Rayomi, Cameromi (at one point, Cameron is still alive you guys), Parkomi has and will always be there and just Naomi #TeamNaomi, where Naomi goes with NO ONE (yes, it exists). I’m just here to remind you, “Hi, I’m the author, and I’m writing the story.” (Waves cheerfully at the screen, ignoring weird stares from family) I want to all assure you guys that you can stop spending enough time on who Naomi will be with. Honestly, this book doesn’t revolve in romance, it revolves around humor, bullying, and friendship. Romance is like a little add on like action, something to keep you guys awake or well, blushing. And if any of you are wondering:

Yes, I have already thought of the whole book.

1. Who Naomi will be with.

2. How the book will end.

3. How many readers I just killed by writing the words “The End” when the end comes, which will be the coincidentally be the same time as the Apocalypse and/or Armageddon, whichever suits you. (P.S Apocalypse: destruction of mankind, Armageddon: Judgment Day from the guy upstairs)

But now what will you guys do? Well two things can happen. You guys ignore this and keep on going for you ships (which of course you should, I’m not stopping you. All I mean to say is that there is only one ship that will reach to the finishing line while the others sunk to the sea with random icebergs popping out of nowhere). And I bet there will still be hashtags and conversations of who ships who. But then there’s also stopping it and just enjoy the book I’m writing to you one chapter at a time, and not obsessed who Naomi will ship with. You can stop worrying about your ships and instead spend your time drooling over the guys.

With that out of the way, (throws it behind back and cringes at the sound of a bad crash in the background) I’m going to go plot more on who Naomi will be with. (Begins to laugh evilly)

Mwah ha ha ha ha… (fades away)

(Comes back) Oh, and you better get ready for the next chapter... (THEN fades away)

RubixCube89-

(Comes back AGAIN) Wait! One last thing! I got this brilliant piece by Swaying (please excuse me for capitalizing your username) who shared it with me. Swaying thank you once again for the beautiful part of this story and I really hope you win that contest. I want to dedicate this chapter to you, I hope you enjoy it. Now here’s a look of that very piece, I hope all of YOU guys enjoy it just as I did, and hopefully Swaying will post the rest of the story in her profile. Here it goes:

Bullying.

We go to school in hopes that maybe we might not be called another name. Maybe just for a day we may remain invisible to the predators that see us as their prey.

You're a freak.

They tell us.

You don't belong. 

They taunt.

It's a constant battle within yourself trying to prove them wrong. That you're not a freak. That you do belong.

We are sent to school by our parents thinking it's safe and that we won't experience the cruelty of the world in a place they deem as safe.

They're wrong.

The cruelty of the world exists in the safest of places because it is not the school but the students that ridicule all those that are different.

We see and we hear the sounds of bullying. Yet most of us stand and others join because it seems cool.

It's not.

I was called ugly for the first time in second grade and overtime the obscenities spoken to me have increased by rate.

You're a slut.

They tell me but they don't acknowledge the fact that I have not once had a boyfriend.

We sit in the back of classes, zippers as our mouths because maybe if we don't speak they won't notice us. That maybe if we blend in with the dark world they created they won't hurt us.

But we are proved wrong.

We sit in classes where silence takes place but the minute we step in the hallways it's a battlefield waiting for the first to come out alive.

No one ever does.

They think that meaningless words like whore and asshole can't take away lives.

They don't understand the power of their words cut like knives.

Overtime the emotions we lock up cause us to explode.

Where we lose all our sanity and our hearts of gold.

Because we are the victims

We are blamed when shootings occur. 

Or when lives are taken.

But who is really to blame?

-Swaying

RubixCube89201