a/n - all my chapters are so heavy and this isn't any different, forgive me for my sins.

i've been off the maps lately with my updating guys, i'm sorry, but i'm slowly just learning to allow myself to take small breaks every now and then. i used to be so obsessed with having to update on a schedule but i find that whenever i force myself into a schedule, my writing doesn't turn out as good. i'm learning to just write when i feel inspired :---))

this bOOK IS ALSO SLOWLY COMING TO AN END, RIP BRI.

enjoy the chapter, you are all so incredibly beautiful!

stay happy,

x bri.

-

[ cara ]

I've come to notice that sunsets are all people usually ever talk about - the deep shades of purple and red and orange and magenta that fill the sky as they slowly sink beneath the horizon. They're the descent of natural beauty, and it's all the hype, really. People in movies sit on the hoods of their cars in front of sunsets and make out. There's an endless amount of poetry written about sunsets and the colors and the warmth and the colors - it's a little crazy.  Within the push of like, six buttons, you'll find pictures of sunsets just about anywhere, let's be honest.

But I hardly see any poems written about sunrises. I don't hear or see as many people talking about the pale blues and light pinks and lavenders and pale colors of sunrises compared to the deep shades of sunsets. I find it a little heartbreaking knowing how under appreciated sunrises are, because they're some of the most beautiful things to exist in our small world full of corruption and chaos and utter shit. Maybe we're just too lazy to wake up at six to see the sunrise, or maybe we for some reason we think that we'll get artsier pictures if we wait until the sunset - more likes, more reblogs.

But I don't think any kind of sunset can beat this.

This was almost too epic.

I sat there with my lower body laid across the rocky trail-ground, my head resting on the material of Calum's sweatpants, outlooking the view of Los Angeles' sunrise from Griffith Park. The trail was set up on a steep hill, so it was practically pedestaled above the entire city. There were blues, and pinks, and purples and clouds in the sky and it was so incredible and it made me want to experience sunrises more often, because they're simply the uprising of natural beauty.

And so I wondered, why would anybody choose to experience the descent of beauty rather than the birth of it? The uprising of it? Why watch beauty descend when you can watch it arise?

"You're right," Calum suddenly said and nodded, wordlessly letting me know that I'd somehow managed to say all of that out loud. I let out a deep breath through my nose and flipped over so that I was looking up at Calum from his lap, and he smiled down at me before tilting his head back up to look out at the view, hands fumbling with the ends of my hair. "I think it was worth waking up at sixth in the morning for."

"Indeed." I chuckled and sat up to sit beside him, rather than on him. He only situated his arm around my shoulder and reeled me back into him anyway, though. If I somewhat smiled to myself, no one had to know.

I feel like if anybody else were to be thrown into this situation, if you will, were to fall in love with their twin's boyfriend or girlfriend who they were aware didn't love them back, and were accused by one of their closest friends for ruining their sibling's life - they'd automatically shut themselves down, shut their feelings down. Chances are, they'd probably hate themselves for feeling the way they did and they would probably do whatever they could do in order to stop their feelings for worsening.

And yet here I am, sitting beside my twin sister's boyfriend wondering how someone could be so damn attractive above and underneath the skin, and if after all this, someone so incredible would even be willing to stand next to someone so deceiving. I'd been screamed at and accused of ruining both Cal and Elena's lives, yet I'm still not sorry for how I feel. I want to be, because not feeling sorry at all makes me feel like the fire-breathing monster in this story, but I can't be. I can't be sorry knowing that I'm falling in love with this guy, and Elena doesn't want anything to do with him. I'm not exactly sorry.

It just aches. A lot. Because regardless of who actually loves him, he's going to want Elena. He's always going to want Elena. My feelings are irrelevant, that's the truth.

I cleared my throat and turned away from the sunrise to instead face Calum. It felt like the colors and the warmth and the loveliness of it all was making me hella emo, and I wasn't down for that at barely seven in the morning. "Are you excited to tour again?"

"Always, yeah, but I want to stay on break for a while longer. Tour doesn't start for a while, anyway. 'Couple more months." Calum shrugged and continued to look out at the view, more than likely unaware of me staring at him. "What about you, are you excited for UCLA?"

"Of course." I grinned at the memory of coming home two weeks before the end of senior year to empty out the mailbox, finding both Elena and I's acceptance letters to UCLA. "Still sucks though, I barely pushed through high school, college is gonna be dreadful."

"Pull a Calum and drop out," He teased, snickering and wiggling both his eyebrows. "you can join the band. How do you feel about playing the triangle?"

I tugged playfully on the lobe of his ear and laughed as he shrieked and pushed his full bottom lip out, before pushing myself off of the dirt trail we'd been sitting on for the past hour. Using one hand to brush off the butt of my leggings, I outstretched my other towards Calum. "We've gotta go, dude, it's a half hour drive to the hall and it's nearly seven. Your sister's gonna pluck out each of your leg hairs individually if we're late."

"First of all, I'm a hairless piece of crap. I've tried everything and I can't even grow an arm hair." Calum mumbled and took ahold of my hand, lifting himself up. "And you've gotta stop calling me dude or I'm going to cry real tears."

I furrowed both my eyebrows together curiously, "What's your deal with the name dude? I mean, I like the name dude, dude is cool."

"Well I don't like the name dude!" He whined loudly. "I'm your boyfriend and you are my girlfriend and we are in love and we're going to get married in five years and have a dog named Dillo so the least you can do is call me babe and give me kisses."

I snorted, "Yeah, no. Dillo sounds way too much like a certain plastic object people put up their-"

"Elena!"

"I'm being serious!"

"I'm breaking up with you," Calum huffed, unhooking his arm from around my waist and picking up his pace so that he was now walking ahead of me. I gaped after him, almost laughing - he was actually upset. I didn't know whether I found it cute or funny, or maybe a crossbreed of both?

"Okay, Calum, come on, I'm sorry, it was a joke." I laughed, jogging after him and placing both of my hands atop his shoulders once I'd gotten close enough. He only shrugged harshly so that they flew off and walked quicker towards the car, slamming the door once he'd gotten in. I stood there for a moment, kind of in shock at how seriously he was apparently taking this, before eventually following after him.

Once I'd finally caught up and made it to the car, he was already sitting in the driver's seat with his arms crossed and his eyes trained directly ahead of him. I pulled on the passenger's handle, only for the door to stay put, not moving. I narrowed my eyes in frustration and attempted to pull at the handle a couple more times before coming to realize that the little shit had locked it.

I cursed under my breath annoyedly and knocked on the glass of the window loudly, trying to catch the dark haired boy's attention. He only continued to stare straight ahead and I rolled my eyes. "Are you kidding me, Calum?"

After getting no response, I groaned loudly and continued to attempt pulling at the handle - the door stayed put. I knocked furiously yet again on the glass, "Dude, this is literally my car and you're locking me out!"

Calum suddenly snapped his head in my direction to glare straight at me with his arms still folded across his chest, and it was only then I'd realized that I'd once again called the poor boy dude. I exhaled loudly and tilted my head back before peering back into the glass to find him still staring at me, this time looking less irritated and a little more upset. "Calum, I'm sorry, I didn't realize, okay, we've gotta go though, we're going to be late if you don't let me in now."

Calum stared at me for a little longer before blinking and giving in, reaching over to unlock the door for me. I thanked him quietly, slid into my seat, and shut the door, the whole car filled with silence after that. He didn't start the car, and neither of us said a word. It was painfully awkward, the cringey type of awkward. Everything had been fine, earlier, and now he was suddenly upset over something that was so... small. It was even worse knowing that this was really the first time I'd actually experienced Calum legitimately being upset with me.

Eventually after a few seconds of silence, he let out a loud breath, running his hands through his sooty, black cloud of hair, and then across his bronzed face. "You're going to laugh when I tell you."

I immediately found myself shaking my head, as if on instinct. "That isn't true. I'm your girlfriend, and regardless of what I call you, I care a lot. Whatever this may be, I'm not going to laugh at you for it."

A few more moments of silence followed, and I could tell he was contemplating on whether giving in and telling me whatever the hell hew as planning on telling me was a good idea or not. Eventually, though, he cracked, "I have this fear that if you keep calling me things like dude or bud or friend, you'll eventually just start looking at me as just that. Just a dude, just a bud, just a friend. And I don't want to be just that. I-It's dumb, but it's a fear and it's there and it sucks because I know you're only joking around, but --"

I gazed at my dirt-covered Nikes to avoid meeting Calum's eyes - I used the unsurprising silence that took over to teach myself how important it was to listen to the other sides before automatically criticizing because hell, when he put it that way, it sounded legit, and I felt pretty bad. I took a deep breath and leaned over the driving console to lock my arms around Cal's torso tightly. "I'm sorry."

"No you aren't."

"I am!" I argued, pushing my head into his neck and frowning. He was only making me feel worse. "I'm sorry, okay, I really had no idea you felt like that, I thought it was a harmless pet-name, I don't want you to hate me."

"I don't hate you." Calum quickly replied defensively, looking down at me with the same frown etched on his face. Both of his arms suddenly wrapped around my middle tightly. "I'm never going to be able to hate you, actually. It kind of sucks."

"Never?" I repeated, feeling kind of shocked at the confession. "Never's a pretty strong word..."

"I'm aware."

I bit down on my lip, nervously. My hands were trembling. "What if I do something really bad? Like, something that ends up hurting you?"

Calum shook his head, "I don't think you're capable of doing that, Elena."

"You'd be brutally surprised to see what people are capable of --"

I never ended up finishing the sentence, as before I was able to process what was happening, there were fingers on my chin lifting my head out of the crevice of Calum's neck, bringing my face closer to his until there was simply no more space left between us and our lips locked. We stayed like that for quite a while, and my stomach ached and twirled in the most uneasy way possible.

I was playing around with every ounce of trust Calum was giving to me and all I could think about was how shitty a person I was for continuing to deceive someone that I claimed to love right in front of their eyes while they had no idea.

Calum shook his head insistently at me, his eyes flickering all across my face. He grinned gently and kissed the crown of my head, "Never."

"Is that a promise?" I asked, the amount of hope lingering in my voice surprising me.

"It's a promise." He nodded in agreement, rubbing his hand in long strokes across my back.

I hummed in reply to let him know that I heard him, that I believed him, but my mind was more so focused on the idea of what would happen if this all backfired, if this entire project didn't end so gracefully -

his promise would burst into flames.

-

"Lil' more to the right."

"Like this?"

"Erm, a little more."

Michael peered over his left shoulder to look at me incredulously. "El, if I move any more to the right I'm gonna fall off the ladder."

I folded my arms over my chest and lifted my eyebrow at the pale, now blue-haired boy jokingly. "Maybe that's the point?"

If Michael wasn't already bitch-glaring at me earlier, he definitely was now, green eyes narrowed with his eyebrows scrunched together and all. "Do you want me to raise my special finger?"

"I'll pass." I chuckled and rose both my hands to my sides in a surrendering motion. "It's fine how it is, Mike. I was joking. Just hang it up."

Along with a melodramatic eyeball, Michael sighed and taped the other end of the banner Malikoa had ordered up on the wall where we'd (after torturous struggle and threats of middle fingers being raised) decided it looked best. I pursed my lips together, not saying anything further as he walked out of the room quietly.

Mali had somehow managed to rent out the hall they were planning on hosting their after-party in three days prior to the actual wedding, and so of course, she'd called all of us here to help decorate at barely eight in the morning - Mike was a little grumpy.

It could've also been the fact that there was still no word on Emma's case, though. Nothing on Elena's either. We'd told everyone about Emma's situation excluding Malikoa and Jack, but out of everybody, Michael hit the bottom the hardest, and I don't blame him. A part of me felt horrible for opening my mouth that day we were alone together in the hospital room - I'd just told him all about Emma's feelings for him and the fact that he had a chance with her only for him to find out that she was missing a few days later.

The sound of combat boots clicking against the tile of the hall floor pierced the silence that had filled the room a few seconds ago when Michael left, causing me to to look upwards towards the open entrance. Ashton grinned toothily as our eyes met, hands shoved into the pockets of his black basketball shorts. "Hey, Mali said you knew where the rest of the streamers were? We're running out, she's literally tying them onto everything she sees."

I snickered and shrugged my shoulders tiredly. The sunrise was definitely worth waking up for, hell yes, but I really wished I'd gotten a little more sleep. I felt dead, I'll be honest. "There's some more in my car, she texted me maybe eight times yesterday telling me to buy at least seven rolls."

"Seven rolls of what?" Luke asked, joining Ashton and I in the ballroom with a bag of Haribo wedged in-between his fingers.

"Streamers." Ash and I said at once, Ashton shoving me playfully into the wall after.

Luke grimaced, reaching into the bag of candy to pop a red gummy bear into his mouth. "I don't think you should give her any more of those, she's literally tying them on everything. Even the handles of the bathroom doors."

"I told you!" Ash yelled aloud, turning to face me and shove me into the wall yet again. I groaned and rubbed at the spot where my shoulder collided with the hard surface, making sure to kick the drummer's shin harshly in return. He hissed loudly and a sudden feeling of satisfaction suddenly overtook me.

"Get off her back, it's her wedding. She's allowed to go a little ballsy." I reached into my back jean pocket to pull out my keys, taking Luke's hand that wasn't currently holding the bag of sugar and plopping them into his palm. "You and Ash should go get the streamers now."

Luke grunted and looked at me with a silent groan written all over his face, "Me and Ash?"

"Ash and I." Ashton corrected him, already making his way out of the ballroom, and probably towards the exit leading to the parking lot.

"Whatever!" Luke called after him before turning back around to face me with his pink lips shaped into a frown. "Why do I have to help, that was supposed to be his job!"

I rolled my eyes and pushed at his backside, struggling to push the six foot something man-boy out of the ballroom. Underline, italicize, parenthesis, bracket, man-boy. Man-little-boy. Man-infant-with-a-strange-fascination-for-gummy-bears-at-so-early-in-the-morning. "Did you not hear me? She made me buy seven rolls! They aren't small, baby rolls either! Go help him out, it's not a big deal."

Luke let out a loud whine as he eventually was forced out of the room the exact minute Mali walked into the ballroom, eyeing the miserable blonde boy curiously. "Is he good?"

"He'll live." I shook my head, grinning. "Where'd Calum go, by the way? It's been like a half hour since I last saw him."

Malikoa scoffed and punched my shoulder playfully. "Oh no, the world's ending!"

I felt my cheeks physically tint crimson at how obsessive that'd just sounded, groaning to myself internally. Had it really come out that way? "No, no, that isn't what I-"

Mal giggled and pulled out one of the chairs Michael and I had covered in white spandex cloth earlier, taking a seat on it. "I'm playing, El, love is like that, can't go too long without seeing them, I know. I sent him off to go buy some more ribbon, though, we're running kinda' low."

"What? Why would you need more ribbon, you told me yesterday that-"

"I know, I know, but I'm really digging the ribbon-ish, streamer-ish vibe. I feel like I need a lot more."

I simply shook my head and kept my mouth shut, deciding not to spill Luke and Ashton's beg to differ that they'd told me about earlier. Luke was already upset enough, which reminded me -- "What about Michael? He kind of just, walked out on me, earlier."

"He's in the lobby where there's stronger signal." Malikoa shrugged, like it was a casual sort of thing of Michael to do, which did seem pretty accurate, honestly. "But what about Emma? Have you heard from her lately? Is her Uncle doing okay?"

"She texted me last night, yeah. He's doing fine, supposed to go into surgery tomorrow night." I lied, playing along with the story that we'd all come up with to explain Emma's absence to Mali - her Uncle was having a shoulder-surgey and the Graylinns wanted to be there to support.

Mali sighed and puffed her cheeks out, pouting her lips slightly. "I'm still upset she couldn't make it, it would've been so nice if she could be here."

I bit my lip and bounced back and forth slightly on the balls of my feet, not exactly knowing what else I could possibly say to Mali. It wasn't too hard to tell that she genuinely was upset about Emma not being able to be at her wedding, which made me feel even worse for lying to her.

"Elena?"

Mali and I both turned to look at the open entrance to the ballroom where Luke was standing, stiff, with his bottom lip trembling. There was a piece of paper clutched tightly in his fist that was attached to a pink balloon. Ashton stood behind Luke with his lips rolled back and a similar expression on his face. I frowned and squinted curiously, "Hey, did you guys find the streamers?"

Ashton cleared his throat and shifted his head down to face his feet for a minute. "Yeah, we have them, but um, we need to talk to you."

"Alone." Luke added quickly, eyes flickering to Malikoa briefly, before quickly landing back on me, as if he'd just caught himself in the act of staring at something he wasn't supposed to be staring at.

As if sensing the prominent tension in the room, Mali stood from her seat and touched my shoulder understandingly before making her way back to the open entrance of the ballroom. Once she'd left, I turned to look at Ashton and Luke expectantly with my eyebrows raised. Slowly and hesitantly, almost like he were afraid, Luke shuffled towards me, eventually outstretching his hand towards me to hand me the paper he was clutching so tightly between his fingers. Ashton stayed frozen by the entrance, just staring at the two of us like he was watching a scene unfold before him. I eyed Luke curiously and reached to take it from his grasp, the vibrant pink balloon still taped onto the paper.

"It was taped onto your car window," was all Luke shakily whispered and was all I actually heard and was able to process before my mind suddenly went white, went blank. I stared straight at the paper with wide eyes that wouldn't even blink. My heart squeezed in my chest until it eventually felt like it'd just stopped.

I learned about Deja Vu in high school, seeing as I took French and all. French was never really my strongest subject, but I'm pretty positive that Deja Vu basically meant already seen ; a feeling of already having experienced something before.

I stared blankly at the large, printed image of Emma taped against a roughened up, dirty-oatmeal colored wall, stripped down to her under-layers with bruises littered all across every inch of her body. Her legs were black and blue and there were scratches covering her face. The only difference there really was from this picture and the picture I'd seen of Elena was that Emma's eyes were actually opened. The problem was that you couldn't see anything in them - they were blank, hazy.

I let out a sound that was somewhere between the lines of a whimper and a sob, and it wasn't just because of how sick it made me feel seeing Emma like this, but also because I now knew that it was official. The same person who'd taken Elena, who'd beaten Elena and laid the pictures out for us like it was art being presented in a show, had taken Emma, too. Someone was out for them.

This felt like Deja Vu.

Luke had stepped closer to me with his arms opened slightly, like he was going to enclose me in a hug, until I flinched at the sound of my phone going off in my pocket. I exhaled, waveringly, with my fingers still gripping onto the picture, and slid my phone out.

ONE NEW MESSAGE

FROM: UNKNOWN NUMBER

Here's one more, just for you!! xx

ATTACHMENT:1248JPG.FILE//D88EJD

I pressed the power button of my phone within a matter of three seconds, and dropped it onto the tile floor the minute I'd opened the attachment. I quickly lifted my hand to cover my mouth with hopes of somewhat stopping the sobs from coming out too harshly. Hesitantly, Luke opened his arms once again and I slowly stepped into the offer of a hug. It took a while, only because this time, I actually tried to detain it all, but eventually, Cara Morales being the crybaby Cara Morales genuinely is, let it all go, let it all out.

It was another picture of a girl beaten to the maximum, black and blue not only covering her legs, but her torso, her arms, her neck - it was Elena. Not even five seconds, I hadn't even looked at the picture for five seconds, but I'd still memorized it all from top to bottom, left to right - she was there, Elena was there, laying with her body on the ground and her head against the wall. Her eyes were bruised shut, her lip bleeding, her body all sorts of colors that I didn't even know could appear on the human body. It was Deja Vu. It was a repeat of the picture I'd last seen of Elena, only this time, worse. This time, she didn't even look like herself. This time, she looked distorted. This time, she looked like a true aftermath of a photoshopped picture.

This time, she didn't even look somewhat alive.