By Friday, I don't know how I am going to make it another week without Liam in any of my classes. We text throughout the day, but it still isn't the same without him being here. There hasn't been any drama for the past two days with the exception of Harper finding out about the fight. She asked me a million questions and even tried to call Liam, but she still has no idea why Liam attacked Derek and I let it stay that way. The energy in the halls is more somber compared to the first game and I know it's because our star quarterback was suspended from school, therefore unable to play in tonight's game.

I decided to drop off my letter yesterday after cheer practice. I waited until the school was quiet and stealthily made my way to the office. The large double doors were shut, so I shoved the folded piece of paper under the door. Ian, Marissa, and Elijah are still at school, so I don't think anything's been done about my tip.

At lunch, all the cheerleaders get together to create a large paper banner for the players to run through at the start of the football game. The girls are still quizzing me, just as interested as Harper is about the fight and why no one knows why it started. I try to convince them I haven't spoken with Derek, so I really have no idea.

Harper is quick to tell the rest of the girls about how she and Liam are still good together but now she is dateless. She makes it seem that Liam wanted to go with her, but now that he's suspended, he's just broken up over not being able to take her to the dance. She also doesn't hesitate to throw in how I volunteered to go with her. Lily and I exchange looks knowing it's far from the truth, but we don't say anything to make it seem otherwise. That and Liam isn't here to contradict her, so nothing is preventing her from running her mouth.

After our last class, we all meet up again for a team dinner but this time at my house. My mom has our dinner catered in and we all sit around the kitchen, talking about our homecoming dresses and dates while we cram pasta and salad into our faces. After our plates are disposed of, we help curl each other's hair and put navy and yellow HPH stickers on our cheeks. I thought homecoming was going to be the main topic of conversation tonight so I am bummed when they suddenly want the scoop on "the Derek break-up." I try to keep it as simple as I have when I talked to Lily and Harper about it.

"Derek wants to go to Stanford for college and I realized that I don't. We kept arguing about it and realized the longer we stayed together, the harder it was going to be to break up. And neither of us wanted a long-distance relationship so we got tired of fighting and just broke up," I say with a shrug. I thought it sounded reasonable and I figured our break-up would be old news by the time Derek returned to school on Monday. All the girls that have eyed him from afar will finally have their chance with him, so they won't stay focused on me for long. They all give me the sympathy nods as I try and act sad about it, but just as I thought, I hear a few girls wonder if that means Derek is officially up for grabs. I want to tell every girl here they can have him but I decided to stay quiet unless it comes it.

When we get to the game, Harper returns to her normal spot next to me and Lily stands to my left. The crowd is much smaller from the last game, so we use the game as practice time for our stunts. We do basket tosses and pyramids and we even manage a full squad back tuck without anyone injuring themselves. Harper's confidence must be back because right before halftime, she asks if she can tumble to a cheer again. She executes her back tuck perfectly and I hear her wish that Liam saw that one.

When the halftime buzzer signals, all the ladies quickly disperse into the crowd, but I stay back to grab my phone from my cheer bag. I am about to text Liam when I swear I see him standing by the fence away from the stands. People are heading up to the concession area, so no one notices me leave the field.

I quickly trot over to the small chain-link fence but must have been mistaken when I don't see him again. I'm standing right next to the bleachers when I spot something moving underneath the side of the stands. As I am slowly walking over to investigate, I feel a hand grab onto my arm and pull me under the dark set of bleachers. I am about to scream when I see it's Liam's hand that grabbed me.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you, I thought you saw me," he says as he drops his hand covering my mouth.

"I thought I did too until I remembered that you're not allowed to be here. How'd you get in?" I ask and he shrugs, "I snuck in. I wanted to see you." I glance over my shoulder to make sure no one is around us. The bleachers are dark enough underneath, so no one can see us and the crowd above us is too loud to notice anything. I just don't want Harper spotting us.

"I don't know if anyone saw my letter. Every day I walk into class hoping Ian won't be there, but he's in the same spot every morning. Why aren't they doing anything?" I worriedly ask.

Liam shakes his head, "I don't know, maybe they have and nothing came up. Didn't you follow Ian to his house one day? Do you know where he lives?"

"Yeah, he's not far from school why?"

"I'm suspended and bored, so maybe I can go over there during school. Check his place out," he suggests.

"You wanna break into Ian's house?" I say a little too loudly and Liam shh's me again. He checks over his shoulder but we still don't have an audience.

"I just wanna check it out Ellie, it will be fine." Liam just got suspended for fighting- I don't want him getting arrested for breaking and entering. He must have read my mind.

"I won't get caught, just tell me where he lives," he says with pleading eyes. Through the cracks of the bleachers, I can see the cheerleaders starting to make their way back to the field.

"Hey I gotta get back, I'll text you the directions to his house," I say as I flip back around to face Liam. He grabs my hand to keep me under the bleachers, even though I know I need to be getting back.

"Can you come over tomorrow?" He weirdly hesitates before continuing, "I want to show you something." I can't help but smile.

"Of course. I'll call you when I get up." He grabs my hips and slowly pulls me in for a kiss. My insides warm as I feel his lips on mine. I feel like this means we are good again and I'm sad when he pulls away.

"Goodnight El," he says and I start to make my way back to the field. I don't want to leave him but I know I have to get back before the game starts or Harper will ask a million questions. I turn to look at Liam when I'm back on my box, but he must have already left. I don't know how he snuck in, I just hope he can sneak back out.

The second half of the game is uneventful and we end up losing by seven. Any excitement that was in the stands disappeared by the fourth quarter and most of the fans were gone before the game ended. The boys were somber as they made their way to the locker room so we all jump off our boxes. I hear Lily making plans with Adam and I already know Harper is going to go stay with her cousin, Alexa, who's in town tonight. The other girls are planning to get boba, but I'm not in the socializing mood tonight, so I wave off their invitation to join them.

As I am walking to my car alone, I get an eerie feeling that someone is following me. My footsteps crunch the gravel beneath me and I swear I hear a second set of footsteps nearby. I keep looking over my shoulder, but I don't see anyone heading my way. The parking lot is illuminated, but the perimeter of the field is already dark, leaving shadows all around me. I can't shake the uneasy feeling, so I walk a little faster until I reach my car that's at the end of the lot. I glance over my shoulder one last time before I slide into my car, keeping my car key in between my fingers.

I head out of the lot in line with the other cars and head towards my house. The night is still young and I'm not ready to go home. Liam said we'd hang out tomorrow so I don't really want to pester him. I decide I'll ask my mom to have a primp night and do pedicures and face masks. I could use a night in that's drama free.

When I pull up to the garage, I see her car is in the driveway. I walk into the house and spot her at the kitchen table flipping through a stack of papers.

"Hey, Mom!" I say as I slide a chair out. I dump my cheer stuff by the table and settle in. She continues to finger through the stack after watching me drop down next to her.

"Wanna do a primp night?" I ask not wanting my Friday night to be a complete waste.

She eyes me suspiciously before replying, "Uh, sure! I'm just surprised that it's a Friday night and you have no other plans than to hang out with your old lady," she says with a smile. "Go get the nail and face stuff and I'll make us some fun drinks." She pushes away from the table, excited to have her daughter wanting to hang with her. I quickly run upstairs to strip out of my uniform and grab all of the spa stuff. I realize it's been a long time since my mom and I have done anything together. We went to get our nails done, but I was in such a bad mood that day over Liam that I didn't say much.

We spend the rest of the evening covering our faces in mud and soaking our feet in warm bubbly water. She made me a virgin margarita and I sip on it as I fill her in on my breakup with Derek and I even tell her about the fight. I admit to some of what happened with Derek last Saturday but I'm still vague with the details. I told her he got a little aggressive with me when he was drinking and Liam caught wind of it so he punched him in the face for it. She wasn't entirely impressed with Liam punching Derek, but she did say it was possible Derek deserved it. I watched her face pinch as I confessed to the drinking and the aggression, but I shoved her thoughts away from me. I didn't need to hear the disappointment too.

I also tell her all about Liam and how we have this great connection. I won't expand on what that connection is, just that we get along really well. She admits that I should be single and enjoy my senior year but I'm already practically with Liam. We just haven't made anything official. She looks uneasy about me jumping into another relationship and I wish I could explain to her how deeply I already care for him. That I need him in my world.

We end the night when our masks are peeled off and our toes are freshly painted. We decide to clean up tomorrow before I hug her goodnight and make my way to my very inviting bed. I text Liam goodnight and within seconds he writes back sweet dreams.