***So my afternoon class got canceled today, and I managed to get another chapter done. Oh, golly. I realize now that we're seven chapters through this book, and big things are gonna happen soon, and...

AAAAAAAAAH.

I mean, I've been waiting to write most of this stuff for MONTHS. It just blows my mind that I'm finally sharing it with the world in book form.

Also, fun fact: Including this chapter, "Wrong Place, Wrong Time" is already over 25,000 words. Gosh, guys. This is gonna be a long book LOL***

***(Nya's POV; song for this chapter: "I Wanna Talk About Me" by Toby Keith)***

I ride to school with Zane this morning. Kai and I stayed the night at the monastery after all that happened with Cole last night. He'll be fine, but he's not coming into school today. Kai's staying back with him, just in case something goes wrong.

I guess I could've come to school with Lloyd, but he seemed to be in a bad mood when he got in last night. And I'm sure not going with Jay.

I promised him we'd talk this morning, but I purposefully avoided him, if I'm being honest. I still can't believe he played me just so I would cuddle with him and feed him and...

And confess my feelings for him.

I swallow back hurt. I really miss the Jay Walker of February, or even the Jay Walker of last fall. We may not have had any romantic history back then, but he was still a good friend. I can't even call Jay that these days.

"You seem particularly broody this morning," Seliel observes as we walk into school. Well, I walk, and she hobbles.

I huff. "Maybe it's my martyr complex acting up." I'm still salty about that for obvious reasons.

She raises an eyebrow, blowing a huge bubblegum bubble. After popping it right in my face, she shrugs, "I speak only as I hear, and you definitely have that whole 'I-am-the-savior-of-my-friends-so-I-must-die' thing going."

My eye twitches. "And why would you say that, Seliel?"

"Because you actually think your life is horrible. And you thought running away was going to keep you from hurting others. I think you still do believe running away is the right thing to do."

I scoff. "Seliel, what do you know about it?"

"More than you think." She pops another bubble. "We should talk sometime about that, ya know?"

"Whatever. Later." I head off toward my first class – English. We're reviewing for tomorrow's test during our time today.

I shiver. Tomorrow is the last day of high school – like, forever. I'm never going to see most of my classmates again. And I won't see my team for a while – not after the wedding, that is. I'm not ready to leave everyone behind.

Hopefully, I'll be fixed soon enough that I can come back to the team in a few years. Maybe I could even find a way to fix myself before the wedding? Then, I wouldn't have to leave at all.

I take a deep breath, walking inside my classroom.

Where Jay Walker is standing right next to my desk.

I swallow, backing away. Um, I really don't want to be here anymore. You know what? I think I've reviewed enough for this class. Who needs an extra day of in-class review when you've already spent the past four years of your life killing yourself over school?

However, Jay spots me and immediately walks out of the classroom, cornering me by the wall.

Oh, gosh. What have I done to deserve this?

"Nya?" he says softly, his eyes pleading with me to listen. He gingerly takes my hands in his.

I pull away from his touch, turning my head to the side so I don't have to look at him. "Hey, Jay."

He grabs my hands again. "I'm sorry."

I puff out a breath, avoiding a reply. I know anything I tell him isn't going to be pretty.

"Nya, please say something. I'm really sorry. I hate you being mad at me."

"I hate you lying to me." I shake my head. I should've seen this coming, but I thought Jay was different. I guess I took how sweet he was back in February and applied it to him today.

And let's be honest, those are two different Jay's.

"I know lying to you was wrong," he continues, his voice as smooth and gentle as molasses. "I shouldn't have done it." He fixes a strand of my hair.

"Do you regret what you did?" I blurt. I'm unable to stop myself.

"Of course, I regret it."

"No. I mean, like, do you regret pretending to be asleep yesterday while I told you...about us?" That's the part that hurts the most. Jay got exactly what he wanted from being sick: Me divulging that I still cared for him.

I see doubt flicker in his eyes for a moment, but he shoves it away. "Yes. I regret faking that I was asleep."

I study his face for any signs of dishonesty, but I find none.

"Okay," I murmur. "I'll...forgive you."

"Really?" His expression shines with happiness.

I nod. "Yeah. Just don't do something stupid like that again."

He wraps me up in a bear hug. "Thank you, Nya! I – I'll make things up to you, I promise!"

I sigh against him for just a moment, enjoying his closeness. However, I force myself to pull back.

"Jay, I didn't say I was going to trust you like I did before. And remember what I said about space? We need some boundaries, buddy."

"No, we don't," he says emphatically. "We need bonding time. That way, I can get you to trust me again."

I feel my resolve begin to crumble. "Jay..." I don't want so much space between us. I don't want to let him go.

"Please? I can't stand you having a bad opinion of me, Nya."

Coldness washes over me. So this is about him? About me having a bad opinion of him, rather than him making things up to me?

So he really doesn't care that I'm a person.

I choke on tears. "You need help, Jay." I start to walk away, but he softly grabs my arm.

"Did I say something wrong?" He looks like he's about to cry, himself.

"The problem isn't what you say, Jay. It's what causes you to say the things you do." I tug myself away from him and rush into class.

I'm done with his lies.

***(Kai's POV)***

Skylor yawns beside me. "Do your sister and Jay ever plan on getting here?"

Skylor and I are currently waiting around at the local bakery she intends to buy our wedding cake from. We're supposed to be flavor-testing right now – good thing Cole doesn't know – but we're kind of waiting on our wedding party. Jay and Nya should've been off school an hour ago.

I shrug. "I told you about Nya blowing up at Jay last night, and you know that she's good at holding grudges. She's probably just now deemed him worthy to drive her here."

My fiancée elbows me. "You know, she gets her grudge-holding skills from somewhere."

"Yeah. I have this really annoying fiancée who has a memory for wrong like nobody's business. Her name is Skylor Chen – "

She rolls her eyes. "You're hilarious. Hey, look! They're here."

My eyes stray to the foyer, where Jay is holding the door open for Nya. Without a second look, she stalks inside and heads straight toward us.

She has not forgiven Jay yet.

"There's my favorite maid of honor," Skylor beams, trying to lighten the tension in the room. She extends her arms for a hug.

Nya smiles vaguely and gently hugs her back. "Hey, Skye. Sorry we held you up."

Jay says nothing, only casting my sister a dejected look.

I honestly don't blame her for being mad. Jay played her like a fiddle by pretending to be sick.

I briefly considered punishing him myself, but after seeing how miserable he was without Nya, for once I took pity on the guy and left him alone.

"Okay, cake-testing," Skylor announces, taking charge. One of the staff comes over with a smile.

"Is zees your tasting group today?" he lilts in a French accent.

Skylor nods. "What do you have for us?"

The staff member takes the lid off a sampling plate like he's Gordon Ramsey or something. "Zees are a few of my proudest creations," he declares. Then, forking a bit of chocolate cake, he hands me the serving utensil. "Try some! You will like!"

I nod, popping the whole thing in my mouth. My eyes widen in surprise and pleasure.

"This is really good," I mumble, mouth filled with cake.

"You are supposed to share!" the staff member exclaims, forking another piece and handing it to Skylor.

She chuckles slightly at my faux pas, then takes a tiny bite of the dessert. Her eyes close in pleasure as she chews, and then she hands the fork over to Nya. "Try this," she bids her. "I promise it's good."

Without even looking at it, Nya hands the sample over to Jay. "I don't like sweet food. It doesn't suit me."

"You'll like this," I reply. "Besides, you like some sweet food. You enjoy milkshakes."

Skylor raises an eyebrow. "And Nya, just because you're throwing a fit doesn't mean you have to insult the employees here."

"I didn't insult anybody," Nya asserts, her eyes narrowed. "I just said I didn't like sweet food."

Jay takes a small bite of the dessert, trying to patch things over. "Mmmm, this is really good. And it's rich, Nya, rather than incredibly sweet – I think you'd like it if you just gave it a try." He holds the fork up to her mouth.

She turns her face away, crossing her arms. "You also thought I'd like you lying to me, but we all know how that turned out."

Jay's expression falls. "I'm sorry, Nya. I just wanted to show you that – "

"Stop it with the excuses, Jay. I've heard them more times than I want to count already."

"Dang," I mutter.

Skylor raises her voice. "Shut up and try the cake, please. You're making a bigger deal out of this than you need to, Nya."

I can't help but snicker at my sister's disgruntled expression as she grabs the fork out of Jay's hands and pops the rest of the cake in her mouth. She grumbles something indecipherable about its taste, but for Nya, that probably means it's good. She's just in a funk and doesn't want to admit she likes anything.

We continue testing cake samples, most of which Nya refuses to try. Jay eventually takes pity on her – she really doesn't like sweet food – and just eats the whole sample before Nya can. That way, Skylor can't force her to have something she won't like.

The staff member who helps us seems to become increasingly frustrated as Nya declines all his 'creations', as he puts it. Finally, he pulls off his chef's hat and shoves the sample plate at her.

"You no like cake?" he asks, perplexed.

"No." The word is monotonous and resounding.

He sputters. "Well, if you no like zees flavors, perhaps you buy cake from somewhere else, no?"

Nya shrugs. "It's not my wedding. Ask Skylor."

My fiancée clenches her fists. "Nya – "

I clear my throat. "Nya, let's go sit in the car for a while, okay?" I loop my arm around her shoulders and half-guide, half-drag her outside.

"You just got ungrounded a week ago," I sigh as we hit the afternoon air. "What's up with you?"

"Nothing."

"That's a lie."

"It's all you're getting." Her expression is hard.

"Nya, I have plenty of ways to deal with your stubbornness," I warn her.

"Bite me."

I stick my pinky finger in her ear. She sputters and pulls away from me while I double over in laughter.

"You asked for it," I tease her between fits of amusement.

"I didn't ask for any of this!" she exclaims.

Her pure anger and hurt cause me to sober. "What do you mean, 'you didn't ask for any of this'?"

She slams open the back door of my junk car. "I didn't ask for everyone in my life to betray me, Kai, but that's exactly what I'm stuck with. Jay, Lloyd, Cole...okay, not so much Cole, but still."

"Is this about the 'running away' thing?" I ask suspiciously. I climb into the front seat of the car.

"Yes. No. Sort of." She crosses her arms and stares out the window at the clouds.

I turn on the car and begin the drive to the nearest fast-food restaurant. "Do you want to talk about it?" I ask, trying to calm my voice. I've been slightly demanding in the past when parenting Nya, and Skylor has always encouraged me to keep a cool head. Today, I think we pretty much switched roles: She's the hothead, whereas I'm the understanding caretaker.

"Why would I want to talk about it?" Nya growls.

"Because...when I'm mad, I like to speak my mind."

"I know that full well." She sighs, looking down at her lap. "Jay doesn't care about me anymore. Lloyd doesn't care about me anymore. I can't seem to stop hurting others. Life's just great, Kai."

"You know, you never told me what Lloyd did to split you two apart." And I'm very curious.

"He messed up." She doesn't offer me anything else.

"Okay. Um, what's this about Jay not caring for you?"

"He only wants me if I'll date him. He apologized to me this morning, Kai, and it was really...really sweet." She swallows. "But then he said he wanted to make things up to me because he couldn't stand me being mad at him. He just...makes everything so that the world revolves around Jay."

"Huh." She's opening up to me. I should so be a relationship counselor.

"You know," I say slyly, "there's a song about that, Nya."

"About what?" she huffs.

"About somebody who's supposed to be in love with you, but who only ever thinks about themselves. You wanna hear it?"

"Not if you're the one singing."

I smirk.

"We talk about your work, how your boss is a jerk – "

"Kai!" she moans.

"We talk about church and your head when it hurts,

We talk about the troubles you've been having with your brother – "

"That would be you, Kai. You're my brother."

"About your daddy and your mother and your crazy ex-lover,

We talk about your friends and the places that you've been,

We talk about your skin and the dimples on your chin,

The polish on your toes and the run in your hose – "

"I assume this is payback for me singing horribly in times past."

"And God knows we're gonna talk about your clothes.

You know, talking about you makes me smile,

But every once in a while,

I wanna talk about me,

Wanna talk about I – "

"That's just plain bad grammar. I've been studying English like crazy the past two weeks, Kai."

"Wanna talk about number one,

Oh, my, me, my.

What I think, what I like, what I know, what I want, what I see.

I like talking about you, you, you, you, usually. But occasionally,

I wanna talk about me, me, me – "

"I get the point." I can hear the smile in her voice.

"Man, I am the best brother ever," I sigh, quite pleased with myself.

Nya's quiet for a moment, but she finally says, "You really are, Kai."

My heart squeezes, and I'm just about to make one of those girly 'aww' sounds. But then, Jay makes that noise all the time, so maybe it's not a girl thing? I guess Jay has a feminine side, though.

I run through a drive-thru and buy a large fry for Nya and I to split. Then, I pull into a parking lot, turn off the car, and get out.

Nya doesn't budge.

I tap on her window. "Get out, or I'm not giving you any fries."

"I'm training my body. I'm a ninja, remember?"

"Pfft. You barely had any cake while we were at the bakery. It's all right for you to have some fries."

Without another complaint, she climbs out of the car and follows me to a nearby park bench. Then, we kind of just...watch the traffic go by.

"Kai?" Nya eventually whispers.

"What?"

"If I did something really wrong – like, really wrong – would you still forgive me?"

I frown. "I don't like the sound of this, Sis."

"Please answer me."

I shrug, snagging a fry out of her hand right before she can eat it. "Yeah, I'd forgive you for anything I can think of, Sis. Doing drugs, failing out of school, sleeping around...I don't want you doing those things, but I'd sure forgive you for them."

She picks at a loose thread on her t-shirt. "So you forgive me for being a butt today at the bakery?"

"You never said you were sorry." I elbow her. "But yes, I forgive you. I know you're bad with apologies."

She nods her head slightly. "Thanks. But...what if it was something more serious than the bakery?" She debates her next words. "What if it was something involving our parents that you...um...never knew about? Like, what if I said some mean things to them?"

"'Mean things'? What do you have, the vocabulary of a two-year-old?"

She laughs softly. "Shut up. Yeah, um...some of the last memories I have of them involve me...uh, talking back to Dad."

I regard her for a moment. Nya never opens up about our parents.

"Why would I need to forgive you for things you said to him?" I wonder.

"Because he was your dad, too."

I sigh, hugging her to my side. "Trust me, Sis, there's nothing you could ever do or say to anyone that would make me stop loving you. I'm nice like that."

"Huh." She thinks about this. "So...on the topic of forgiveness and all, you think Skylor's going to forgive you for leaving her alone at the bakery without a ride?"

"Probably."

"But she'll be mad."

I chuckle. "No doubt about it, Sis. No doubt about it."

***So this chapter was supposed to have more Kailor in it, but I saw a sibling moment and couldn't pass it up LOL

Do you guys think Nya is justified in how she's acting toward Jay right now? What could he do to make it up to her?

Also, Skylor is slowly turning into Bridezilla (though she did have a right to be mad at Nya in this chapter, for sure!). All I can say is...good luck, Kai Smith.***