➸ EIGHTEEN

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Hey, how are you guys doing? Who's in high school? Who's in college/university? Who's working? How's school or work for all of you? You guys never answer my questions like I'm just tryna get to know y'all. LOL. This chapter is more of a filler I guess, I'm sorry I KNOW I SUCK.

5–FUCKING–K. Authors note at the end.

Shoutout to biancamarshall3 , she's honestly so nice and I love her comments LOL. Thank you so much for reading and actually liking my book! It means more than you know(:

Vote - Comment - Share (If you wanna but I'd appreciate it if you did. But you don't have to. But please do.)

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Thalia Lively

My eyelids slowly started dropping for the hundredth time in this class, the lack of sleep finally catching up to me once again. I can never get one, just one, good nights sleep. Every time I close my eyes, it's almost like an invitation for memories to slide through.

"Sleeping beauty." I felt someone poke my right ribs gently and my droopy eyes flickered to Nathan's concerned ones. His eyes scanned my face slowly, first starting at my tired, baggy eyes then to my frown lines that were slowly starting to form. I ran my hand through my long hair as I looked away from him and to the teacher who spoke but I was too tired to actually listen to her lesson.

I squinted as I looked out the window that had bright rays of light stinging my eyes at a first glance. The urge to run home and sink into my loved bed was strong as I whined when I rubbed my face tiredly. Oh, what I would do for just one night to allow me a peaceful sleep.

My face remained being plastered into my palms as my head started pounding. "Are you coming?" I heard a voice say above me and I looked up curiously. I saw students flooding out of the room, as I assume the bell rang while I was caught up in my thoughts.

I nodded slightly and stood up, putting my binder in my bag then following Nathan out of the class silently. I feel like someone just threw a brick at my head repeatedly, it was pounding annoyingly. I've only drank water my whole life, so headaches were never a problem for me. Until, I started losing sleep.

"So, partner." Nathan said from my side as we both lazily walked through the hallway.

"Partner?" I looked at him out of the corner of my eye, amusingly.

"Yeah, partner. We're partners for the photography assignment. Didn't you hear her call out our names?" He raised an eyebrow and I shook my head slowly. Of course I didn't hear her, I was basically slowly being brought into a self caused coma during that class.

"Oh." I closed my eyes slowly, wanting to sleep right here on the floor, if I could.

"Hey, guys. Thalia, let's go, we're going to be late." I heard Rileys cheery voice say loudly since it was hard to hear in this hallway full of obnoxiously loud conversations, as students walked by to get to their classes. I opened my eyes to look at her and her eyebrows furrowed.

"What happened to you? Why do you look so tired?" She grabbed my face and started examining it while I blinked at her, hoping to get my eyes to get wider. "Did you get any sleep, last night?"

"No." I said softly. I pulled my face away from her grasp and started walking off to my next period, only to be pulled back by a very concerned Riley.

"Go home and sleep." She demanded but with her angelic voice, nothing she says will ever come out intimidating. It was like a baby kitten was attempting to order me around. It just doesn't work.

"No—"

"Yes." Nathan, who I forgot was even still with us as I assumed he had already left, spoke up strongly. "I'm going to visit the guys at the hospital, I'll drop you off on the way." His voice was way more convincing and effective. He, himself, was extremely intimidating. His tall structure towered over people in the hallways. Even the teacher sometimes seemed a little bit thrown off when he entered the class or spoke back to her.

I observed him quickly as he spoke to Riley about the guy's conditions. His muscles were being shown through his grey t-shirt, and that widened my eyes immediately. I should've looked at his arms earlier, maybe then I wouldn't look so lifeless and they wouldn't be making me go home. I can't sleep, even though I would kill for a nightmare-less sleep. I've tried for months and months, it just never lasted long until the incident replayed and I wake up anxiously. I was afraid to even close my eyes, in fear of seeing the scene happen all over again.

"Thalia?" Riley snapped her fingers in front of me and I rubbed my face almost aggressively, I just wanted this to go away.

"Yes?" I replied, helplessly.

"Nathan's driving you home, go." I looked around and noticed the halls were suddenly empty, indicating everyone was in class by now. I looked at Riley and she noticed too as she started running down the hall. "You better get some sleep!" She yelled over her shoulder as she cut into the left corner.

Nonna drove me to school this morning, I was too tired to drive myself. My eyes were shut closed. Nathan took my bag that I held in my hand and started walking to main doors that led outside. I get to leave school because I'm tired, I'm not complaining anymore as that information just started to sink in.

"Normally people skip school to go get high or whatever, yet you're skipping to go to sleep." Nathan practically read my mind and I chuckled, realizing how ridiculous that sounded.

"You guys suggested it, not me." I said while walking through the parking lot, hiding my face away from the sun. It wasn't too hot today but the sun was still out and glaring right into my sleepless eyes.

I felt him pull my hood over my head and I silently thanked him, I also silently cursed at myself for not doing that sooner. We reached his car and got in wordlessly.

His phone started ringing loudly which caused me to jump at the sudden noise. "Yeah?" He answered in a bored tone. The person on the other end seemed to have screamed loudly as I watched Nathan pull his phone away from his ear. "What's wrong with you, get Ethan back into the room. Why did you let him leave in the first place?" He rubbed the side of his face as he spoke.

If I wasn't so out of it right now, I would've broke out laughing knowing Ethan was probably doing something he shouldn't be doing. Even in a hospital and in terrible condition, he still manages to fool around.

"Okay, where's Carter?" Nathan said shaking his head and turning on the car for it to warm up. He reached over to grab a sweater from the backseat, his bicep being right in front of my face. I was waking up more and more.

He put on the sweater and turned the phone onto speaker mode. "He left after he saw Ethan and Austin racing each other in wheelchairs. I don't know where he went, he didn't come back since." I heard Emmett's voice say disappointingly.

"Wheelchairs?" Nathan questioned, thinking about it for a moment. "Well, who won?" I turned my head at him, wanting to laugh and he grinned at me slightly.

"Austin. Ethan threw a huge tantrum, as always, but it was his fault for not watching where he was going when he hit the vending machine." Nathan chuckled and I imagined the scene in my head, shaking my head at Ethan's tactics.

"I'm on my way." Nathan drove out of the parking lot and I leaned back in my seat, comfortably looking out of the window as I watched the trees zoom by from the cars speed. One of the things I noticed at this town was that, it was covered in beautiful trees. It was a wealthy town financially and wealthy in natures beauty.

"Can I come with you?" I asked suddenly, realizing I didn't want to go home. I wouldn't be able to fall asleep anyway, so there's no point of going there. Plus I really just wanted to take a long drive somewhere. He looked over at me thoughtfully then after a moment he nodded.

"Where do you want to go?" He asked, stopping at a red light.

"Aren't you going to the hospital?" I asked, turning my head to face him completely. His face was one you'd never forget, it just had such a distinct structure that I'm sure made girls weak in their knees. "Wait, what photography project? In English class?" I remembered what he had said, earlier it completely skipped my mind.

He nodded. "She said something about trying prove if a picture is really worth a thousand words. We have to take six pictures." He looked over at me, smiling.

"What are you smiling at?" I said while the corner of my lips turned upward at his breathtaking smile.

"Nothing." He looked away and leaned on the wheel lazily. "I don't need to actually go to the hospital, so we can go anywhere." He answered my second previous question. If he didn't need to go to the hospital then why did he say he did?

"Can we just drive around?" I hesitantly asked, not sure if he wanted to drive around all this time. Long drives always keep my mind at ease, I love them to an endless extent. Without an answer, he reached over and turned on the radio, searching through the stations until he found a song that was decent.

"As you wish, princess." He looked over me grinning and I took notice at how deep his dimple went. His perfectly straight, white teeth shone when his smile started reaching his eyes the more I observed his face. He had a perfect shaped nose, perfect eyebrows, perfect long eyelashes, perfect emerald eyes, perfect everything. He was perfect.

"You're going to be the model, you're the more photogenic one of us two." I stated, making my mind up. It would be a shame to put his amazingly— yet annoyingly good looks to waste. We might as well use them to our advantage, I'm sure people won't even care what the picture looks like, as long as they see his face, it's perfect.

"Uh, no." His eyes remained on the road as we drove on a main street that didn't have that many cars, which was odd. "That's defiantly debatable." He looked over at me briefly then looked away.

"No, you're the model, end of story." I took out my phone and went straight to the camera app, ready to prove my point. While he looked out of the front window, the car curving to the left, I quickly took a picture of his side view.

"See?" I showed him and he looked at it shaking his head.

"I should've known. But if you want to play that game." He took out his phone quickly and aimed the camera at me. I made a silly face just in time and he laughed softly. He showed me the picture of me having my knees up to my chest, squishing my cheeks together and raising my right eyebrow. I took his phone away from him and started taking multiple pictures of me smiling widely while Nathan was in the background making a weird face.

I laughed as I looked through the pictures. I'm extremely agitated at the fact that even when he's trying to make ugly faces, he still looks like an adonis, sculpted by god. All of a sudden the car stopped moving and I looked up from his phone, seeing we're at Best Buy.

"What are we doing here?" I questioned curiously as he got out of the car.

"We're here to buy a camera." My eyebrows shot up and I looked at him in disbelief. "Common, let's go. We can't use our phones, they're shit quality anyway." He closed his door and walked to mine, opening it with ease. I got out still mind boggled.

"You're going to buy a camera just for this one project?" I asked him as we walked through the parking lot, the sky getting darker and darker indicating that rain was soon to come. I normally didn't mind the rain but right now, I silently wished it didn't come for a while.

"It's for a good cause." He shrugged, looking around as we walked into the store. We found the cameras easily, they weren't far from the entrance. We started looking at the different cameras set out for display, turning them on and looking at them to see which one was good enough. He rubbed his neck and looked at them carelessly.

He picked up a really nice black one that looked expensive as hell but I didn't comment on it since this would be his camera, so he can pick whatever he wants.

"This is good enough." He looked around for a worker to come open the glass windows that held the camera behind them. "Pose." He said while aiming the camera at me and I couldn't act quick enough to cover my face when I saw a flash go off.

"Stop delete it, now random people can see my picture on that camera." I shoved him playfully and reached for the cameras but he put his arm up, not allowing me to reach it. I whined when he smirked down at me and I wasn't tall enough to jump and grab it away from him. I wasn't even short, he was just a tree.

My hand shot down in defeat but in the process it skimmed down his chest as I brought it down. I heard him take a sharp intake of breath and held it for a second or two.

"Hey, do you guys need any help?" A young employee came over to us smiling and we both broke out of our awkward state. Nathan started talking to the guy about the camera and I started looking around. I caught sight of a couple only a few steps away from me, the two laughing as the slim girl was recording her boyfriend acting goofy. I smiled slightly when he jumped at her suddenly and attacked her in kisses, covering her whole face. She was still recording and laughing loudly as they got weird looks from people that walked by.

I sighed, looking back at Nathan to see if he was done and he seemed to be as he had the camera box in his hands. He turned to me and gestured with his head to head out. He payed quickly as he managed to get into a line that only had two people. I took a glance outside and silently cursed when I saw tiny rain droplets falling down from the sky and into the store door. Nathan came up beside me and looked outside too, the rain started to drop faster.

He took off his sweater and put his camera to the side. He put the sweater on my head and tied the arms of the sweater around my head so that it was like a helmet. I chuckled at his creation and he nodded approvingly at his work.

We ran out of the store and dashed for the car, not wanting to get soaked as it started pouring rather than just falling softly. I basically flew into his car and sighed contently. He came in on the drivers side and started opening the camera up immediately. I guess he bought the card and everything with it too, but I wasn't really paying attention to what he was doing. As he turned it on and started focusing on what buttons did what. As I watched him and waited for him to finish getting it started and all, I noticed he had one ring on his index finger on his right hand. It was a simple sliver one.

"Why are you looking at my hand like that?" He asked amusingly, looking at me rather than the camera. I blushed being embarrassed and looked away, trying to play it off.

"Why would I be looking at your hand?" I made a 'pfft' sound afterwards and he shook his head. He brought the camera up to his eye and aimed it at the rain droplet covered window.

"Look out of the window." He instructed and I listened, wanting to see where he was going with this. I focused my attention on the window, watching the raindrops scatter over the window. It was crazy how fast the weather from sunny to pouring, within minutes.

I heard the click of the camera going off and I turned around, knowing he was done. He smiled down slightly at the picture and showed me, the lighting made it look gloomy but I really liked it. I smiled and nodded in approval.

"Now who's the model." He said, putting the camera away. I rolled my eyes, not replying. I got the sudden urge to want to know more about him, he was confusing. He was undeniably carved by god himself, he was terrifying to others with his stone cold expression he has on daily, he's loving to his family and he's different with me. I would've expected him to be unwilling to make any interactions with me since I'm just some new girl that showed up. But he just had this aura around him that I couldn't explain and I wanted to so badly just figure him out. I wanted to do badly hold myself back from doing so, also.

"Can I steal this sweater too by any chance?' I said holding his warm sweater to my chest. It smelled exactly like the other one, again I couldn't pin point the exact scent but I was in love with it regardless.

"Sure, wanna come to my closet and take every other sweater I own too, while you're at it?" He said sarcastically but I took it a hundred percent seriously.

"I mean since you asked." I replied and he chuckled, looking at me funny.

"We should probably get you home, it's going to start to be a thunder storm any minute from now." He looked outside worriedly and I nodded. He started driving off and I leaned back in my seat.

"This is the second time you made me skip class, Nonna is going to come after you." I stated with a straight face but failing when he had a moment of terror flash across his face. It was gone as quickly as it came.

"She'll never know?" He said questioningly rather than in a statement. He leaned over, tickling my side and I jumped away. His eyes widened and a mischievous grin spread out across his face. "You're ticklish, huh?"

He continued tickling me with one hand and I laughed out crazily, wanting it to stop. "Stop, we'll crash!" I said still laughing but stopping abruptly after that statement.

"Crash into what? The garage? We're already here." He chuckled and I smiled softly. I opened the door silently, the word repeating in my head as I tried to put the pieces together.

Stop, we'll crash.

Why did those words seem so familiar? It feels like I've heard those exact words be repeated over again but I don't remember from where. I didn't have my full memory since two years ago, and nothing made me more angry. I couldn't remember the exact details and I've spent the last two years trying to remember everything and put the pieces together. I feel like this was a piece.

Was this something I had said?

"Thalia?" Nathan called out to me and I blinked twice, taking myself out of my trance.

"Thank you for like," I stopped, not knowing what I was thanking him for. "Thank you for sneaking me out of school completely and driving me back home." I completed and he nodded. He looked very serious as he observed me.

"Something happened." He stated, nodding.

"What?" I said, not sure what he meant by that.

"Something happened to you in your past. I notice all these little details about you, they're strange." He concluded and looked at me intensely. "I plan on finding out what happened." He said roughly but the words came to me almost comfortingly. I didn't say anything as I closed the door and ran to my house.

I stepped inside letting out a long breath that I wasn't aware I was holding in. I was getting too close.

Was this really my fresh start? Because ever since I've been here everything has been coming back to me ten times harder and now these new found emotions are filling me up with frustration and confusion.

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THIS WAS NOT EDITED.

This was horribly written (in my eyes at least) and was so rushed. I know I'm not updating as much as I used to and I apologize, I plan on changing that. It's hard juggling so much as once, but I'll make it work! This chapter to me is complete rubbish, I hate the way I wrote it like it's so boring and filled with

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