Photo of Jax above

"This is beautiful." I smiled. Standing on the red stairs I looked around at the bright sky and the people all around me. There was barely any space to walk around but we've been able to manage so far.

"Smile!" My dad shouts from the bottom as he brings up his camera to his eyes.

Nick, Marissa, Hunter, Jax and I all gathered together and smiled as my dad took numerous pictures of us. After a while of taking photos we all sat down on the stairs and took in the view in front of us.

People running around on the sidewalk, pictures being taken, little kids bundled up with jackets running around with big smiles.

Everything around me had lights shining bright even if you couldn't see it from the morning sky. At night was when the lights shined the brightest.

"Where do you want to go next?" My dad asked me.

"Uhm," I look around. "How about...Central Park?"

"It's cold." Hunter exclaims. "We should eat."

"How about we get some pretzels and head over to the park?" My dad suggests as he points over to the pretzel truck at the end of the block.

"That doesn't sound like a bad idea, right now." Marissa nods along.

"Marissa and food," Nick chuckles. "She'd eat dog shit if you told her." My eyes trailed down Nick's legs and it wasn't until he stood up that I saw a small bulge on the side of his leg. "She'll eat anything you give her."

"Nick," I pull him aside as we walk, "Make it a little more obvious?" I look down.

He gives me a questioning look and follows my glance. Cursing under his breath, he takes out the box quickly and puts it in his jacket pocket.

"Thanks, Emma," he sighs. "Was it that obvious?"

"I mean it kind of looked like you had a boner on the side of your thigh." I shrugged.

Laughing, he thanks me again and we join the group as we reach the pretzel truck. We walked around for a while before getting into our car and making our way to Central Park.

When we get there I couldn't stop smiling. I took in the sight in front of me with Jax by my side.

"Wow." I let out. There were trees everywhere, so much green, and people walking around.

"You kids look around," My dad speaks. "We'll meet back here in an hour I'm going to rest here." He sits down on the bench.

"You sure you don't want to join us?" I ask.

"Go on," He waves. "I'll be right here."

Nodding, Jax and I walked hand in hand around the park. Hunter, Nick and Marissa walked in front of us.

"Are you happy?" Jax turns to me.

"Yes," I nod, smiling. "So happy, and I'm even happier you're here with me." I look around and watch the birds happily fly around and listen as the wind rustles through the leaves. "It would have been nice if Amanda and your mom came."

"My dad brought Amanda here before with Chloe and Monica," He tells me. "She loves it here."

"I can see why." Jax and I stop and lean again the railing that separated the grass and the walk way. Hunter, Nick and Marissa stood besides us taking pictures.

"Listen," Jax begins to say. "We have to tal-"

"Hey, love birds!" Hunter interrupts. "Come join in!"

"In a second!" Jax shouted back.

"Come on, let's go take some pictures." I pull him along. "It'll be a good memory."

"Emma, wait."

Pulling him to my side, I smile widely as Hunter snaps pictures of all of us and we even asked a woman running by to snap a few with Hunter in it as well.

We were walking around, admiring the view when Jax came to a stop. He brought me over to a bench and turned to me. The others stood not so far away, having their own conversation.

"I've been meaning to talk to you." Jax says in a low voice.

"What about?" I have my head resting on his shoulder. I could hear his heart start to beat faster and he moved away for me, looking intensely at me.

"I don't want to ruin this trip for you." Jax begins.

My hands suddenly start sweating and a million scenarios go through my head.

"Whatever it is I don't want to know." I shake my head. "Not now."

"You have to know, Emma." He says. "Before we left Boston I-"

"Stop," I get up. I didn't want to find out what I think he was about to say. "I don't want to know. Just wait until we're back home."

"Emma, please."

My eyes water and I shake my head repeatedly. "Whoever it was I don't need to know."

"Whoev-What..Emma, no." He gets up. "I didn't cheat on you, fuck."

"What's going on?" Hunter says from behind me.

"We're just talking man." Jax sighs.

"You didn't cheat?" I wipe away a tear that had slipped down.

"What the fuck, bro?" Hunter gets in between us.

"Hunter, don't do this right now." I tug on his arm, looking around to see if anyone was watching us.

Hunter pulls away and leans into Jax. "Emma give us a second."

  "What? N-"

"I said give us a second." He demands.

"Fuck you." I say under my breath. Marissa brings me into a side hug as Hunter and Jax are on the bench talking.

"What's that about?" Nick nods his head to where they were sitting.

"I don't know." I shrug. "I thought he was going to tell me he cheated."

"He cheated?" Marissa's eyes go wide.

"No, no...I don't know he just wanted to talk." I sigh. "Hunter got in the way before he could tell me anything."

"I'm sure whatever it is isn't bad." She says.

Nick looks at his watch and tells us it's time to meet my dad again and we call over Jax and Hunter. I walked ahead with Marissa and Nick and let them stay behind us.

The entire way silence filled the air. There was tension between us and when we reached my dad, he was throwing crumbs of bread to the birds.

"You had fun?" My dad says as we drove off. I could feel his stare through the mirror.

"Yeah," I nod. "It was okay."

Jax laid his hand on my thigh and gave me a squeeze. "I love you, you know that?"

I nod, staying quiet. 

"I didn't cheat on you that's not what I wanted to talk to you about."

"So then what?" I turn to him, making sure to keep my voice lower than the music playing on the radio.

"We'll talk when we're back home." He assures me.

"Why? You were ready to talk less than an hour ago. Is it Hunter?"

Now it was his turn to stay quiet.

I scoff. "My brother isn't in charge of you. Fuck that and fuck you for listening to him and ignoring what I have a right to know."

"Emma," He shakes his head. "It's...complicated."

"What's so complicated?!" I raise my voice. My dad looks at me through the mirror and Hunter looks back. Nick and Marissa uncomfortably squirm besides us.

"What's going on?" My dad lowers the radio.

I notice Hunter giving Jax a stern look before turning away and I cross my arms and face the window.

"Nothing," I say. "Are we almost back at the hotel?"

"Five minutes."

Arriving at the hotel, the first thing I did was take a bath. My muscles relaxed immediately under the warm water.

Since the park I couldn't take my mind off of Jax. There was clearly something bothering him and whatever Hunter told him, now he doesn't want me to know.

My heart ached with pain knowing he was hiding something from me and my own brother knew. Whatever it was, I was going to find out. Whether he told me or not.