( 𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 𝙁𝙄𝙁𝙏𝙀𝙀𝙉. )
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JAYLENE ROSEWOOD often thought about how different her life could've been if she hadn't made particular decisions. The thought of it all always left her up at night, thinking for hours without any desire to fall asleep. It chewed at her brain, making her anxious to the point where she thought she was gonna go completely insane. Knowing that a single action she made resulted in a major outcome was absolutely mind blowing to her.

It was crazy to think that if she hadn't been sitting out that day, tanning on the dock by her home, she would've never associated herself with John B. In that moment, she wouldn't be smiling like an idiot, heart loudly pounding against her chest as she walked back towards everyone else, her eyes scanning the crowd in search of Sarah Cameron.

The state of euphoria she was in distracted her from her task, causing her heart to nearly pop out of her chest when a strong grip pulled her to the side, stopping her before she could reach the ongoing celebration going on a few feet away from her. It was extremely sudden, resulting in her breath hitching in her throat as she looked up to face Jason Smith.

His stare intimidated her. The way his eyebrows were harshly knit together with his lips pursed into a thin line as he held her in his grasp, creating crimson colored marks on her porcelain skin. His brown eyes were no longer soft like she remembered. They were colder than the Arctic Ocean as they shot sharpened daggers at the petrified girl.

The anxiety she felt as he tightly held her with a strong grip was through the roof. Jaylene felt vulnerable as she winced in pain, managing to part her lips to speak. "Jason, your grip's a little tight there, buddy." She motioned towards the hand marks that were slowly beginning to form on her upper arms.

He quickly realized what she meant, causing him to let go of her as he glanced towards the spot where Jaylene had previously been stood at with John B. Jason had seen everything that went down between the two. From the short conversation they had all the way to the wholesome hug they shared before locking their lips together. And he was angry. Extremely angry with both participating parties. The thought of John's face caused him to ball his hands up into fists, imagining what it would feel like to beat the living crap out of the Routledge boy.

"Who were you with?" He tucked his hands into the pockets of the dress pants he wore. His tone was harsh and demanding, letting Jaylene know that he wasn't playing around.

"A friend." Jaylene replied, grazing her finger across her lips in hopes of allowing the swelling to go down.

"A friend, huh? What—what friend would that be?" Jason wanted her to admit who she'd been with, but the girl was determined to continue lying about her whereabouts for as long as she possibly could.

A scoff ran past Jaylene's lips as she gave him a look. She realized that he was only trying to create another pointless argument. Typical Jason. She thought to herself. "I'm not doing this, Jason. I've already tried to make amends with you and it's about time that you realize that I don't owe you an explanation to what I choose to do with my life." She tried to walk past him, but he managed to grab a hold of her again.

"Why were you in Chapel Hill yesterday? Were you with that friend of yours? John B?" The mocking sarcasm was evident in his voice as he held her closer to him, getting a good look at the fear in her eyes.

Jaylene's eyes widened in surprise, but she quickly brushed it off as she cleared her throat. She was gonna kill Andrea as soon as this was over. "I wasn't—"

Jason wryly chuckled, quickly cutting her off mid-sentence before she could continue feeding him her lies. "Jesus christ. You've always been a shitty liar."

"What the hell are you implying right now?" She managed to pry his fingers off of her, immediately adding pressure to the marks formed all across her arms.

"I'm implying that you're a horrible liar. Just admit that you're fucking a pogue." The words seethed through his teeth, a vein popping from his neck as Jaylene loudly gulped down the lump in her throat.

"What? So I'm not allowed to have friends anymore? You think that you have a single ounce of control over me?" Jaylene's voice rose as she shook her head in disbelief at the accusations being thrown at her.

"You know what you are? You're a fucking slut who enjoys messing with people's feelings to help satisfy her needs. Maybe if your whore of a mother were still here she could've taught you some fucking manners." He spoke through gritted teeth, allowing the strong stench of alcohol to travel up into Jaylene's nostrils. His words stung and broke her heart into a million little pieces, but she didn't show it.

Jaylene had always known that Jason had a temper, but she'd never experienced it in the years that she knew him. He never loved her and his drunk spoken words helped her confirm that. But she didn't care that he wasn't in the right state of mind. He knew exactly how to trigger her and he had decided to do it in a way that just pushed her to retaliate. She wasn't about to allow him to speak of her in such a degrading manner. So, instead of staying quiet, she shot him one of the dirtiest looks ever, leaning closer towards him so that her lips were hovering just above his ear. "Let's get one thing straight. My needs were never satisfied. It's extremely hard to orgasm when the guy you're sleeping with cums within a few seconds of inserting his dick inside of you."

A smirk was now formed on her face when she realized that she'd managed to hit a nerve with the harsh insult she'd thrown at him. It hurt his ego and she loved that.

However, he didn't stay quiet for much longer. Quickly, he regained his composure and gave her a disgusted look. "Once he breaks your heart, don't expect me to welcome you back with open arms."

She stifled back a laugh, giving him a mocking smile as she pat him on his shoulder. "It's cute that you think you'll ever cross my mind. I tried being nice to you even after everything, but I'm done. I'm done being some sort of rag doll that you can drag around whenever you please." Jaylene pushed past him, but stopped in her tracks before she could make it far. "And if you talk about my mother again in such a demeaning manner, I'll give you a good kick in the balls to help insure that the Smith last name ends with you." She spoke in a threatening tone before making her way back towards the crowd of people. Jaylene was no longer searching for Sarah Cameron, but for Andrea Smith.

But before she could locate the youngest Smith sibling, a familiar voice broke her from her thoughts, causing her to mutter a quick profanity under her breath as she looked up towards her father as he held his hand out towards her, motioning towards the dance floor as music played in the background.

"I'm really not in the mood to dance right now." She mumbled, looking up towards him as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Oh, c'mon! You loved it when you were a kid!" Henderson encouraged his daughter, giving her a look full of hope and glee as he waited for her to give in.

Jaylene parted her lips to protest, but quickly shut her mouth when she caught a glimpse of JJ Maybank getting escorted out of the island club by a security guard. It caused everyone around her to put their conversations on pause as they watched him roughly get thrown around by the much stronger man who had a hold of him.

She watched closely as the blonde haired boy managed to escape the man's grip, a smirk tugging at her lips at the fact that he'd been caught like she assumed he would.

"Oh, Mr. Dunleavy, I see you got your drink. Good, that's really nice of you." JJ pointed towards the older man who'd previously asked the boy, who was playing an undercover waiter, to fetch him a drink. He gave him a slight pat on the shoulder and then proceeded to grab the drink from his grasp, earning himself a confused look in return. "I'm actually gonna down that." He added, bringing the glass cup to his lips and draining it of any liquid it held.

He continued shouting a bunch of nonsense like a complete idiot as Jaylene watched in amusement. The looks on people's faces were priceless as he pointed towards Sarah's stepmother, Rose, letting her know how much she resembled lady liberty with the ridiculous headband she'd decided to wear to the formal party.

"What? You think this is amusing?" Henderson scoffed from beside her, receiving an eye roll in return as Jaylene kept her gaze focused on the boy getting dragged away from the party.

"Please, as if you're one to educate me on what's right and wrong." Jaylene shot back at him, knowing that this would be the start of a conversation they'd be having once this was all over.

"Let go of him! You can't just boot him!" She heard Kiara's familiar voice shout from where she stood with her parents. It gained her attention and everyone else's as they looked towards the Carrera girl who was sticking up for the Maybank boy. "I invited him here. I'm a member of this club." She added, motioning towards herself with an annoyed look planted on her face at how horribly the man was treating her best friend.

After that, the banter didn't go on. Instead, the blonde pushed the security guard away from him, thus causing a bunch of chaos to erupt. He called for the rest of his crew to join him, and before Jaylene knew it, the four inseparable best friends were reunited, having a small celebration with everything they'd accomplished. She managed to lock eyes with John B. for a few seconds as he shot her a wink before fleeing the scene alongside the rest of his friends.

But the chaos didn't stop there. Once the four were out of sight, Jaylene came up with a brilliant idea. A large smile adorned her face as she turned back towards her father.

"You know what this night needs? A speech!" She exclaimed in an extremely enthusiastic tone. It only caused her Henderson to grow confused as she left his side before heading towards the man who'd been in charge of playing music that entire day. Jaylene asked him if it was okay if she borrowed the microphone for a minute, and within a few seconds, the microphone was in her grasp as the music came to a sudden end.

The attention was quickly turned towards Jaylene Rosewood as she tightly held onto the microphone that was now in her grasp. The spotlight was on her as she scanned the crowd of people who gave her confused looks. So she cleared her throat before sighing. "Hello, everyone. I know how chaotic this night just got, but it's not quite over yet." She began, pausing for a few short seconds before continuing. "I just wanna start off by congratulating my dad for reaching yet another milestone in his career as a businessman, or whatever it is he does, and I also wanna congratulate Ward Cameron as well." She motioned towards the two men who wore medals around their necks.

Despite the confusion, the crowd cheered for the two, completely unaware that that was only the beginning of Jaylene's so called speech.

The brunettes body was tense as the cheers quickly died down. She felt completely disgusted just looking at everyone. "But that's not all," She started, biting down on the inside of her cheek as she pointed her finger towards all the wealthy people eyeing her. "As many of you are all aware, I was off the island for six months living with family in New York because I apparently tried to drown myself. Well, let me just let you all in on a secret, that's a big fat lie that was created by my lovely stepmother. Truth is, I OD'd on oxycodone that was supplied by a friend, and I was spending my precious time at a rehab center." Jaylene watched people's faces fall at the revelation, causing her to shake her head in disbelief at the amount of people who didn't know the truth.

"See, the reason my step mother created that lie was so that you egotistical pieces of shit wouldn't compare me to my mom. You remember Marleen, right? She's the woman you all constantly badmouth because she wasn't fortunate enough to grow up under the same circumstances that all of us here did." Jaylene was filled with anger as she continued speaking her mind, blocking out the whispers from the people around her and completely ignoring the cold looks she received from the good amount of people she'd just called out. "I mean, that's what my dad told me. But I know that's not true. You know why? Because if that were the case, then Lorelei would've kept her legs shut instead of being a home wrecker. My mother was a kind person who didn't deserve to be put through that kind of torment. She didn't deserve to have her husband cheat on her with the woman who she considered a friend—" The microphone was quickly cut off as Henderson approached the angered girl, a guilty look settled in his eyes at the truth that had just been unveiled.

"I'm extremely sorry for the interruption, everyone. If you'll excuse us." Henderson nervously spoke into the microphone, unable to avoid the whispers and judge mental looks being thrown at the two. The attention was mainly focused on him though, and it terrified him knowing that this would surely mess with his reputation.

｡･:*:ˑ༄ؘ ۪۪۫۫ ▹

IF YOU WERE TO ASK JAYLENE how she felt after exposing the lies her family had tried burying, she'd say relieved. It felt like a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders as she made her way into the dimly lit home. The lies she had to go along with were no longer suffocating her and she was finally able to breathe again. And it felt absolutely amazing. It felt amazing knowing that she no longer had to hide behind a mask.

But that feeling was quickly taken from her the second that the front door was slammed shut by her furious father, him being the last to step into the household. She could tell he was angry by the way his hands were firmly placed on his hip, but she couldn't understand why. No one forced him to cheat on his wife who'd done nothing but love him. He'd been outed and that's what bothered him.

"So, do any of you have anything to say to me? Cause I'm dying to change out of this dress. It's cute, but extremely uncomfortable." She was the first to speak. The tension in the room didn't bother her. She wasn't the slightest bit ashamed of what she'd done. "Great. Nothing? Alright." Jaylene turned to walk towards the staircase, but stopped the second the shouting began.

"When are you gonna grow up and quit acting like a child? Are you aware of what you just did?" Henderson's voice caused her to jump, catching her off guard as she shut her eyes closed and sighed.

"There it is! There you go blaming me for all the fucked up mistakes that you made!" Jaylene snapped, knowing he'd usually scold her for such vulgar language, but she didn't care. She was finally calling people out on their shit and it felt refreshing. "How are you able to live with yourself? You claim you loved her and made me believe that all these years, but it was nothing but a lie! And you have Nate and I living in the same house as the woman who helped tear this family into nothing but shreds!"

"Listen, sweetheart. You need to relax." Lorelei's voice only enraged her more as the woman tried to calm the teenage girl.

Jaylene ignored her, pointing a finger towards herself as she looked her father right in the eye. "Consider this that last strike you told me about and enroll me into boarding school whenever you get the chance. Anything is better than having to live in this suffocating household." She gave him one last look before finally walking up the stairs.

"Yeah, enroll me too while you're at it." Nathaniel spoke for the first time since the family of four made it into the home, giving the two adults disappointed looks before following in his sisters steps.

But if only Jaylene would've known that the heartbreak she had to endure that night was only the beginning.

authors note. Protect Nate and Jaylene at all costs cause those two are about to go through some shit.