Back to Square One

“Okay, what’s up?” my sister confronted me.

“What?” I asked confused.

“You and Hazelyn have been totally ignoring each other and you’ve been avoiding each other. Don’t think we haven’t noticed,” she told me with her arms crossed.

Okay, maybe not so confused. Since the day that I talked to my sister (the day after getting drunk with Hazelyn), I’ve been avoiding her. I don’t know why but I felt like she needed space. She’s been noticeably avoiding me as well, making my avoiding her a lot easier.

“What are you talking about?” I asked with my innocent eyes and went back on my computer, acting like I was still doing my report for work, but I was already done.

“You’re difficult. You can’t just expect her to come running back to you if you’re not gonna do anything,” she told me before leaving my office with a bang.

I groaned as I sent my report and got up, stretching. I walked out of my office for the first time in two weeks. Except for meetings, meals and bed of course.

I walked down the stairs, and was on my way to the kitchen to find something to fulfill my hunger. I got pulled into one of our supply closets. I figured it was one of the guys since I doubt my sister could manage to move me an inch, much less three feet.

“Dude!” Oh it was Kyle.

“What?” I frowned. “I’m hungry,” I complained shaking him off.

“Aunt Leslie’s here,” he told me as if I should be worried.

“And?” I grumbled. Don’t mess with me when I’m hungry.

“She knows about you and Hazelyn.”

“Everyone does,” I huffed.

“No, I mean that she thinks you’re dating?”

“Uhuh?”

“Well, you guys need to pull this off.” I just shrugged. “I left their place in a hurry to tell you because Leslie tried to pull off trying to get Hazelyn to date another one of her friends’ sons. And well… Lyn was pissed and told her that she was dating somebody already, and when Leslie asked who, Tristan said you.”

“I don’t get your point man,” I told him.

“The point is, you guys need to pull this off if you want both your parents off your balls.”

His words sunk into me and I looked at him in panic. “Dude, how are we gonna do this?!” I asked.

“This is what-,” he got cut off though, because the door flew open.

“What the hell are you doing inside a fucking closet?” Hazelyn asked with her arms across her chest.

“We were just talking,” Kyle smiled pulling me out.

“Well, my mother is in the kitchen and I need you to act like my boyfriend,” she sneered at me and started to walk towards the kitchen doors.

“What are you doing?!” I asked her, pulling her back with her jeans’ belt loops.

“Saving our nuts from getting set up with random creeps,” she told me matter of factly.

“What? You’re just gonna waltz into the kitchen and start pretending?” I asked incredulously. She looked at her like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “How are you gonna do that?”

“What do you wanna do then smart ass?” she snapped.

I looked back at Kyle with a wink and he just shook his head at me.

“Run in there as if I was chasing you,” I told her.

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Just do it,” I rolled my eyes at her.

She ran into the kitchen and I followed her after a few seconds, spotting her near the counter and I ran after her, tickling her sides – making her bust out laughing. When I was finally done, I took a deep breath and my eyes landed on aunt Leslie.

“Hey ma, sorry. I forgot you were here,” Oh fuck. I slipped. I wrapped my arms around the woman and gave her a tight hug.

Hazelyn’s eyes grew, and so did Aunt Leslie’s smile. “Oh darling, I’ve been great. But now, I’m indescribably happy,” she said to Hazelyn and I. “We’ve almost lost hope in you two lovers getting back together,” she cooed at us.

I looked at Hazelyn and she sent me a sweet smile as she sipped on her drink.

“Yeah well, we just couldn’t stay away from each other, huh babe?” I smiled at her. She shook her head no and bit her lip, looking down at her feet as if she was embarrassed.

“You two are cute. Well, I’ll be seeing more of that cuteness during my stay here,” she said clapping her hands together.

I shot Hazelyn a look, and I saw a horrified one on her face, but quickly played it off. “What are you talking about mom?” she asked.

“I forgot to tell you that I took a two week vacation off. Just enough time before you start training for the X-Games! Congratulations on that by the way. I think that you just got your inspiration back,” Leslie said sending me a wink.

“Mom,” Hazelyn whined playfully sending me a pout from a few feet away.

“Oh hush you little baby. I’m just glad you two are back together. I mean, you both are a mess without each other,” she smirked.

“Ma!” Hazelyn snapped at her mother.

Leslie was about to say something but her phone began ringing. “Excuse me for a moment,” she said before putting her phone to her ear and walking on the other side of the kitchen, mumbling incoherently at the device.

I suddenly felt something shove against me, and instinctly catching it. I saw that it was Hazelyn that Kyle had shoved at me, and she was blushing like crazy.

“You guys were inseparable when you were together,” he whispered at us. “Act like it!” he said before walking out the kitchen.

“You should try acting, you can pull it off,” I whispered against her ear.

She smirked at me and whispered back: “You should too. You do a great job at it.”

I laughed at her and shook my head. “You know what the best part of a romance movie is?” I asked her. She bit her lip and took a glance at her mom who was watching us intently. She then shook her head at me and looked at me dead in the eye. I leaned over to her ear, and whispered softly. “The Kiss.”

She looked at me with a smirk, just like the reaction I was looking for. “Really?” she chuckled. “Do you wanna try it? Or should we move it to later on in the movie?” she asked in a challenging tone.

I smirked at her, taking her challenge and started leaning in until we heard a glass break. We both jumped from each other, looking towards the mess and saw Leslie in the middle of it.

“Sorry, just some shock,” she mumbled. “Sorry. But you can carry on with whatever you were about to do,” she beamed at us.

Hazelyn blushed as I just laughed. “It’s okay. I’ll get somebody to take care of that, we’ll move to the living room.”

She chuckled as I carried her over the pile of broken glass. I carried her all the way to the living room after asking one of the helpers to clean up the mess.

Hazelyn and I sat on the loveseat as Aunt Leslie sat on the other couch as we talked. We basically caught up on what’s been up in the past years. Hazelyn apparently got a job in video and music productions in addition to Hollister.

I also learned that she went off to Florida when she left, and stayed there for a year and that’s when she decided to tour the world. She ended up in Japan for a week somehow.

“Hey! I have a great idea!” Aunt Leslie piped up.

“Mom,” Hazelyn said cautiously.

“We should go to Fiji! We haven’t been there in years!” she said. “What do you think?”

I looked at Hazelyn who seemed to want to disagree. “Mom, we have work,” she reasoned.

“We can get Kyle and Samantha to do it,” she said.

“But we have responsibilities mom,” Hazelyn sighed.

“You can leave it for a week or two,” Leslie said waving it off.

“I don’t know,” Haze said. “If Ryan doesn’t have anything…,” she said looking at me, hoping I’d say no. Fuck no. I’d take this chance to be in an island with her. With her mom. I was internally having a party in my brain.

“I don’t think I have anything planned,” I said cautiously.

“Great! We’ll leave in two days!” Aunt Leslie clapped her hands. Hazelyn opened her mouth to say something but Leslie’s phone rang again. “Well I’ll call you two. I have to go,” she said before getting up and scurrying off.

Once she was out of sight, Hazelyn jumped three feet away from me. “What the hell were you thinking?!” she frantically whispered at me.

“What?” I asked innocently as I walked towards the door.

“We cannot go to Fiji!” she followed me. “Together!”

“Why not?”

“Because!” she screeched.

“Because what?” I asked turning around.

“Because!” she repeated. “Because I don’t wanna go,” she said confidently. But I heard the slight squeak in her voice.

“That’s one thing you have to work on babe, you know you can’t lie to me,” I winked at her as I leaned down kissing the tip of her nose and walked into my room and closing the door behind me.

“Ryan!” she screamed banging at the door. “Open the door!”

“I’m gonna take a shower!” I sang.

“Ryan Dolciani, open the god damn door!” she screeched.

“Nope,” I laughed sitting on my bed.

She was quiet for awhile and she knocked softly this time. I raised an eyebrow as I got up and walked to the door, close enough to hear her soft voice. “Come on please babe, open the door,” she cooed.

I chuckled as I opened the door and saw her with her puppy dog face. “What’s up with the-,” she cut me off by a kiss, catching me off-guard.My heart instantly started beating faster, and those familiar butterflies that only this woman gave me started flying in my stomach. As if my body just knew, my arms wrapped around her waist as I pulled her closer.

“Play along, my mom’s watching,” she whispered against my lips, making me shiver. She stepped away from me and looked at me with the cutest puppy-dog eyes- even cuter from the ones she gave me in high school. “I’m sorry,” she said a little louder.

I tried to get a glimpse of her mom but she was nowhere to be seen, but I decided to play along anyways. “It’s okay babe,” I said to her, catching my breath as I pulled her towards me and kissed her forehead. I can’t believe that our first kiss in 3 years would be so spontaneous. An act, but still spontaneous.

“Hey kids. Sorry to break up your beautiful moment here, but somebody’s here to see you Lyn,” Savannah said poking her head from the bottom of the stairs.

“What? Who?” she asked.

“Gabriel.”