It felt like an eternity before I could get Harley at the airport. He was a barker, and he hates traveling, so I had some sleep medicine that he took for the flight. When I found him, he was waking up, but he was too dreary to bark. His stubby little tail had plenty of energy, though, because he began wagging it the moment he saw me headed towards him.

After getting all of my bags, I turned my phone back on and began looking back through the numbers I called to find the cab service I used last time I was here.

Luckily, I saw the man holding a piece of paper with my name on it before I could find the number. It was strange, but I went over to him anyways. I was very hesitant, though. What if they somehow managed to find me, and he was just the driver?

The man smiled warmly at me, and all fears went right away. I was good at reading people, and he was capable of feeling, so it couldn’t be one of them.

“Welcome back, Miss Eberly.”

I couldn’t help but smile back, partially in relief. “Uh, thank you. It’s nice to be back.”

He began carefully rolling the cart that had my bags away. I prepared to be here until the end of the show, just in case I actually was. There were two bags of clothes, a garment bag, my shoe bag, and a small bag with all of Harley’s stuff. In this bag, I also had the spare bag for things I would buy.

When we got outside, he opened the door of an SUV for me and told me to get on in. I couldn’t help but gaze into the car first, and when I did, I saw Niall sitting there with his Raybans on and a smile on his lips. He wasn’t looking in my direction, though, so I wasn’t sure what was going on.

Still, with Harley’s crate in my hand, I climbed into the back and took a deep breath.

Facing him would be hard. I knew that. I didn’t realize that it would be as hard as it actually was. All I wanted right now was to kiss him, but I couldn’t even look at him because I was worried I might. Well, because of that, and my cheeks were glowing red.

“I love your hair,” he informed me, which only made me feel warmer and much more nervous. “And this must be Harley.”

Come on Everit. Stop this!

I cleared my throat, took a deep breath, and nodded, giving him a small smile as I looked over at his gorgeous face for the first time. “Yeah. This is Harley.”

My reaction surprised him, but through his surprise, he smiled more. “There’s something different about you.”

I shrugged and laughed a little. “Besides the hair?” I showed him my wrists and behind my ear. “And the tattoos?”

He chuckled softly and nodded. “You seem different, more confident. Still that adorably shy girl from before, but different—almost like an entirely different person.”

“In a way, I am,” I said.

He gently took my wrist and began looking at the words. Right now, he was looking at my left hand. “What’s this mean?”

“It means beautiful love in Italian,” I murmured. “Behind my ear, I got the Irish word for beautiful, and this one is strong.”

“Can you actually speak any different languages?” he asked, mostly out of curiosity, while he continued to peer at my wrists.

I nodded. “Lots. Irish, Italian, French, Russian, Indian, Spanish, German, and English.”

His eyes widened behind his sunglasses. “Wow. That’s a lot. Do you pick up on other languages easily?”

“Yeah,” I scoffed. “Better than you could really even imagine.”

“So, we need to talk,” he said, completely out of the blue. Of course I knew it would have to happen, but we went from casual small talk to the serious stuff so quick that I was caught off guard. “It’ll have to be later, tonight, but we need to talk.”

The mention of night, any night, reminded me of something quite terrible. My glowing red eyes didn’t exactly scream “normal,” and on most occasions, it was easy enough to fix. I could put in my contacts that matched my dyed eye color.

Not this night, or any night in LA, because I forgot them at home.

I knew I was forgetting something, and that just had to be it, didn’t it?

I started to panic. “Uh, tonight? Well, um . . . you see, the thing is . . . tonight? Well . . . .” But I couldn’t come up with anything. It was probably my only weakness, my inability to come up with a clever lie in the middle of panic, but I couldn’t. So, I just took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay. Tonight, but . . . we have more to talk about than you realize.”

His eyebrows rose, but he nodded and left it at that. “Alright. That’s fine with me. Zane, Kiley, Caleb, and Madi are already at the house. Brinley’s flight was delayed, so she won’t be here until tomorrow. Noah and Eleanor will be here in a few hours, so we’ll all go out to dinner and pick them up beforehand.”

“It’s weird hearing so few names and realizing that’s all that’s left,” I sighed, and I remembered that I probably shouldn’t be here. “Why did you save me if I did so badly?”

“You didn’t do badly, Evie,” he assured me. “Even through the pitchy moments, you still had the most incredible voice of the two of you. Like Adam said, something about your performance was powerful, but it wasn’t as good as it had been. Jesse’s was the best his ever had been, and yours was probably the worst it’s been on that song. But you were still better. I picked you because you have a better chance of winning this competition. I’m trusting that you learned how to put it all behind you?”

I nodded, and I even grinned over at him. “I practiced quite a few things, but mostly, I just realized that I have to think positively, and I have to have confidence in myself. When I did that, I was able to not think about it and able to clear my head.”

“And you’re sure this worked?” he asked, eyebrows high as a smile pulled across his lips. “That’s rather fascinating.”

“My best friend, Max, was my audience, and he actually said I’m better than before.” I stuck my tongue out with a scowl. “I think he’s just saying that. I mean, I have to be good at least to get this far, but, I just . . . .”

“Don’t like compliments,” he snorted, and he laughed—rather loudly, and I couldn’t help but smile at the sound of his sincere laughter. “Trust me, Evie. I know. I’m sure he’s right, though. You’re just underestimating yourself.”

“Better to underestimate myself than overestimate,” I reminded him. “Otherwise, I’d be going around telling everyone how much better I am than they are, or I’ll get my hopes set too high and will get a harsh reality check.”

“I see your point,” he murmured. “I’m glad that you actually admit that you can sing now, though. I’d say that’s an improvement.”

---

When we got back to the house, Harley was wide awake, and he immediately went nuts. He didn’t really like people, but he quickly adapted to them all to the point that his tail was very frantically wagging as he tried to lick Kiley in the face.

She was laughing as she leaned down to pick him up. “Hi there, cutie! What’s your name?” She looked over to me. “I used to have a poodle that looked just like this! Her name was Annabelle.”

“His name is Harley,” I told her, and she smiled as Harley began eagerly trying to lick her face—like he knew her.

“He’s so cute!” she exclaimed. “Makes me want to get a dog when I get back.”

I laughed and nodded. “He’s my first dog, but he won’t be my last.”

“Dogs just . . . make even the dullest days brighter,” she murmured, and she began scratching behind Harley’s ears with a smile. “Isn’t that right, precious?”

I began carefully moving my way upstairs. “He is absolutely precious. You can play with him if you want. I’m gonna unpack.”

“Alright,” she agreed, and she set him down and got on the floor with him. “Are you a good boy?”

It was a scene that made me laugh because Harley’s tail was wagging so hard that it was shaking his butt, and Kiley was about as excited to play with him as he was to play with her. I didn’t linger, though, because I had a lot of unpacking to do. I just got started with the bag of shoes.

Surprisingly, it didn’t really take that long. Still, it felt good to be unpacked, and I sincerely hoped that I wasn’t going to have to just put it all up at the end of the week.

No, Everit. Think positively but not arrogantly.

Harley came trotting in while I was unpacking my garment bag, and when he got in here, he drank some water I set out for him, ate a few bites of food, and then plopped down on the bed. Despite the fact that he slept over six hours on the flight over here, he was already asleep on the bed when I began drying off from my shower.

There was a knock on the door before I could get dressed, so I tightly wrapped the towel around myself and opened the door. I hoped that it was Kiley or Madi, but I wouldn’t be so lucky.

Caleb had a very lustful grin as he looked at me up and down. “You know, the fact that you and I both made it through is fate calling, I think. You and I should—”

“No,” I interrupted before he could finish. Quite frankly, I didn’t want him to finish. “Besides the fact that I don’t do that, I don’t have the fifteen seconds to spare. What do you want, Caleb?”

He laughed that comment off. “Oh no, Everit. I can assure you. I go for a long time, especially when the pussy is as loose as I’m sure yours is.”

My mouth fell open before I realized it, but I quickly shut it back so I could give him a death stare. “Okay, for someone trying to sleep with me, you sure are saying all the wrong things.” I slammed the door on his face, which scared the daylights out of Harley. “What do you want, Caleb?”

“Besides you?” he asked, clearly still not catching the hint that I wasn’t at all interested. “Niall told me to come let everyone know that we’ll be leaving for the airport in fifteen minutes. We can still—”

“Please tell Niall to come here!” I cut him off, rolling my eyes in disgust. “And you, go away!”

“I’m coming!” Niall not so distantly told me. “Caleb, really?”

I opened the door back once I was certain Niall was the only one out there, though I was still in just my towel. “I’m not feeling too hot. I think I’m gonna just go to bed.”

His eyebrows rose, but he only looked at me briefly before looking around the hallway. “Can I come in?”

I stepped aside and gestured him in. “We can still talk tonight. Just wake me up.”

As soon as the door was closed, he frowned and turned sharply to face me. “Okay. What’s really going on? Clearly, you’re feeling quite hot.”

“It’s part of what I have to talk to you about,” I murmured, despite the fact that my cheeks were burning against the rest of my cold skin. “I could explain right now, but it would be a very edited version, and you might not like that.”

“Well, as much as I love seeing you in just a towel, I really shouldn’t be in here,” he said. “We’ll talk tonight after everyone is asleep.”

“That’d be best,” I agreed.

“Are you sure you can’t come?” he asked, and it almost sounded like he was about to beg. “It’s the last day before Brinley gets here, and I’d rather spend it with you.”

“Unless we can miraculously be back by sunset, I can’t,” I sighed.

His lips pressed together before turning into a coy smile. “I can make sure that happens.”

I cocked an eyebrow at him. “You promise?”

“Pinkie,” he said, and he even held his pinkie up for me to hook mine onto.

I felt like a little kid again, but it made me feel good inside to do this. So, with a huge smile, I hooked my pinkie before pushing him gently out the door. “I’ll be ready in ten minutes.”

Luckily, no one saw him come in, and no one saw him leave. Still, he felt the need to push his luck and gave me that adorable smile. “I’ll see you downstairs, Evie. Don’t keep me waiting too long.”

My heart was soaring, and I quickly shut the door so that I could have a very private moment to freak out. I started dancing around and softly singing happy songs. One of the songs that came to mind was Up All Night, especially the part about finding, erm, someone and telling, erm, him he’s the one.

Like I promised, I was ready in ten minutes. I braided my hair into a cute French braid, and I put on no makeup. I also put on a pair of mint colored short shorts—not the sketchy short kind—and wore a black, loose, low-cut tank top that said beautiful love in white letters. It had been a while since I wore my boots, so I put on my black lace-up combat boots, my purity ring, and my pirate locket.

With a glance in the mirror, I saw Everit again. Everit wasn’t ugly, but she was no Mum. Still, she had a certain confidence that didn’t used to exist, and Audry was nowhere to be found. It was bittersweet, but it was necessary and relieving.

I came downstairs only to find everyone else waiting on me. I made sure to leave my iPod playing on the dock so Harley didn’t freak out, but he wasn’t very happy about me leaving him. He never was.

Niall was the first to notice me, and when he did, he had to work really hard to not appear like he found me very attractive. I didn’t understand why, but somehow, he did.

“Let’s head on out so we can be back for the beautiful sunset,” Niall told everyone, and that made me smile. “The view from the rooms is incredible.”

Of course, I already found myself willing to follow that boy everywhere, so I was the first to follow him out the door. I wasn’t sure if sitting beside him up front was the best idea, so I simply sat behind him in the middle seat.

Still, I was close enough to feel my heart pounding and flying at the same time, to feel the cage of butterflies release into my stomach . . . to feel those intense Niall feelings that always left me wanting more.

Especially the ones I felt when his lips were on mine.

Notes

The lyrics are from the song What About Now by Daughtry. I love that band so much. :)

Also, you can check out Everit's outfit here. :) If you want.

Anyways, I wasn't gonna update anymore tonight, but I decided, ya know what? I'm not sure if I'll get to tomorrow, so I'm gonna go ahead and give you awesome guys one more. :)

All the positive responses are awesome. I appreciate it so much. By all means, please continue. :D Comments, subscriptions, ratings...it all means a lot. :) Hell, even views mean a lot. So thank you. :)

More importantly than all of that, I hope you continue to enjoy this. :) That's what literature is for, right?