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Author's Chapter Notes:
I want to give a humungous thanks to everyone who has been reading! I have gotten a lot more feedback then I had ever expected. And, just for that...I will give you all, what you want, in this chapter! Enjoy and let me know what you think.

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“I’m not taking him! You can’t pawn him off every time you two get into a fight,” Kevin shook his head. I just stood there and watched the scene unfold.

“You don’t understand Kevin! The kid HATES ME! He doesn’t want to be here, he doesn’t like his life here, and he sure, as hell, doesn’t want me as his guardian. I don’t know what to do anymore!” he screamed back. His back was to me, Kevin was facing him and AJ was on the side…so I could clearly see the looks on both Kevin and AJ’s faces, but not his.

“Kev…” AJ interjected. “I smelled booze on Baylee tonight. We have tried, like fuck, to get through to him but he just shuts us out.”

“NO, correction…he shuts ME out…he adores the fuck out of you. If I remember correctly I think his words were ‘I don’t understand why AJ is such good friends with you. He is so cool and you are such a dick.’.”

“Ouch,” AJ scrunched his nose.

“He was drinking?” Kevin furrowed his eyebrows.

“Yes.” The other two men answered.

“Oh boy,” Kevin sighed.

“See? What did I tell you guys? I TOLD you from the beginning that I couldn’t do this! Why did Brian do this to me? I am fucking up his son! I don’t even want to know what Brian would say to me, if he were here!” He asked. I could faintly hear what I thought to be sniffles. Was he really crying? Over me? What had I done?

“It’ll be okay. Teenagers are hard to deal with, it’s not your fault,” Kevin comforted and he and AJ engulfed him in a hug. I slowly made my way down the stairs until I was to the bottom, only a few feet behind them.

“Did you pack?” AJ asked me and he and Kevin looked up at me.

“No,” I answered. “I’m staying here.”

“I don’t believe that you are in a position to tell us what you are or are not going to do, Baylee,” Kevin said, crossing his arms. “I am very disappointed in you.”

“I know,” I nodded my head.

“AJ, let’s go,” Kevin put a hand on my guardian’s shoulder. “You two need to talk.”

“I believe that you owe a certain someone an apology, too,” AJ sneered at me. The rage and disappointment were still very evident in his voice and eyes. I simply nodded as they left. It was just me and him now. We stood in silence. He hadn’t even turned to face me.

“Go to bed, Baylee. You have school in the morning,” he instructed as he slowly trudged into the other room. He had still not looked at me. I was ruining the relationships that I had with both my guardian and AJ. I had betrayed their trust and acted like such a brat. I decided to follow him.

“Kevin is right,” I said softly to his back. He had taken a position on the large couch and was flipping through channels. “It’s not your fault. I have been acting like a brat.”

“I told you to go to bed, not that I expect you to listen,” he replied with a shake of the head.

“I heard what you said to Kevin,” I continued to talk and ignore his instruction.

“Baylee…” he stood up to, sort of, face me but still didn’t make eye contact.

“I don’t hate you…just so you know,” I blurted before he could tell me to go to bed, again.

“You act like it.”

“It’s not really intentional…it just kind of…happens.” I explained from where I stood in the doorway. I had to fix things. Not that I expected everything to be all hunky dory and fine, but I had really screwed up and needed things to start being okay, again. My parents put me with him for a reason and maybe I would figure it out, eventually. Until then, I have to trust their decision.

“Whatever. It’s well past midnight and you have school in the morning,” he said as he pushed past me. This was going to be a bit more difficult than I had expected.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered causing him to stop. He finally looked me dead in the eyes and that’s when I saw that he had, in fact, had a few streaks on his cheeks. He actually shed a few tears. Mind you, this is a big deal because he is not the type to really cry…so just those two or three tears told me how badly and how deep I had hurt him.

“Excuse me?” he questioned with disbelief and confusion dripping from his voice.

“I said…” I licked my lips before taking a deep breath to continue, “I said that I am sorry, Nick.” His light blue eyes were still locked with my darker blues. We just stood there as he was, obviously, trying to figure out if I was joking or not. “And…I…uh…” I took another long deep breath. “I kinda…well…I…I love you.”

“I love you, too, Baylee.” He smiled slightly and let out a sigh as he pulled me into a hug. Maybe we could start getting along again, now? I guess, we’ll see.