Nevaeh slowly turns around. What she sees is not who she expects at all. She is scared when she sees them again.
Nevaeh sees all eighteen of her brothers and Nylah. She is so confused and scared and hurt.
"W-wh-what?! I do not un-understand how y-you are he-here right n-no-now." She manages to stutter out. Then Rosen is by her side, as she falls to the floor weeping. Nevaeh looks around and sees that Rosen, Ryder, Harrison, Henley, Nylah, Gavin, Sebastien, Luca, Marc, James, Johnny, Michael, Harlem, Adrian, Connor, Sam, Jason, Kyler, Henry, Scott, Derek, Liam, and Reece. She turns around and sees that Chris is still tied up in the chair.
She wants an explanation from everyone but first knows what she has to do. She grabs the gas can that is nearby and pours the liquid all over Chris. Then she grabs a match, lights it, and throws it on Chris.
She and everyone else quickly gets out of the building. Thankfully, the building is an old house that is in the middle of nowhere, with no surrounding houses or buildings. Rosen called the police, and all he told them was that he and his friends were baking and forgot about it and it caught on fire.
By the time the police got there, Chris' body had disintegrated and was unidentifiable. Not that the police knew that anyone else was in there.
~~~
It has been two days since the fire, and no one has said anything to Nevaeh. After the fire, everyone went back to the house that the boys and Nevaeh and Nylah grew up in. Which was huge!
But while they were there, Nevaeh just stayed in her room most of the time. She could not talk or even look at anyone. She did not know who to trust anymore. Guess that is what happens when you have lied to your entire life. But could you blame her for not talking to anyone and just isolating herself?
On what seemed like the five hundredth day of Nevaeh being in her room, she finally came down. All she said was, "Tell me how this is all possible and tell me how you guys all know each other." She points back and forth between her siblings and her roommates.
Gavin spoke up first, "the day you saw us all 'die' was not us. They were holograms. You see, Ryder, Rosen, Henley, and Harrison here helped us." The four roommates gave Gavin a dirty glare for throwing them under the bus like that. He continued, "We knew that if we stuck around you and Nylah were going to kill yourselves or get killed by Chris. So we thought it would be best if we fake our death, but we needed you to believe it." Nevaeh interrupted, "Oh, I believed it alright. You know, crying myself to sleep every night for over a year, hurting myself physically and mentally, pushing others away, and being a jerk towards others for the tiniest things. Yeah, I believed it all right." She gave a disgusted look at everyone but let them continue nonetheless. "We did not want to Vae" Nylah continued the story using Nevaeh's nickname. "We did not. But we knew we had to and could not do it by ourselves. So we had our friends, Henley, Harrison, Ryder, and Rosen, pretend to be your roommates for the year so that they could look out for you." Nylah said feeling so guilty about lying to her twin.
"After you and Henley were kidnapped, then we knew that we could stop Chris once and for all. He never had to hurt you or anyone else ever again. But when I saw you in the chair Nevaeh, I could not help but feel protective over you. And not in the same way your siblings do. I felt like I always had to be around you. To be happy and to make sure you were safe. And at first, it was only to make sure you were safe. But then I started liking you, as more than a friend, and I did not even want another guy looking at you." Rosen told Nevaeh whole-heartedly.
Nevaeh started to tear up but quickly wiped her eyes before the tears slipped out. She understood why they did what they did. They wanted to get revenge on Chris but could not have Vae find out. So they faked their death and had friends keep an eye on her. Those friends then became Nevaeh's roommates and they all got along and became friends. Then Rosen caught feelings and became even more protective over Vae but also felt horrible that he had to hide what was going on.
Nevaeh felt betrayed and hurt. She slapped Rosen and yelled out, "I hate all of you! My brothers and Nylah should be dead and my best friends, well my ex-best friends, can go rot in a hole! I hate you guys!" she stormed off to her room, not being able to hold back the tears anymore.
She fell back against her door and cried her eyes out. She is so upset, she does something she has not done in a while. She never thought it would come down to this again. With each motion of the blade against her wrist, she whimpers softly, hoping someone will hear her crying out for help.
Nevaeh hears a light knock on her bedroom door and quickly cleans herself up. She grabs a white towel and puts it over her wrist holding it in place with a hair tie.
She walks over to the door and opens it only to find Rosen there. She has her bleeding arm behind her back and her okay arm in front of her.
Rosen asks, "Nevaeh, I am so truly sorry. I never meant to hurt you. Or fall for you this hard." he mumbled the last part, but Nevaeh still heard him. She smiled slightly but grimaced when her wrist moved and shot pain throughout her arm. Rosen notices this and asks, "Hey, are you okay?" he seems genuinely worried, but she has to lie so no one finds out, "yes, I am. Thank you. Um, yeah, I forgive you but do not expect me to forgive everyone else. not yet anyway." Rosen just nods his head in understanding as she closes the door.
But before she fully closes the door, she loses her balance and passes out. Rosen immediately picks her up, takes her downstairs, and gets her into his car.
On the way to the hospital, Gavin calls him and asks what happened. "Nevaeh..she was cutting again. I did not know at first but then she passed out and I saw her wrist. There was a white towel covering the cuts but it was mostly red from all of the blood. I am taking her to the hospital, you and everyone else can meet us there." he hangs up on Gavin before he can say anything else.
~~~
Gavin has his phone on speaker so that everyone can hear what Rosen is saying. All everyone saw was Rosen quickly carrying Nevaeh to get her to the car.
When Rosen hung up, they got into their cars and sped off to the hospital. When they got there, they saw Rosen in the lobby waiting for the doctor.
"Did anyone say anything yet?" Scott asked Rosen. Rosen just shakes his head. It was quite clear that he had been crying. Gavin asks to speak to Rosen alone.
They step outside and Gavin asked, "what happened when you went to talk to her?"
"I knocked on her door, she answered, I told her I was truly sorry and I never meant to hurt her, and I asked for forgiveness. Then I asked if she was okay because she did not look too good. She said she was okay, thanked me, and told me she forgave me. Then she started to close the door, and that is when she passed out, and when I saw her arm. She had a towel on it, but I removed it so I could see what had happened. There were so many cuts and a lot of blood. I quickly picked her up and drove her here. Then you called and I told you guys to come here."
Gavin asked, then, "You like her don't you?" he had a sly smirk on his face.
"I do. I think- nevermind." Rosen wanted to tell him that he was in love with Nevaeh, but was scared to admit it in case she did not feel the same way.
"Ya know, she loves you too," Gavin smirked. Rosen was bewildered. He did not understand how Gavin knew that. But it was like Gavin could read his mind because he replied, "I overheard her talking to herself. She said, and I quote, "I do not know what to do, what if Rosen does not love me back. Wait, love? I do not love him, right? Oh my gosh, I am in love with Rosen!" Rosen looks happy but also nervous.
"What do I do?" Rosen asks Gavin. "Go in there, and when the doctor allows it, go in and tell her how you feel."
Rosen was confident in this plan, he liked how it was going to go. And then he began to overthink it all. What if she does not, like me? What if she was just saying that because she knew Gavin was listening to her? What if- his thoughts were cut off by the doctor asking for Nevaeh's family. Rosen stood up and walked over to the doctor.
The doctor told him what room Nevaeh was in and Rosen sprinted down the hall.