"Do you need anything else?" The air hostess asked Lauren with a smile plastered on her face. Lauren replied with a shake of her head.

The air hostess left Lauren to her thoughts as she looked out of the plane, at the clouds.

The pilot had announced that they would be arriving in Greenville in half an hour, Lauren was scared of what Scarlet might say about this but she knew that it wouldn't be nice.

Even if Lauren treated Scarlet with respect, she was still the sister of the man that slept with Scarlet's girlfriend, and this made Lauren a little scared.

Scarlet was sat in her old house, on her old couch, in front of her old parents, with a frown on her face.

"I can't believe that Vanessa is getting married and you didn't even send me an invite." She was pissed off to say the least as her parents smiled apologetically at her. She rolled her eyes at them, when Vanessa entered the living room, talking to her fiancee on Skype.

"Say hi to mom and dad, Kevin." Vanessa spoke happily as she brought her phone in front of her parents, completely ignoring her younger and only sister.

"Hi, Kevin." Laura, Mrs. Payne, greeted with a smile and a wave as she wanted to avoid the awkward situation with her younger daughter at best.

Mr Payne, Andrew, followed his wife's lead as he greeted Kevin with an overly excited tone of voice, making it obvious that he disliked the man.

Vanessa took the phone away from her parents faces and began to make kissy faces at her fiance, through her phone.

Scarlet had no energy left to even discuss about this with her parents anymore, so she just got off the couch with an angry look.

"I'm just gonna be in my room." She grumbled as she began to take her luggage upstairs but was stopped by her parents' voice.

"About that..." Her father paused as he nudged his wife to explain, while Scarlet stood impatiently on the first step of the stairs.

"Vanessa is staying in your room." Laura spoke with an apologetic smile, the fiftieth one in the last three hours.

"I'll take the guest room, then." Scarlet spoke, controlling her anger.

"Yeah, that's for your relatives that are coming for Van's wedding." Laura played with her fingers as the same smile stayed on her face, while Scarlet went red.

"Great, where am I gonna go now?" Scarlet questioned as she looked at her parents with a glare.

"Oh, you can stay with me in my room." Vanessa spoke from the recliner as she still had her cellphone in her hand.

'Not your room, my room.' Scarlet bitterly thought as she gave her sister a tight lipped smile before climbing up the stairs to go to Vanessa's room.

The cab driver gave Lauren her change before he drove off, while Lauren straightened up to look at the medium sized house colored white while all the other houses on the street were sky blue.

She dragged her bag by the wheels to the front door and rang the bell with sweaty hands. She didn't know why she was so afraid of what might happen. She quickly wiped her hands on her dress that she also straightened out nervously.

Voices could be heard from the inside of the house as she prepared herself for what was to come. The door opened and she gave a bright smile to the little boy that stood in the doorway looking up at her.

He stared at her, still standing in the doorway, making her uncomfortable to say the least. "Um, hi. Is Scarlet here?" The boy instantly gave her a toothy grin before taking her hand and dragging her in.

"Aunty Scar, there's someone here to meet you!" The boy exclaimed while Lauren rolled her bag in the house wearing the best smile she could muster.

'I'm about to meet her parents.' She thought as if it was such a big deal.

As the boy neared the living room, the chatter became more clear and she was ready to face the family.

"Oh, who is this, young man?" An old woman came into view and she smiled at Lauren before bringing her gaze to the little boy holding her hand.

"She's here to meet Aunty Scar." The boy spoke excitedly making him look more adorable as the woman smiled at the sight.

The woman bent down to be level with the little boy, "Why don't you go call her from upstairs?" The boy nodded frantically before running to go up the stairs.

"Hi, I'm the birth giver of Scarlet." The woman held out her hand for the blonde to shake, which she did quickly with a small smile. "You can call me Laura."

"Lauren. Lauren Grayson." The woman smiled and beckoned Lauren toward the sofa, where another woman sat, talking to her phone animatedly.

"This is my oldest daughter, Vanessa." Laura introduced Vanessa to Lauren, who wasn't aware of her surroundings. "She's busy talking to her fiancee, they're getting married next month." Laura spoke with a smile as she gestured Lauren to sit beside the bride-to-be.

Laura sat down, herself, on the recliner as Lauren placed her luggage beside her and her purse, on her lap. "So, how do you know Scarlet?" Laura asked as she stared at the girl.

"Oh, we-" Lauren was cut off when she heard the familiar voice of Scarlet, which made her nervousness come back in full force as she stared at the entrance of the living room.

"Who is it?" Scarlet asked her cousin, Gregory, for the millionth time in that minute as he dragged her by the hand towards the living room.

She rolled her eyes when she got no response from the six year old. She was busy drowning in her sorrows in Vanessa's room when the six year old barged in and dragged her out. Katie was still swirling in the black headed's mind and it didn't make it any better that her heart kept telling her to go back to the girl.

Finally, the two cousins reached the living room and what sat there- who sat there- made her blood boil. Lauren quickly stood up forgetting about the purse that sat in her lap as it fell, she smiled nervously at Scarlet before picking it up. Scarlet glared at the 21 year old, while Lauren knew what was going to happen next.

"Can we talk outside for a moment?" Scarlet spoke sickeningly sweet as she looked at her mother for the permission.

Laura glanced from Lauren to Scarlet before she shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly.

Scarlet came closer to Lauren and grabbed her wrist a little too tightly that made Lauren wince, but it didn't stop the black headed woman that was just waiting to explode.

She dragged Lauren outside, and away from her family, as she closed the front door behind her so that no one would hear her loud voice. She took a deep breath as Lauren soothed her wrist with a frown.

"What are you doing here?" Scarlet managed to ask the girl calmly as she kept her anger at bay.

"I-" 

"No, don't answer that. I already know why." Scarlet cut Lauren off as she sarcastically spoke. "Stewart wants me back, doesn't he?" 

Lauren was lost for words as she tried to calm her heart from exploding in fear of the once sweet and caring woman.

"Just go back and tell him that even if he begs me to come back, I won't. I'm through with him, his magazine and everything." Scarlet spoke a little too loudly making Lauren flinch and bow her head down.

Lauren was about to speak when the front door opened and Laura came out wearing a frown on her face.

"Oh, my baby." She engulfed Scarlet in a hug as Lauren stared at the two in confusion. The one, most confused at that moment was simply Scarlet, who had no idea what was going on with her mother.

"Mom, what are you doing?" Scarlet's question came out muffled as her mother hugged her ruthlessly, with love.

"So, this is why you came back unannounced." Laura stated as she broke off the hug and looked at her daughter with love and pity...

"Mom, I don't know what you heard but I can explain-"

"No, you don't need to explain. I already heard you two. This Stewart guy broke your heart, didn't he?" Lauren was the one that coughed uncontrollably and broke the moment of the mother and daughter.

"No, mom-" 

"And this is the woman that is the reason why." Laura glared at Lauren making the blonde uncomfortable. Scarlet would've laughed at the situation but she couldn't.

"Mom!" Laura turned towards her daughter as Vanessa walked out of the house, grabbing the three's attention.

"Who wouldn't cheat on her? Look at her clothes. He must have felt like sleeping with a man." Vanessa laughed as Lauren glanced at Scarlet.

'I think she looks cute in the clothes she wears.' Lauren thought as she bit her lower lip.

"Vanessa!" Laura exclaimed at her oldest daughter, who just gave her mother a grin before going back inside the house while still talking to Kevin on her phone.

"Mom, you've got it wrong." Scarlet spoke making both Lauren and Laura to look at her. "She's Stewart's sister and, he and I are-"

"Sister?" Laura spoke again, interrupting Scarlet who just raised her hands in defeat.

"Forget it." She walked rudely inside the house leaving Lauren with Laura.

Lauren smiled a small smile at Laura as she took in the tense situation she was in now.

It had only been two hours since Lauren had come to Scarlet's family house, and Scarlet's uncles and aunts had arrived with their children, making the house louder than before.

Scarlet was in Vanessa's room with her head buried under a pillow as she was wrapped in a blanket, crying her eyes out silently. Lauren sat between Vanessa and Laura as the whole family was gathered in the living room except for Scarlet.

Everyone was busy in a conversation with each other as Lauren sat silent, too overwhelmed by everything.

"So, you're the sister of the guy that cheated on Scarlet?" A guy spoke to Lauren as she smiled tight lipped at him, which only made him more curious.

"Are you single?" He asked as Laura stood up to go somewhere and he quickly occupied the place, beside her.

"Yes."

"Sweet. We can totally hook up." He gave her the best charming smile that he could muster but it didn't work as she compared his smile with Scarlet's.

"No." 

"Come on, babe. No one will know." He whispered in her ear which made her move away from him immediately.

"Stay away from Aunty Scar's friend, 'Black'." Out of nowhere, Gregory jumped in between Lauren and the guy that was flirting with her, making him groan.

"Greg, dude. I'm scoring here." The guy whined childishly which made Lauren roll her eyes.

"No, Aunty Scar told me to make you stay away from her friend." The boy spoke as he pushed the guy away with his hands, making the guy wink at Lauren before going away.

Lauren was smiling widely from knowing that Scarlet had told Gregory to keep that guy away from her. She couldn't help but to smile more brightly when she saw the woman walking towards her wearing an over sized hoodie and jeans with a pair of sunglasses.

 "Honey, its dark outside already, you don't need sunglasses." Andrew, Mr. Payne, who had introduced himself to Lauren, spoke up as he looked at his daughter with concern.

"Yeah, I know." Scarlet replied without looking at him, with a certain raspiness in her voice that didn't go unnoticed by the blonde girl.

"Come on." She spoke to Lauren as she began to walk towards the front door. Lauren smiled politely at Gregory and the other family members before following the black headed girl.

"Where are we going?" Lauren asked hesitantly as Scarlet closed the front door behind her.

"For a walk." Scarlet gave a simple response as she began to walk towards the street that was now lit up by the street lights.

The silence was deafening as they both walked without uttering a single word, well Lauren wanted to ask a lot of questions but she couldn't because she was afraid of the girl right now.

"Why did he send you here, to laugh at my misery?" Scarlet spoke, breaking the silence as she kept her eyes straight ahead.

"No. He was ashamed of what he did." Lauren spoke quietly as she looked beside her, at the girl.

"Yeah, right. He was in that damn bed with her looking all cocky and you say he felt ashamed, bullshit." Scarlet angrily spat as Lauren flinched away.

"He d-didn't send me." Lauren didn't know why she lied but when Scarlet looked at her, through the sunglasses, she knew why. "I was worried about you." 

"W-What?" 

"I wanted to comfort you, because I thought that we were friends- are friends -." 

Scarlet had stopped walking as she now had all her attention at the blonde. Lauren feeling brave enough, raised her hand and took a hold of Scarlet's sunglasses before taking them off, revealing the red eyes of the girl.

"I'm here now." She wrapped her arms around Scarlet's shoulders before embracing her with a sigh. "I won't hurt you."

Scarlet didn't know what was happening but her heart knew, she was being comforted and it felt a little better knowing that someone had her in their arms instead of having someone in her arms. Her tears came back as she wrapped her own arms around Lauren's back and pulled her impossibly close.

Lauren's breath hitched before she felt her heart speed up from the closeness of their bodies.

Wasn't it ironic, one was finding comfort in the other's arms while the other was finding some kind of love.

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