Page 98 of The Spotlight Effect

“Well, Worlds are soon, so are you ready?” Faith changes the subject. I’m so lucky to have Faith because, for the rest of the time, we just talk about happy parts of the trip while on FaceTime with Zara and Emerson. After Faith left for the night, I got ready and changed for bed. Unfortunately, I couldn’t sleep due to random sentences running through my head, so I decided to just write a song and it’s calledSpring Break.

I never do crazy things, and I don’t think revenge is the way to solve problems, but tonight at two a.m. I post a TikTok on my account of me singing “Spring Break”. I may have retaliated a little badly, but for a moment, it makes me feel better.

Maybe this will get my mind and my heart off things, and I can finally settle.

BROKEN HEARTACHE

GRAYSON

Ifucked up. I never went after her.

She’s going home soon. I’m pretty sure if not today, then tomorrow, and I haven’t spoken to her or tried to even explain myself. I just blamed it all on Hollywood, but then again, I wouldn't even know what to say.

“You know you could do something instead of moping,” Charlie says from my room door. Damn it, I forgot to close that.

“There’s nothing to do,” I reply. I mean, what can I do?

She’s gone, if not now then she will be. Maybe I’m just not meant to fall in loveandkeep the girl. “Are you serious? Go talk to her, call her, chase her down if you have to!” Charlie says, getting louder with his words as the sentence continues.

“Called already, showing up at the house would be weird and chase her down, isn’t that a crime?” I turn toward him.

“Then do something other than nothing.” Charlie walks into the room and plops down on the bed beside me.

I don’t know what to do.

“Come on.” Charlie stands up.

“Where are we going?” I ask him.

“To talk to her, now to the car.” Charlie charges out of the room with an arm up like he’s really about to march into a battle. I guess it is a battle of some sort. A battle of hearts.

Drivingin the rain makes this seem hopeless. It's like the weather already knew it was going to be a failure. Pulling up to the house that she is supposed to stay in while being here in LA, I can tell no one is here. There are no cars, Alexia’s light is off and it’s early for her to sleep, it’s looking like nothing is going on.

“They aren’t here,” I state, not even bothering to get out.

“How do you know?” Charlie puts the car in park and looks closely at the house.

“No cars, no lights and later in the night so they would be home. They aren’t and no events only they would have gone and not us are going on,” I explain.

“I’m going to try calling her,” Charlie tells me and grabs his phone.

“You go knock on the door.”

I appreciate Charlie trying so hard and wanting to help me fix this, but it’s just making me sad and upset. It’s never going to get fixed. I’d have to pull a miracle out of the sky in order for it too. I get up to the door and knock, and no one answers, so I ring the doorbell to be safe, but again, nothing, so I go back to the car.

“No answer,” Charlie says as I get inside.

“Let’s just go.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Charlie wanting to say something, but he doesn’t; he just puts the car in drive and leaves.

“This will be fixed, you two are meant to be,” Charlie says. For a guy, he’s a big hopeless romantic, and I like that for him. But for me, love has never worked out, so why should I get my hopes up now?

As we drive back to The Fortress, I scroll through Instagram just to keep my mind occupied, it barely works. I searched Alexia on Instagram a few times and checked back to the messages I sent her. Nothing. That makes my heart sink. I should forget about it. Love sucks anyways.

A notification covers my screen, and I look to see an email from my father and our family lawyer. I click on it and the email is explaining that my father has called us to court to testify against my mother because she has filed for full custody of us and money for abuse and troubles. He wants to go against her in terms of defamation of character due to the video and say she is unfit.

This is ridiculous. This whole thing is really to protect his image. He already got off for abuse, considering nothing happened after the video was put out, and now he wants to sue my mother. I go to form an email and tell the lawyer I will not testify against my mom; instead, I’m on her side.

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