Chapter 21

            "I like the bunk beds," Maria said, looking around. "These rooms are too cute."

            "It’s homey," Dan said, smiling as he continued to guide Maria through a tour of the cabin. Maria was jumpy. He didn’t blame her. She was destined to bump into Jacob sometime, but she hadn’t yet. Wherever he was hiding, it was a damn good place.

            Maria walked to the stairs that led down to Jacob and Trevor’s rooms. She slowly descended them and smiled when she entered Jacob’s room and saw the nature-theme. "This is great. I’ve always loved the thought of a log cabin in the middle of nowhere, you know? I would love the comfort of sitting in front of a warm fire with a hot cup of cocoa and a good book to read or an easel so that I could paint in peace," she said.

            Trevor joined them. "Um, Maria, we may have a rooming problem. You see, Emily and Sarah will probably get one of the bunk bed rooms and then Dianna and Kristi will be in the other. Alex is rooming with Erik and, well, there aren’t any other rooms. You may have to double up with one of us," he told her, apologetically.

            Maria nodded. She had noticed the guitar on the bed. It was Jacob’s, so he was here somewhere. ‘Now who’s hiding?’ she thought. "That’s cool. I don’t mind. I can always sleep on the couch in the sitting room," she said.

            "It’ll get too cold out there," Trevor told her.

            "She can room with me," Ashley said as he made his way into the room and bounced onto the high bed.

            "Or she can stay right here." They all turned to see Jacob standing in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, a scowl on his face as he looked at Maria. The first thing he noticed was that she had cut her hair. It was now shoulder-length and she had gotten brighter highlights. She had on a long navy blue skirt with a white tee shirt. She wore a white, cardigan sweater over the shirt. She looked amazingly beautiful. Jacob wished that she didn’t look so good. It only made it harder to stay mad at her.

            There was an awkward moment as Jacob and Maria stared at one another. Jacob finally broke eye contact and the silence, "Or you could room with Trevor. He’d love that." Maria frowned.

            "No, that’s okay. I’ll find someplace to sleep. Don’t worry about it," she said.

            "The offer to stay in here still stands. You never had a problem sharing my bed before," Jacob remarked. Now Maria crossed her arms over her chest. He was mad. That had been expected, but she didn’t want to deal with his obnoxious attitude in front of the others. Whatever fighting they did, she wanted to do it in private.

            "We never had issues before. Now, we do," Maria told him.

            "And whose fault is that?" Jacob asked, anger starting to creep into his voice.

            "Come on, you guys, stop it," Ashley said. Since he was partly responsible for Maria’s being there, he had to try to keep the peace.

            "I’m sorry, guys," Maria said as she walked past Jacob and quickly ascended the stairs. Jacob had to hold himself back from reaching out and grabbing her as she went by. He just wanted to touch her.

            "Who invited her?" he asked calmly. Trevor and Ashley looked at each other before looking at Jacob.

            "We did," Trevor said. "Me and Ash. Dan and Erik didn’t know that she was coming."

            "You forgot to tell me, too, dumbass," Jacob said. "I’m all for surprises, but this one is just…great," he added, sarcastically.

            "Jake, you love her. We couldn’t see you just, like, throw that away. As soon as you talk to each other, everything will work out. I know it will," Ashley said, smiling.

            "I know that I love her and she knows that I love her, but she forgot to mention the fact that she knows," Jacob said.

            "Huh?" Trevor asked. Jacob sighed.

            "When I said it out loud, that one time that I said it out loud, she heard me, but she never told me that. She had me thinking that she had been asleep. I don’t know how she feels, but she’s obviously terrified of committing to me, or she wouldn’t have run away and wrote that letter like she did," he told them.

            "Talk to her, man. You guys have always been good at communicating, so talk to her and see where she’s coming from now. If she really wanted to stay away from you and not see you, then she wouldn’t have come here," Dan said.

            "He’s got a point," Trevor said.

 Jacob walked into the room, stopping in front of Trevor. "And what’s up with you anyway? Does this mean that you’re over Maria?"

            "I want you two to be happy. I messed up and I realize now that I don’t ever stand a chance with her, so her being with one of my best friends is fine with me. At least I know she’s with a good guy who will treat her right," Trevor told him. Jacob smiled.

            "Thanks. I appreciate it," he said. After a minute, Jacob stretched. "You know what, fellas? Let’s not get into this now. You guys go wait for your guests to arrive. I’ll just stay down here where it’s safe."

            "Don’t ignore her, Jake. You’ll regret it if you don’t talk to her," Dan told him as he left the room. Ashley and Trevor followed him. Jacob shut the door. Okay, he had Maria in the same cabin with him…now what?

            Two hours later, Erik sprinted to the door when he heard a car drive up. Or, in this case, a van carrying the remaining guests. He pulled open the door and smiled when he saw Alex. She saw him and ran to him, throwing herself into his arms.

            "Whoa, girl. Don’t hurt yourself," Erik said, worriedly. Alex laughed.

            "Seeing you has cured me of all of my pain," she said. It was Erik’s turn to laugh.

            "You’re not feeling too dramatic, I see," he said, sarcastically.

            "Shut up and kiss me," Alex ordered. Erik did so, quite thoroughly.

            "Dude, get a room," Ashley said as he came up behind the couple. They ignored him and kept kissing. Ashley shook his head and kept walking. Dan and Trevor were right behind him. "Can I help you with that?" Ashley asked Emily, who was struggling with a huge suitcase.

            "It’s Sarah’s. You’d think we were going away for a year instead of the weekend," she said, irritably. Ashley laughed.

            "I’m glad you’re here," he said. Emily looked at him through her sunglasses. She nodded. What was Ashley’s deal? He was always around her, yet she acted like a bitch whenever he spoke to her and she barely looked at him. Emily didn’t get it.

            Kristi and Dianna emerged from the van next. Trevor and Dan went over to help them with their things. "This is a cabin?" Dianna asked.

            "This is it," Trevor said, admiring the cabin.

            "It’s huge," Kristi remarked. Dan smiled.

            "It’s great. We’re gonna have a lot of fun," he said. "Maria got here a couple of hours ago."

            "What?" Alex asked. She let go of Erik. "Maria’s here?"

            "Yeah," Erik said, frowning at Alex’s reaction.

            "Who invited her? It couldn’t have been Jacob," Alex said.

            "It was me and Ashley," Trevor told her. "Why? What’s wrong?"

            "She treated Jacob like shit! She broke up with him in a letter for God’s sake! That’s just wrong," Alex exclaimed.

            "We thought that they’d have a chance to work things out. It was a way to get them to see each other and for them to work out their problems," Ashley told her.

            "I don’t think Jacob is her only problem. But, I guess if you don’t mind her acting like a bitch, then…"Alex said. "And she can be a bitch, so don’t think that I didn’t warn you." Erik grabbed Alex’s things and led her inside.

            Emily looked over at Sarah, who had turned extremely pale upon learning of Maria’s presence. She looked weak and thin. She hadn’t been eating much and Emily was actually glad that Maria was there. If anyone could help Sarah right now, it was Maria.

            "It looks like it’s going to be an interesting weekend," Dianna remarked as she entered the cabin. Dan smiled.

            "That it is," he said.

            Maria entered the room to greet everyone. She immediately noticed the glare that Alex sent her way. It hurt, but Maria was determined to stay calm and try and make things right with her friends again.

            "Maria! How are you?" Emily asked as she hugged her. "You look great."

            "Thanks. I’m okay," Maria told her. She looked at Sarah.

            Sarah refused to even look at her sister. She just stood looking at the floor.

            "Hi, Maria," Dianna said. Maria smiled at her and Kristi.

            "Hi, guys. It’s good to see you again," Maria told them. Kristi smiled, but it looked a little forced. What had Maria done to her? Maria found it odd that Kristi, of all people, was mad at her.

            The guys took the girls to find their rooms. The two rooms with the bunk beds were next to each other in the same hallway.

            "This is cool," Emily said when she saw the bunk beds. Sarah placed her carry-on bag on the bottom bunk and turned to Ashley.

            "Where’s Jacob?" she asked, softly.

            "He’s, uh, got a room downstairs," Ashley answered. "He’s probably down there now." Sarah just nodded and sat down on the bench that ran along under the windows. Ashley looked at Emily, who shook her head before pulling Ashley into the hallway by his arm.

            "I’m worried about her. She’s been like this ever since the party. She’s depressed and it’s getting worse," Emily said.

            "She’s just upset. I don’t think it’s anything to worry about," Ashley told her.

            "Bullshit! I know when someone is depressed and I’m worried about her," Emily said, firmly. She left a confused Ashley standing in the hallway frowning.

            That night, Maria and Dianna decided to cook dinner for everyone. Most of the food that was available to them was pasta, which was easy to do, so they went right to work making spaghetti. Emily helped out by making a salad.

            "Is Jacob even here?" Emily asked as she sliced carrots for the salad. Maria looked up from the spaghetti sauce that she was stirring.

            "He’s here. We had an encounter earlier that didn’t go very well," she said.

            "You can’t blame him for being mad, though," Emily said. "Although you had every right to be upset at the party."

            "I know. I totally regret the letter that I wrote him. I think he hurt his hand because of it, too," Maria said.

            Kristi then came into the kitchen in time to hear what Maria had said. "He did. He punched a window after he read it," she said as she grabbed some celery and started to chop it up for the salad. Maria sighed. "He was lucky it wasn’t worse," Kristi added.

            "Okay, I get it. It was wrong to write the stupid letter," Maria said. "And I said that I regret doing it. I wasn’t myself back then. I got scared and ran. That’s it. That’s what I did. I can’t take it back. All I can do it try to make everyone understand where I was coming from at the time." Kristi smiled.

            "I’m sorry for being so hard on you, but I saw Jacob’s hand after he’d hurt it and it was bad. I suggest that if you really want everyone to understand what you were thinking that night, you start with him," she said. Maria nodded. "And no letters!" Kristi said, emphatically.

            "Erik, don’t add too many logs, we’ll burn up," Trevor said, irritably. Erik looked over at him.

            "I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that you were the fire-starting expert here," he said.

            "It will get hot, Erik," Alex told him.

            "Okay, okay! Stop ganging up on me!" Erik exclaimed, smiling as he pushed a log off of the pile. He closed the gate to the fireplace and joined Alex on the couch. She leaned against him as he put his arm around her shoulders. The camera was with them, filming them. All of the girls had signed the contract/agreements to be filmed, so they had been cleared for filming without being ‘fuzzy’ on the show.

            Trevor yawned. He leaned back against the couch, enjoying the warmth of the fire. "Man, this is the life, huh? I could stay here forever," he said, sighing.

            "Me too, as long as Alex is with me," Erik said, kissing her cheek. Alex turned her head and kissed him deeply.

            "Thank you for the birthday gifts," she said when they had separated.

            "You’re welcome," Erik said. "It was the least I could do since I couldn’t be with you in person." He looked up and smiled. "Well, look who’s decided to join us."

            Jacob smiled when he saw Alex. She jumped up and ran over to hug him. "How do you feel?" he asked her when she had let him go.

            "A lot better, thanks. How about you?" she asked, glancing around to make sure Maria wasn’t around.

            "I’m okay," he said, but Alex still saw hurt in his eyes. She nodded.