GLORY AND GORE! ( DEFENDING JACOB )

𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍

❝ 𝑰 𝑫𝑶𝑵'𝑻 𝑩𝑬𝑳𝑶𝑵𝑮 𝑻𝑶 𝑨𝑵𝒀𝑶𝑵𝑬 ❞

❝ 𝑩𝑼𝑻 𝑬𝑽𝑬𝑹𝒀𝑩𝑶𝑫𝒀 𝑲𝑵𝑶𝑾𝑺 𝑴𝒀 𝑵𝑨𝑴𝑬 ❞

. . .

ACCORDING TO THEIR FAMILIES, THE KEY TO STAYING CONNECTED WAS THROUGH DINNERS. laurie and meredith were beginning to be each other's crutches throughout this whole ordeal, and andy and david seemed to be bonding over trying to figure out who actually killed ben rifkin.

they were like some kind of twisted friend group.

madeline sat with adrian at the dining table, sitting across them was jacob. all three of them were silent, madeline on her laptop, jacob scrolling through his phone, and adrian working on some homework. maddie was somewhat envious in the fact that adrian still got to go to school, madeline would take anything just to have one normal day.

andy walked into the room, a protection glove on his hand. they seemed to be grilling in the backyard.

"how does everyone want their burgers?" he asked, squinting at the group of teenagers who were eerily sitting in silence.

"medium well," madeline answered, glancing towards the man for a moment before going back to her online homework. the other two answered and the man sighed.

"you all are unbelievable, here," andy grabbed the electronics and took them in his arms. "you two especially need to get along. now, talk, do normal teenager things other than escape on the electronics." he then walked away with their stuff.

madeline sighed, leaning against her hand. each of them looked around at each other in silence.

"so, talking," adrian started. "i guess we can do that. i'll go first, jacob, did you kill ben rifkin for some sick act of love for my sister?"

jacob squinted at the other boy and maddie gasped. sure, she didn't like jacob right now, but that was out of line. adrian only grinned and stifled out a laugh, putting his hands out in a fake surrender, "just joking."

neither of the accused laughed, maddie just leaned back in her seat and looked at Jacob. oh, how she missed him. it was almost comical how much she did despite trying to ignore him these past couple days. being without jacob truly made maddie feel a sense of loneliness. without texting him every day, she didn't feel like she had anyone to talk to while she sat in her house alone, or with a tutor for two hours. adrian was her only friend at the moment and even he didn't want to spend all his time with her. jacob was also the only other one who knew what she was going through. 

they were supposed to be going through it together, but they weren't. 

madeline opened her mouth after a few minutes, "adrian, can you leave us to talk?" she turned towards her brother with a small smile on her face. "i think that jacob and i need to talk alone."

"are you sure?" adrian asked the blonde, raising an eyebrow. madeline nodded, watching him leave the dining room to go outside with the others. 

madeline looked at jacob, still giving him a blank stare. it was hard to be mad at him, she had to admit. she wanted nothing more than to just walk over and hug him. but she wasn't going to, she was still mad about the whole sarah thing. madeline never had anything against sarah until now, she actually really thought that sarah was a good singer. they've had a few conversations here and there. madeline didn't want to hate her, but it made her blood boil to think of the other girl hanging out with jacob alone.

and possibly sarah was really just trying to be nice. but then again, sarah hasn't tried to talk to madeline at all, and she also was being accused of killing ben, so there had to be a reason as to why she was only speaking to jacob.

"how was your genome testing?" madeline asked him. small talk was easier than no talk.

"it went fine. i had to sit in the MRI machine for almost a whole hour though," jacob replied. "when do you have yours?"

"tomorrow at eleven," madeline stated, remembering that she had to take some kind of sleeping pill so she would be able to get a good nights sleep tonight. apparently the test would come back wrong if you were sleep deprived, which maddie was, heavily. she blonde picked at the fading scab on the side of her cheek. breathing was beginning to get a little easier now that her bruises were fading.

jacob nodded his head, a small smile on his face. "do you want me to come with? we can pick up coffee and lunch afterwards."

"no not really."

"oh, come on mads. you can't stay mad at me forever!" jacob said. 

"i can damn well try," madeline replied, feeling anger start to bubble up inside of her. 

jacob sighed, running a hand through his hair and looking right at her, saying, "well, stop. stop trying to hate me. we're still best friends, we've always been. despite your feelings for me, good or bad, you have to listen to what klein said. we're in this trial together. and you hating me and not showing your face in public with me is going to make people think we actually did this."

"are you forgetting what happened last time we tried to go out together alone? i sure still have the bruises from it," madeline retorted, clenching her hands into fists as her arms stayed crossed across her chest. 

"then we'll go through the drive throughs  and eat in the parking lots. we'll stay in more public areas, come on, you can't keep acting this way if you want any chance of not going to jail."

madeline looked at him with a more concerned expression on her face. she didn't want to go to jail, and with the charges they had, they were looking at a whole life in jail. her expression softened and she looked at him with wide eyes, unclenching her fists. 

"okay, you can come with."