"On the road again..." I shouted at the top of my lungs. "Just can't wait to get on the road again!" The words were flowing through me as the song played on the radio. Oklahoma took us only an hour or two, just barely crossing into the state before we hit good old Arkansas.

"The life I love is makin music with my friends." I continued singing, tapping the steering wheel with every beat of the song.

"With my friends." Staton echoed in the background, standing in the kitchen area of the van making us some lunch.

"And I can't wait to get on the road again." I sang, finishing out the song as the music slowly faded away. Staton and I both burst into a fit of giggles as he came to sit back down in the passenger seat with our sandwiches.

"I can't believe you know that song." He chokes out, trying to take breaths between each awkward laugh.

"What the hell do you mean, you can't believe I know that song? Are you dumb? Everyone on the planet knows that song. It's like the pinnacle of road trip music!" I shouted, nearly choking on my own laughter.

"Sorry but I am not sure what to tell you, you are not the type of girl that would know a song like that. I'm quite impressed." If I had something to throw at him I would. I couldn't belive he was shocked at the fact that I was singing the song perfectly.

"God, have you never been on a trip with your parents. We aren't so rich we don't drive places."

"We aren't rich at all." Staton corrected, wiggling his finger in the air. He grabbed one of the sandwiches before handing it over to me. I took it with one hand, quickly taking a bite to satisfy my starving stomach. "Our parents have money yes, they are doing quite well for themselves, we on the other hand are broke as a joke, and need to figure out how we are going to make money."

"Ugh don't remind me, I'm already stressed enough with this drive."

"You are stressed?" Staton questions, chewing on his own sandwich.

"I guess, I mean, I don't know. I'm not, not stressed if you get what I mean."

"No, I absolutely do not, and the more I hang out with you in a vehicle for endless hours a day, the more I realize you are insane." Staton teased, grabbing one of the small bags of chips we had purchased before we left.

"Oh come on, I'm not that insane, and don't you dare act like I am." I pretended to give him a death glare, but without taking my eyes off the road for too long so it ended up just being me scowling at the road ahead of me.

"You know you are cute when your nose crinkles like that." Suddenly all the anger I could have built up had disappeared. That's all it took. One compliment from Staton and I was like putty in his hands. He really knew how to mold me into whatever personality he wanted me to have at the time.

"I don't crinkle my nose." I countered.

"Uh, yes you do. I just watched you do it."

"Well stop watching me, that's weird!" I shouted, the words hurting my ear slightly. It's been three days of nothing but playful banter and listening to songs quietly on the radio. The shouting was drastically different than anything else we've heard.

"It's been a while since I've heard someone raise their voice like that." Staton grabbed his plate, taking mine as well and went to throw them away in the little garbage.

"Yeah, that's true, there hasn't been as much fighting without the group has there?" I checked my mirrors, fiddling with a piece of leather that was peeling from the steering wheel.

"It's been nice though hasn't it?"

"I guess you could say that, but aren't you worried about how our friends are doing? I guess they made it home safely, but they still haven't reached out to either of us to check. I've been terrified that once they made it home my mother was going to finally reach out." I wasn't sure where I was going with this, and I wasn't trying to bring my mother up again, especially after yesterday's interesting conversation about kids.

"Your mom hasn't contacted you at all?" Staton seemed completely shocked. I was confused by his confusion simply because he would have known if she had messaged me.

"Well, except for that one time of that fair, but just to let me know she was shutting my cards off. I haven't heard anything else from her."

"I forgot about that. That was such a pre-written text though, I wouldn't have been shocked if she had one of her so-called friends write it for her."

"That would mean she would have to have friends in the first place," I said, turning the music down slightly so I could hear Staton better.

"My mom has messaged me almost every week to check in on me and to ask me to come home. I told her we weren't coming home, so maybe that's why your mother hasn't contacted you since she shut your cards off. Man, that's so crazy to think about, we really thought we would be able to run away from home and just live off our parent's credit cards. Like they would have never noticed."

"They didn't for a while," I said. "But wait a minute, you told your mother we got married?"

Honestly, I was shocked she had even messaged him on a regular basis, but that didn't shock me as much as the fact that he was sending her updates and I didn't even know they were talking. He could have never mentioned that and I would have never noticed. Was she talking to my mother? Was she getting her information from Staton and passing it along? How could he not tell me about this? What else was he telling her?

"Yeah, and that we bought a van, moving to South Carolina, you know, I've been just keeping her updated."

"Why haven't I heard about this?"

"Well, things with your mother is such a touchy subject, I didn't know if you would be mad that my parents, though they were angry at first but now have come to terms with the fact that I'm not going to do what they want me to do, and support that we've gotten married and are out here doing our own thing. I don't need to punish my mom because I ran away."

"I never said you had to punish her." The words fell out of my mouth. Confusion and anger took over me all at the same time.

"Well then what are you saying?"

"I'm saying, I'm shocked you never told me about it, even with the situation with my mom. This feels like a big thing that I should have known about."

"You should have known that I was talking to my mother?" Staton seemed truly confused, and the fact that he didn't see the problem with the situation made it hurt even more.

"No... I mean, yes. I don't know." I muttered, stumbling over my words, trying to figure out how to explain to him how I was feeling. I wasn't mad that he was talking to his mom. That was the least of my concerns. I was frustrated that he had felt the need to keep that from me. What else was he hiding?

"Well Maple, I don't know how to help you, if you can't help me and let me know what you are so confused, worried, upset, hell whatever emotion you are feeling about. I can't do anything if I don't know what the problem is."

"The problem is, I simply do not know how I feel about that."

"I don't have a bad relationship with my parents."

"Then why the hell did you run away with me?" I couldn't believe what he was saying. The tears were starting to form in my eyes, slowly threatening to fall down my cheeks.

"Because I love you and I chose you?"

"Why is that a question?" The tone of his voice made his words seem not convincing at all. I didn't want to be the reason he broke up his family. I didn't want to be the reason anyone broke up their family.

"Well, to make matters worse, since you think I'm lying to you and hiding all this shit, which doesn't make any sense because it was literally my mother. Breygan has reached out to me too." Staton folded his arms across his chest, turning to look away from me. It felt like eye contact would be too much, and I wouldn't be able to hold it right now anyway as I tried to focus on the road. We still have at least four hours before we got to our next stop for the night. Those hours couldn't tick away fast enough at this point.

"What!" I didn't want to shout, but the shock was taking over my body. Soon I'd need to pull over and figure this whole thing out.

"Yeah, he messaged me to let me know they made it back safely and Aria's parents are pissed off at you, but not nearly as mad as Julia's were. Julia is no longer allowed to hang out with Aria because they are trying to blame her for everything. But as far as I can tell, she's had Tony to lean on. He came out of a nowhere but has really warmed up to her fast. That's all she raves about."

"What the actual hell?" My throat felt like it was closing in. Everyone was talking to Staton, letting them know about every single detail of their lives, and not a single person was talking to me.

"What? Was that too much honesty for you?"

"Where is all of this coming from?"

"Sorry, I didn't know I wasn't allowed to talk to my mother or my friends. I didn't know you were in control of everything I do on my phone. Here do you want it? You can just have it then and you can decide what messages you would like to share with me or not." I wasn't sure how the fight had gotten this serious, but Staton was really hurt by something I had said.

"Hey, let's take a beat here for a moment. I'm not exactly sure what I said that set you off so bad. I was angry. I guess I am angry, but I don't want to yell and fight about it. I was a little hurt that you kept this from me because I feel like all of that is big news and you should want to share it with me. I'm not mad that you are talking to your mother, though I am worried about what she is telling mine. I can't control that though and I'm not asking you to leave your family behind for me. Do you think I want you to cut them out and never talk to them again?"

"Kind of, I mean the whole running away thing did come off like that."

I'd never been more shocked in my entire life to hear something come out of someone's mouth. Especially something so hurtful out of Staton's. He was always there to protect me and make sure I was taken care of, yet here he was blaming me for everything that went wrong with us running away.

"I...I...don't." I stuttered, the tears finally falling down my face. How could things have gone so bad so quickly? Here I was worried I had said the wrong thing to Staton, and just proving to myself that all of my fears were true.