The gleaming, gold trophy that weighed down my arms barely registered in my mind.

I should have been ecstatic. We won. The applause, the trophy, the flowers being thrown, was like a moment from a film.

And yet I couldn't feel worse.

All I could think about was how Leo was feeling. I'm certain he's just running on auto-pilot right now, smiling and waving to anyone and everyone.

I just wanted to hold him and never let go, but we had to do the full show of accepting the rewards, talking to the sponsors and the judges.

We had nearly finished talking to two of the judges when I saw Leo's Mum coming over to us from the corner of my eye. God, this wasn't going to be good.

As we bid farewell to the judges, Ms Hardman completely ignored my existence and headed straight to her son.

She went to engulf him into a hug but Leo froze at the last second, just standing in complete disgust as his Mother hugged onto him.

"I'm so proud of you Honey." She congratulated, pulling away and holding Leo out at arms length "I knew you could do it."

"Eliana helped me through most of it. She deserves the congratulations more than I do." Leo replies monotonously, not even looking at her and staring straight at me.

I appreciated him saying that, but I knew it would rub her the wrong way.

I literally saw Ms Hardmans body go rigid as she turned around to face me. The thinnest, most forced smile pushed it way into her lips.

"Yes, well done to you both."

I could have laughed with how ultimately forced her comment was.

"Thank you." I replied, having to push the same smile that she was giving me.

Harvey appeared at my side, hugging me from the side and going to say something until he caught sight of Ms Hardman.

"Ms Hardman? What are you doing here?" His voice was filled with confusion as he looked between Leo and I.

Leo cleared his throat, pushing his hand through his hair "Uh Harvey, this is my Mum."

Harvey looked exactly like I did when I found out that she was Leo's Mum.

"I'll explain later." I whispered to him, knowing that he was gonna have a thousand questions for me.

"Can we talk later, please." Leo directed his comment to his Mum, and she went to argue instantly but the look Leo gave her made her stop.

Hell, if Leo gave me that look I would stop talking too.

Once again, Ms Hardman pulled her son into a hug again and he reacted the same, not even attempting to hug her back.

I saw Leo sigh deeply, his head hanging low as his Mother finally left. Instantly I moved over to him, taking his free hand in mine.

"Wanna get out of here?" My question was quiet so Harvey didn't hear me. Leo nodded his head ever so slightly.

"Go and grab your stuff, I'm gonna say to Miss Lacey that we're leaving and then we can go wherever you want." I brought his hand up to my mouth and placed a kiss on the back of it.

I didn't need to tell him twice, Leo left to the men's changing rooms instantly.

"What's going on?" Harvey questioned, his face still confused from the Ms Hardman situation.

"I promise I'll explain it to you, I just want to get out of here and so does Leo so we're gonna shoot off. Is that ok?" I know Harvey said he was ok with Leo and I, but I didn't want to push it.

Harvey's jaw clenched for a fraction of a second before he rolled his eyes slightly "Sure. I'll see you at home."

-

The calmness that I felt sitting in the passenger seat of Leo's car was euphoric.

I didn't realise how loud it was in the dance hall but now it was only the sound of the engine running, it was bliss to my ears.

Glancing into the back seat, I couldn't help but smile at the gold trophy that sat wedged between our bags.

Leo was quickly filling up the car with some petrol and then he was going to drive us somewhere far away.

Away from all the drama and bullshit and craziness that was plaguing our lives. More Leo's life than mine, but I hated seeing him hurt by all of this.

Leo joined me in the car, handing me a bottle of Sprite as he sat down. He had finally tied his hair up into a messy bun as I could tell the strands were annoying him and getting into his eyes.

We had also changed back into our own clothes, so I was even more comfortable in the leggings and hoodie combo.

Leo was sporting some grey jogging bottoms and a loose black t-shirt. I could tell his was a lot more relaxed being away from the dance hall and from his Mum.

Leo started the car up and pulled onto the motorway we were heading down.

Because of the silence of the drive, I felt like I had to ask what was going on with Leo's Mum and Dad. He didn't say another word about it at the competition but maybe now that he's calmed down a but more he might talk a little bit more.

"So Leo... Has your Mum said anything else to you?"

The way his hands gripped the steering wheel a little tighter made me regret asking him. I wasn't going to force him to talk to me, but I hoped he would maybe think that talking about it would make it easier for him.

"I don't really know what else to say to you about it, all my Mum said to me was that Devin had reached out to her and apologised and that they were on some sort of road to making up." Leo sighed and I still couldn't wrap my head around it.

"I'm sorry but... Is your Mum on something? Is she seriously thinking of working things out with the guy who beat you up as a kid?" I couldn't help but scoff "My parents aren't even around and don't particularly care about anything I do but even they wouldn't do anything as fucked up as that."

My rant was making me head hurt. I just couldn't comprehend what kind of crack Ms Hardman was smoking.

I rubbed my temples with my fingertips but paused when I heard Leo laughing lightly from beside me.

I glanced over to him in disbelief "What's so funny?"

"You. You're getting so mad over my problems... It's just weird, I've never had someone want to defend me before." Leo's left hand placed itself on my thigh and squeezed it slightly "I never wanted all of my family shit to be thrown onto someone else, let alone someone I care about like I care about you."

"But I just want you to know, it may not seem like it, but I don't really care about what my parents want to do. If they wanna get back together then they're gonna do that without me in their lives. As soon as school finished... I wanna go to America and start up something to do with dance like you want to do."

As much as I wanted to hold my tears back, I couldn't stop them from pooling in my eyes. Never in a million years would I have thought that my year was going to end up like this.

I had known Leo for a maximum of 4 months now, and in that time I had never even considered falling for a person like I was for him.

We both had the same dreams, and he wanted for us to pursue them together.