My mom comes out then, hands full, but refusing help as she lays out a buffet on the picnic table my uncle Ian made as a gift for Lolli and Nate.
My mom stacks all our plates full, something I know she’ll miss, and my dad delivers them to where we sit.
The meal is more or less eaten in silence, or if there is conversation, I miss it, too lost in the whispers in my own mind to hear anything around me.
A little while later, everyone’s shuffling again, and my mom slips up. She hugs me, quietly sharing something with me, but I miss it too.
The next time I look up, it’s just us again, Chase and me, his plate sitting untouched before him.
He hasn’t moved.
I wish he would.
I wish he’d leave, but I know better than that.
Especially since his eyes, they’re locked on me, again or still… I don’t know, but I want him to look away, because I can’t, and it’s slowly killing me inside.
The troubled and tormented expression staring back at me right now, imploring me to understand shouldn’t be there.
I should be looking into the eyes of a determined, resolute man ready to hurdle mountains, tumble and fall, and climb to our feet again until we find the steady base at the top. Together. That’s what love looks like, right?
A mess of emotions?
A bumpy ride?
A thrilling experience?
But who the hell am I to say what love is?
All I know of it is what I’ve seen from my parents, and this is nothing like that.
This is agonizing.
Gazing at him now, at the flick of the flame as it bounces off those green eyes of his, both dim and dejected, I wonder if I’m being unfair.
Chase and I, we hadn’t really gotten to a starting point, then this morning happened.
Our emotions were out of sorts, we were hurting and confused, focused on loss and lost in what-ifs. The moment got the best of us.
We went from spunky attraction to sex on the beach under the bright moon.
From nothing to one hundred—real quick.
I want to grin at my inability to lock lyrics out of my head, but I can’t find it in me to acknowledge that piece of me right now.
The certainty of the situation is clear. Only a fool would deny what’s more than obvious, and that is what meant more than I’ll admit to myself, must have meant so much less to him.
I know Chase felt something, just like I know this is painful for him, too. A different kind of painful, but painful, nonetheless.
I’ve always wondered if we were a longshot best not taken, but now I know it’s true.
Reality is sad.
I’m sad, but I’ll have to get over it, because like my brother has been trying to tell me, keeping our friendships tight is more important than anything.
We didn’t make promises; I didn’t ask him for more before I gave him everything, and that’s on me. I’ll bear the burden if it means I get to keep him in some way.
With that thought in mind, I inhale, offering a soft smile to the man across from me.
It’s as if he was holding his breath, as a gush of air wooshes from his lips, and he jolts to his feet, finding his way over to the empty space beside me.
His gaze flies between mine. “Arianna…”
“I know.” I nod, swallowing the lump in my throat, unable to keep my eyes dry. “You don’t have to say it.”
His features pull. “I feel like a jackass. I knew what I was doing, and… I wanted it.” He looks into my eyes, and I see his truth. “I wanted you, Ari. I just, I don’ know. I didn’t think. I just jumped.” His head jerks away in frustration. “I feel like I’m screwing you over, like I’m treating you like you’re not important to me when you are.”
“Chase.” I fight hard to keep my voice from cracking. “Look at me.”
He looks over, but only with his eyes, as if the thought of facing me head-on is too much.
“I know better than that.” The left side of my mouth lifts sadly, a tear making its way down my cheek. “You were good to me.” I place my shaky hand on his knee, afraid to touch him but needing him to hear me. “I don’t regret it.”
He studies me, searching for sincerity, but his nod is unsure.
“You’re not some random girl, Ari. You’re more. You mean… so much more.” My heart punches me behind my ribs, and I wish he would stand and walk away, stop talking or something, but he continues.
“I don’t even know what happened,” he whispers earnestly. Regretfully. “We were standing there in the dark, your hair was blowing around and you… you looked so beautiful, Ari. And sad.” I clench my teeth to keep a sob from breaking free. “Everything with Payton, I don’t know. I had to kiss you. Once I did, I couldn’t stop.” He swallows, and I use every bit of strength I can muster not to look away.
Chase drops his attention to the ground, and I brace myself, adding a couple of nails into the organ beating behind my chest to keep it at bay, because I know what’s coming. I know what he’s about to say and it’s going to sting like no other.
Soft green eyes lift to mine, and I dig my nails into my thighs, focusing on the physical pain rather than the emotional torture he’s about to inflict.
And he does.
Chase’s voice is low and regretful as he whispers words I will never forget. “It was a mistake.”
I gasp on the inside.
“I don’t know, Ari. Maybe if things were different I… we…”
That’s all I can handle because things could be different. Things would be different… if he wanted them to be.
But at the end of the day, the facts are clear.
I mean a lot to Chase, but his friendship with my brother means more.
And that’s okay.
I’ve known it for years. I’ll know it for years to come.
Hopefully the ache doesn’t last as long as the hope did.
Pushing to my feet, I can hardly force a smile.
“I’m going to go home with my parents tonight.”
He’s on his feet in the next second. “No—”
“I need to leave, Chase,” I cut him off. “I’m fine. I just—” I can’t be around you. “I need to leave.” I need to figure out how I’m going to be able to face you after this.
“Yeah, okay,” he says quietly, dropping his chin to his chest. “What will you say to Mason when he asks why you’re leaving?”
A flicker of anger burns in my chest, but I push it away. “I don’t know, but after last night, I’m sure he’ll be happy to see me go.”
I start down the steps, both of us knowing my words are not true. My brother will be upset, angry even, but I can’t possibly be in that house with Chase just down the hall a day longer.
At the edge of the dock, Chase’s heartfelt words reach me, but they don’t soothe as he intended.
“I don’t want to lose you. It might not feel like it right now, but you mean a lot to me, Ari…”
“Yeah,” I breathe, while in the back of my mind, it whispers, just not enough.
Later that night, as I cross the road to climb into my dad’s truck, headlights catch my attention from a block down, blinding me. I lift my hand to shield my eyes, to try and see better, but then the light flicks off, and there’s nothing but darkness once again.
I climb into the back seat, close my eyes, and hope like hell when we get to Avix, it will be like nothing ever happened.
Chapter 11
Arianna
* * *
“Where you at, girl!”
Holding back a sigh, I let my pen fall from my fingers and use the moment’s interruption to stretch. I don’t bother answering Cam’s obnoxious ass, knowing she’ll pop her head in my room any second, which she does.
“Hey!” She face-plants onto my bed, quickly rolling onto her stomach to face me, her grin far too telling.
Unease wraps around my shoulders, but I’ve gotten decent at hiding it, so much so she doesn’t seem to
notice anymore.
Cam wiggles her brows. “We’re going out.”
I force a chuckle, picking up my pen once more. “I can’t tonight. I have to study.”
She grabs my pillow, growling into it dramatically.
“Ari, come on. We’re three weeks into the semester, and you still haven’t come out with me. I get you want to stay on top of your classes, but, shit, we were supposed to be living it up together, and you keep ditching me, making me look like the hooch caboose.”
I raise a brow.
“You know?” She speaks with exasperation. “The ass at the end of the train. It’s me and three guys everywhere we go, that shit sucks! I need another vagina with me to even it out a bit.”
A small grin pulls at my lips, and I shake my head. “You’re an idiot.”
“You love me.”
“I’m not going.”
“Please.”
“Cameron, I can’t. I have a lot of homework.” Not exactly a lie, but she knows it’s more than that.
She’s quiet for a minute, sighing as she pushes herself up. She walks to my dresser, running her fingers along the photos lining the top of the cheap, carbon fiberwood, and picks up the one of the boys holding the two of us. Still in their uniforms and fresh off their big win in the championship game, we’re lying across their hands, our faces smiling into the camera.
I’ve almost stuffed that one in the drawer so many times, but I can’t bring myself to do it.
“First regular season game’s this weekend, you know.”
“Yeah.” I swallow past the burn in my throat, avoiding her gaze. Of course, I know.
I wrote it on my wall calendar months ago, knowing it was coming with me, even circled it with blue and gold sharpies.
Cam blindly sets the photo down, gently reminding me of what I already know. “You’ll break Mason’s heart if you don’t go.”
The day I left the beach house, Cam left with me, and while I knew she suspected something had happened, I waited until the drive to campus a full week later to lay it all out for her. I told her everything, and like I knew she would, she got angry, and a little while later, she cried.
I didn’t want to keep it from her, but I also didn’t want my own inner issues driving a second wedge in our little group. It took a half gallon of mint chip ice cream and a six pack of beer to get her to drop the Chase aimed pitchfork and understand the situation for what it was: a night of overflowing emotion that drove us past the point of no return.
No one was at fault, and no one did anything wrong. It simply was what it was, and then it was over.
We got to Avix two weeks before school began, and during that time, she was attached to my hip in all her best friend glory. We slowly unpacked and decorated what would be our home for the next year, went on walks and got to know the area.
We went to the movies and hung out with some girls from the first floor of our dorm. Had lunch dates and coffee breaks. She kept me busy with any and everything she could think of, and for the most part, it worked, but as soon as I was alone in my room again, the ache would creep back in. She knew that which is why we didn’t spend a single day indoors from move in day to the night before classes officially began.
That was also the first night the boys were allowed even a minute of free time.
They asked us to come over, see their place and meet their friends.
Cam was so excited, but I was the exact opposite. Dread fell over me and I felt trapped.
My best friend tried to backtrack, but I didn’t allow it. I encouraged her to go. After all, it had been seventeen days since we hung out with them… since that last day at the beach.
Mase would call at night and Brady would push his way into the frame, but Chase never did more than linger in the background, and for that I was grateful.
Cam went to see them that night and though I didn’t ask her to, I know she lied to my brother when she showed up without me. She had to have or he would have been on my doorstep within the hour.
But that was the middle of the month, and now August is almost over.
Her patience is running thin and it’s understandable. I came here to live it up with my best friend, and she was left to do it all without me, while trying to pull me out of my cyclical state of drowning in my sorrows.
It’s not that I don’t want to go, because I do, and I’ve talked myself up to it more times that I can count, but I can never pull the trigger. It’s frustrating, but I physically can’t stomach the thought of seeing him, and it would be naive to assume he wouldn’t be nearby. He definitely would be, probably with a gang of girls flocked around him, as they always have been.
My heart can’t take it.
I can’t take it. Not yet.
Cam said I needed to get out, to get my mind off things, but how can I do that when he’s always around?
It was torturous enough forcing myself to keep our tradition of studying on the bleachers while they practiced, but I had to show some sort of normalcy or my brother would flip out and demand answers. He has no idea how to approach things on a normal level; he goes all in in an instant and that’s the last thing I need, so a couple days a week, Cam and I park our asses in the stadium seats to do homework while the boys work in the heat below us. It’s something that started as a way for us to stay ‘safe’ under their watchful eyes, and it turned into something they looked forward to. Every good run or new play, they’d look up with grins, knowing they’d get one in return from one of us.
We never did get much homework done there.
A small smile graces my lips, but a twist low in my stomach steals it away, and I grow angry with myself because of it.
I’m so sick of being sad.
The good thing about carrying the tradition on here, if there is one, is the boys have to go into the locker rooms afterward to. In high school, they brought their bags home at the end of the day, so it was from the field to the car. Here though, I can slip out before I’m forced to face them, cutting out the possibility of Chase’s awkward glances that would lead me to do something embarrassing.
Other than those days at fifty yards away, I’ve seen Chase once since we arrived. It was during our mandated Sunday dinners together—a pre-condition from our parents when they agreed to house us in the higher-end, studio-style dorms.
They started the first week of school, and while I sucked up the pain his distant eyes caused, I couldn’t make it past the first ten minutes, so I lied. I said I had a stomachache and locked myself in my room the rest of the night. I thought Brady would bust my door down because, not a minute after they all walked in, he began giving me what we like to call The Brady Eye, the one that says I know something, but I won’t call you on it just yet. Bless his heart.
The week that followed I said my study group wouldn’t budge on the time and I couldn’t miss it. I wasn’t even in a study group, but I’ve been searching for one ever since.
The only reason I didn’t get shit for it is likely because I’ve been smart about my absence, finding times I know the others are in class to meet with my brother for lunch or homework sessions then. Same with Brady. Some days I’ll meet one at the coffee shop, or we’ll meet each other outside of our classrooms and chat during the small breaks before the next one.
But never more than one at a time, because that would lead to them realizing, one corner of their tringle is missing. I can’t have that. Not yet.
It’s hard when you realize you simply aren’t enough for someone and it’s even harder when everyone you’re connected to is connected to that person as well.
While it’s not every day anymore, I still sometimes quietly cry myself to sleep at night. I know it’s irrational, some might say dramatic, to cry over someone who was never really yours to begin with, but as cliché as it sounds, my heart aches like he was.
Or maybe it’s the fact that reality forced my hand that night as those waves rolled up over my feet, stealing more than just the sand from under me. Every
thing I thought I might one day have washed out to sea.
My second home took my maybe, my hope, and my virginity.
When I thought of the future, the possibility of me and my brother’s best friend was always present. I spent so many years with the same images in my head that I don’t even know how to imagine anything else. It’s as painful as it is annoying.
But miss our boys’ first game as college athletes?
I could never.
I meet Cameron’s gaze. “I’ll be there.”
She nods, inspecting her cuticles, her voice barely a whisper. “I hear you some nights, you know.” Her eyes lift to mine. “You’re not as quiet as you think you are.”
I pull in a long, steady breath. “I’m okay, Cam. I swear.”
“I can’t help you let go, if you don’t let me try.”
“I know.” I look away. “But his is on me, and I have to work through it on my own. It’s the only way.”
“Promise you’ll try harder?” she whispers.
My lips curve and I lift my hand, my best friend coming in for a quick hug.
“I will.”
“K.” She squeezes me before pulling away and heading for my door. “I’m going to get ready. I leave in twenty if you change your mind.”
I nod, appreciating Cameron even more. She knows my staying in has nothing to do with homework, and she’s allowing it because she knows it’s what I need.
I meant what I said about trying harder. I’m so over myself, and ready to get rid of this hollowness consuming me, but despite our conversation, I still pass on her every invitation the days that follow, and when game night finally rolls around that next weekend, my nerves are going haywire.
I’m rigid all over, the ache in my shoulders bone deep from drawing them in so tight without realizing it. I’m just ready to get there, and sadly, for it to be over.
“Hurry up, hooker!” I shout, pacing the entryway to our dorm room.
I take a deep breath, wringing my hands in the air, quickly dropping them to my sides when Cam’s door is thrown open.
“Chill, ho-bag, I’m ready.”
She walks down the hall, and I can’t help but smile.
Say You Swear Page 10