Stay With Me (She's With Me #2) - Jessica Cunsolo Page 0,67
lying on the couch, shifting as I get closer.
“Chase?” I whisper, not knowing if he’s sleeping.
By the time I went to bed, no one had seen or heard from him since he’d stormed out of the house. We didn’t know where he went, and he wouldn’t answer our calls or texts. At least he’s here now and I know he’s okay, or mostly okay.
Aiden told me that the longer the night went on, the more pissed Noah was getting about the whole thing. Noah was fuming about it since he didn’t understand why his friend would ‘Cockblock him like that,’ and ‘Go apeshit on his ass for no reason.’ Aiden confirmed what everyone kind of knew but never talked about, and explained that Chase walked in on his best friend getting it on with the love of his life. Noah felt really bad about it after that.
“Amelia?” Chase asks groggily, sitting up to look at me.
Once I get closer to the couch and can actually see him clearly, I throw my hands over my eyes to stop the sight from permanently scarring me. Chase is as naked as the day he was born.
“Why are you not wearing any clothes?!” Did he walk home naked?! I don’t see any clothes thrown on the floor.
“I have no idea,” Chase grumbles. “To be honest, most of last night and this morning are pretty spotty.”
Peeping through my fingers to look at him again, I keep my eyes trained on his face.
“Jesus, Chase. Did you get black-out drunk last night?”
I toss a pillow at him as he mumbles an incoherent reply, before finally removing my hand from my face. That’s when I realize he technically isn’t as naked as the day he was born.
“What is that stuff all over you?” I ask him, but then my brain clicks in on something he said a long time ago about what happens when he gets black-out drunk.
“Are you covered in barbeque sauce and—” I lean in closer to him. “Are those Froot Loops?”
Chase looks down at his body as if noticing the mess for the first time.
“Huh. I guess my drunk ass couldn’t find the Cheerios and settled for the next best thing.”
I sigh and sit down on the part of the couch that isn’t covered in BBQ sauce and Froot Loops. Chase is such a mess, and I don’t mean just his outward appearance.
“Are you okay, Chase?”
He laughs a flat, emotionless laugh. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be okay? I lost the girl of my dreams to my best friend. I’m just peachy.”
“Chase.” I don’t even know where to begin. I don’t know how to make this better, how to make him better. “They didn’t know.”
Chase slouches back on the couch, shifting the pillow to make sure it still covers everything, and turns his head to look at me. “How could they not know? Everyone else seemed to see it! Even Jason and Jackson asked me when I was going to marry Charlotte!”
“Noah and Char feel terrible about it.” I try to comfort him, but that only seems to make him angrier.
“They don’t feel bad about it! They feel bad that they got caught.”
“Chase—”
“I know what you’re going to tell me.” He interrupts me, looking slightly defeated, the light dimmed from his eyes. “I don’t own Charlotte and I can’t tell her who she can and can’t have sex with, but still. It had to be my best friend?”
I was thinking that, but I didn’t have the heart to say that to him. He’s hurting—it sucks to see the person you love with someone else, and Chase had to walk in on that firsthand without any warning.
“I just wish I could go back and tell Charlotte how I feel. I know I could make her happy if I just had the balls to say something to her. But now it’s too late. She’s with him now.”
It hurts me to notice that he keeps referring to her as Charlotte instead of Charlie, his pet name for her, which she hates so much. Have things shifted so much that he doesn’t see her as the same person anymore?
“Char isn’t with anyone,” I tell him. “She’s her own person and can make her own decisions. But she doesn’t know how she feels. It could’ve just been an in the moment thing. It’s not too late to tell her how you feel. You’re going to have to have a real conversation with her.”