Never Say Never (Completed)

Twenty-One {Inside The Lines}

I tried weed for the first and only time in my life when I was fourteen and it just so happened to be with Bryan.

It was the start of high school and by some miracle, Sebastian and I had been invited to Bryan Grace's biggest party of the year. Savannah was the only truly familiar face outside of Ian, and had been sitting upstairs in a room with a few other pretty girls and Bryan, all of them passing what I had thought was a cigarette around. Disgusted, I'd wanted to leave, but Ian dragged me into the room behind him and all but shoved me to the ground at Bryan's feet and beside Savannah who greeted me with a giggle and a quick side hug. At that time I'd known of Bryan, but it'd all been secondhand insults from Ian and a glance here and there in the hallways in school since the second grade. But the second I sat down and glanced up I found his eyes on me and my cheeks had flushed the deepest shade of red, according to Savannah. I had finally understood why all the girls in school talked about him; with those piercing blue eyes full of mischief fanned by long, dark lashes and those perfect, full and very much kissable lips. Unfortunately Ian had caught me staring and jammed his elbow into my side before he'd asked for a hit of whatever it was they were smoking.

Bryan had passed it over with a slight hesitation but Ian wasn't at all affected by the disgusting aroma coming from the joint, he'd clearly smoked before. When he passed it my way, I found every pair of eyes on me and had finally understood why so many people fell victim to peer pressure. I stared at it, embarrassed I had no idea what it was. Ian looked as if he were feeling embarrassed himself and looked away from me. Bryan, though, he lowered himself from the bed to the ground opposite of me and smiled.

"You don't have to hit it if you don't want to." he'd said. But he was wrong, because I'd never hear the end of it from Ian if I didn't. So instead of responding, I did as everyone else in the room had, but Bryan tore the joint from beneath my fingers and put it out seconds before I fell into a coughing fit. He'd most definitely expected it and if I were hacking my lungs out, I would have been running out of the room wishing to be swallowed into a black hole.

As I stared into my best friend's eyes before me, Bryan still in his car in my peripheral I almost felt like I had then. Embarrassed. Angry. Nervous. And wanting nothing more than to trudge up my steps and curl up into a fetal position and cry.

"You're high." I stated the obvious, crossing my arms. "Come to talk to me sober and I might try and listen."

I started to walk up the driveway, but he grasped my elbow and swung me around to face him. "Please just hear me out."

"I've heard enough, Ian." I breathed. "I have a lot of other shit going on right now. I don't need to deal with you on top of it all."

"Give me another chance." he pleaded, voice hoarse. "I'm not asking you to trust me again, to love me the way you used to, but give me one last chance to be in your life, Charlotte. I can't. . . I can't do this without you."

I dropped my gaze to the concrete. "I'll think about it."

"Char, please." he touched his hand to my shoulder and I instinctively flinched from his touch again. He squeezed his eyes shut with a quick intake of breath. "I love you. I love the kids. I don't want shit to end like this."

"I said I'd think about it, Ian." I forced myself to look into his dilated eyes so he saw how serious I was. "That's all I can offer right now."

He nodded slowly, the tension draining from him as he raised his right hand to rub the back of his neck. When he looked back to me for a second he looked like my Ian. My shy, cautious, caring best friend and not the bitter, impulsive, angry man he'd turned into over the last couple months.