It's Just Casual

Chapter 25

I knew I was supposed to get some work done, but I couldn't let a whole Sunday go to just that, so I figured I'd start working after hanging out with Mal and Regina. It couldn't take too long, I figured. They didn't like each other, Regina and I were on bad terms and I barely knew Mal, so there'd be very little to talk about.

Around one o'clock, someone knocked on the door and I hoped to God that it wasn't Mal. It wasn't. Instead, it was Regina, who'd arrived a whole hour early and was carrying a bag of all kinds of stuff.

"What is that?" I asked, half disgusted, half curious, while trying to take a peek at the stuff Regina was carrying. It seemed like her house vomited in that bag.

"Hello to you, too," Regina said and I let her inside. "I brought some stuff. I figured it would make the situation of me living here more believable."

"Okay," I said, but I was in no mood to redecorate my home. "If you take care of it, I don't care what you do."

Regina smiled slightly and inhaled deeply as her eyes wandered across the room. She then looked at me and patted my shoulder with her free hand. "Thank you," she sincerely stated and I turned away to make sure she didn't catch my cheeks heating up.

I plopped down back on the couch and observed Regina as she carefully placed some items of her around. When she got to my shelf of photos, I saw her grinning at a few. "This one with you and Henry is really cute," she said and pointed at one in a red frame.

"Thanks," I muttered. I knew which photo was in the frame, even though I couldn't see it. Regina continued adding some photos to the shelf and I picked up my magazine to read it. It was one of the worst magazines I'd ever laid eyes upon, but these were becoming my guilty pleasure.

"I didn't pick you as the type to read trashy magazines." Regina sat down on the chair across the couch and looked at me. She sat as regal as ever and I hated that I actually wanted her to sit next to me. I still wasn't completely over Regina.

"Well, not everybody's got a boyfriend. I need to know how to prepare for hot girl summer," I replied, as my eyes scanned the pictures of boys and their abs.

Regina let out a soft sigh, but I still didn't look at her. "I stopped everything between August and I."

Now, I did turn my head to her. "Of course you did," I said, "because God forbid anyone might actually take a liking to you."

"Would you stop being so incredibly petty, Emma?" Regina said and she was starting to get angry. I deserved that, though. I was being petty and I wished I could be the bigger man, but I'd already discovered Regina was not the only jealous one out of the two of us. "You stopped it with me, remember? You didn't want to be my friend anymore, you are the one that wanted us to stop hanging out. You don't get to be jealous, not right now. Not when everything between us is in the past."

"Are you kidding me?" Regina had gotten angrier, but I wasn't going to let this slide. I had not stopped it. I'd merely said out loud what she'd been thinking. "You are really one for twisting words, my fucking God. I didn't stop it. I literally told you that I liked you and all you did was say it wouldn't work anyway, because you don't want a relationship. A couple weeks later, and you're in a relationship with a random dude I've never seen before, who has been introduced as Luke's new dad and you're blaming me for whatever went wrong between us?!"

I was livid and in no mood to hear Regina's response, so I walked away. I hurried to my bedroom, locked the door and fought the urge to scream. I didn't want Regina to hear me. I didn't want Regina to have witnessed me walking out of a room once again, but I couldn't handle the tension anymore. I needed to calm myself, because I didn't like hearing myself yell. I didn't like getting angry in general and I knew the feeling would pass once I'd had a couple minutes to myself.