When I Find Love Again

Chapter 4

"What happened after he climbed up your room?" Dr. Hernandez asked.

"Well, he climbed up and sat down on my bed facing me."

I noticed his eyes were a shade of red so I asked him about it and he started telling me about how he started using drugs.

He told me that he had a friend, well what used to be a friend, and he introduced Brent to drugs. They used to get high all the time. The way he was telling me the story made him seen like he regretted ever agreeing to anything that Jack, his "friend", made him do.

Jack later then manipulated Brent. He made Brent feel like shit. Jack made him feel insecure.

At the age of 15, Jack demanded Brent to sell drugs. "I want you to sell these for me." I remembered how Brent told me. The sentence sounded so imperative. He basically obliged him to sell. So, Brent went on with the plan. His dad later then found out. He started fighting with his mom about it. His parents got a divorce and Brent went to live with his mother.

Two years later, at the age of 17, Brent's mother died of breast cancer. He was so depressed that his doctor recommended him to take meds. He didn't have any family to take care of him so he was sent away to live with his father. The man he hated the most.

He felt like his father was the reason of the divorce. He told him that it was all his fault and that he doesn't deserve the love and care from his own son. His father felt so upset and betrayed that he punched Brent square in the face.

A year later, he met again with Jack. Brent told Jack that he needed money to get an apartment and asked if he could be in the gang again. Jack was happy that he had one of his best sellers in the game again. Jack offered a room for him in his house and Brent then moved in with Jack and it wasn't such a great idea. This meant parties and drugs every single day. Jacks friends, which were in gangs, used to come in without hesitating to knock on the door. They just barged in and sometimes took away his things. The smell of marijuana and alcohol was the odor of the house. Brent had enough of it so he saved up for an apartment. That is where he recently lived. He dropped out of school the same year he got his apartment. He still was friends with Jack. Brent moving away from Jack didn't mean that he wouldn't sell drugs anymore. The deal was, half of the money was given to Jack and the other half was for Brent. He won a lot of money, but he never bought anything expensive since he didn't want to be suspicious to the police, I mean, a dropped out high school student making money without having a proper job?

After that long conversation about his life, he then asked me to tell him about mine.

There was nothing special about my life.

I was just an ordinary senior in high honor society. Never liked parties, never liked alcohol, and never ever would like drugs. I told him that I was born in Omaha, Nebraska and moved to New York with my family. At first I was bad at making friends in my school, but then I decided to attend clubs. After that I got along with everybody.

Everybody knew me as the smart chick. It was cool for people to recognize you for that, but sometimes it would get a little annoying. People would always ask me to help them with their homework or sometimes try and get my attention while taking an exam.

After I was done telling him that, Brent and I just stared at each other. He started leaning in and so was I. I knew it would be very wrong to kiss him since a basically agreed to not have any type of relationship with any of Sammy's friends. That day, I broke that promise. We made out for what felt like hours, but it only lasted minutes. I quickly pulled away and to make things less awkward I told him that we should go get Sammy from the party. He agreed to take me with him.

The car ride was so silent. Our silence was louder than my screaming. He turned on the radio and the song "Don't" by Ed Sheeran was playing. We started jamming along to the music and dancing and acting like complete idiots. When we arrived at the party, we took opposite ways to try to find Sammy.

The party was a mess I remember. Red cups were all over the floor, loud music was blaring through my ears leaving me almost deaf and a few people were throwing up on the floor and one was beside a plant. It was a disgusting view. I saw Sammy playing beer pong and quickly made my way over to him.

I noticed Brent had found him first and was trying to keep him steady. We arrived at my house, both Brent and I trying to help Sammy stand up on his own. When we got in Sammy fell on me and made me fall back to the table next to the door. My parents woke up by the sound of glass shattering which made them want to come down. My mother turned on the lights and my father made a huge sigh. You could smell how furious he was.

He thanked Brent for taking us back home. After he left my father started screaming at us in the middle of the night. He grounded both of us. I was grounded for a week for escaping out of the house without permission and Sammy was grounded for a month for going to party that he never mentioned either one of my parents and for getting drunk and not having a designated driver. At least I wasn't grounded for a whole month since I didn't drink and practically went to safe my brother from any type of danger.

Brent and I got closer and closer every day. We started texting and calling each other every time telling each other about our day. We looked like one of those cliché couples, but we were not official.

A month later I wanted to ask him about us, our relationship. It was a touchy subject for him because he looked like the kind of guy to not like relationships. So I popped the question. "What are we?"

"Babe, are you seriously asking me this?"

"Yes I am, we are always acting like some type of couple, but we never made anything official. What's the difference that is going to make."

"Exactly Vanessa, you don't get it. If we ever made anything official than it would be harder for me to walk away from your life if anything happened. I don't want to make anything official, yet." He responded.

"What do you mean by harder? Isn't this hard enough? This is harder for me, not knowing what to call you if anyone asks about you and me. I hate to call you "my friend". It hurts me to call you that because I don't see you as my friend. I see you as more than that."

Silence. He just stared at me for a whole minute. He then caressed my face and gently put his lips to mine. And then left.

I thought I'd never see him again. I remember crying for a whole hour and eating ice cream to calm my nerves. Sammy would always ask what was going on, but I would never tell him. I figured I'd tell him when Brent and I got official, but I think that that kiss he gave me was a way of saying goodbye.

After crying for another hour I heard something hit my window. It was him.

"I'm coming up" he whispered while signaling "up" with his fingers.

"You can't come up" I told him and then looked back to check if my door was closed.

After he climbed he took me by the waist and pushed me back on my bed. I was so confused about this. I mean, I thought he left me and now he wants to make out.

He pulled away from the kiss, but still on top of me and pulled something out from his back pocket of his jeans.

It was a rose.

"It reminds me of you. So gentle yet so fierce. So soft and beautiful."

I was mesmerized by his choice of words. The way he said it made me fall for him even more.

"Okay Shakespeare, what's going on?"

"Will you be mine?"

And that was the day that we made each other official.

I knew I had to tell Sammy, but I just didn't know how to explain to him that I was falling in love with his new best friend.

AN: Hello! hope you like this chapter. So I kind of want to make things clear. Vanessa in present day is in college and is 20 years old. In the flashbacks she is only 17-18 years old. Brent in present day is 22 and in the flashbacks he is 19. Thank you guys again for reading. BTW the picture of Brent and Vanessa in an edit i found on Google. i don't take credit.