Who Knew?

2

As soon as we pulled into Ashton's driveway I saw at least fifty people standing in front of his gigantic house, all of them holding cups or what looked like beer bottles. Looks like there will be drinking at this party, great.
Sawyer and I got out of the car and admired the gorgeous house in front of us. All I could say was wow. I could see part of the lake behind it, as well as people swimming in the lake.
"Are you ready to go inside?" Sawyer asked me. I nodded and followed him inside. The inside was just as immaculate as the outside. We walked up the first set of stairs we saw and found the kitchen. There weren't as many people in there, and from the large window I could see that almost everyone was outside in the backyard. Sawyer grabbed us both a bottle of water and checked to see if they were sealed before drinking it.
"BOO!" someone yelled in my ear. I screamed at the sudden sound and turned around quickly. It was a shirtless Ashton Kings, who, might I add, has never spoken to me in my life. I looked over and saw Sawyer smiling at my fear.
"Uh, hi. What was that for?" I could hardly remember how to form sentences. Ashton had never spoken to me before and he's so popular. He could ruin me just by spreading one little rumor. I have to be careful what I say to him. Ashton is extremely attractive, but his looks do not reflect his personality. He is known to cheat on every girl he has ever dated and bullies almost everyone at school.
"I just wanted to welcome you two to my party." He sounded drunk already. The party had started only twenty minutes ago. I can already tell that this party wouldn't be an innocent get together like those in middle school. "The food is over here. The drinks are over there. The people are out there. The bathroom is that way. My room is upstairs. Feel free to walk around, swim, eat, sleep, or make out, whatever you want to do."
"Okay, thanks." Sawyer said to him. Ashton left and Sawyer said to me with a smirk, "So, do you want to give ourselves a tour of this magnificent house?"
"After you,"
Sawyer and I walked up some more stairs to try and find Ashton's room because why not? He did give us permission. Sure, he was drunk, but we were allowed. We came to a long hallway full of doors. When Sawyer opened the first door the nauseating smell of smoke poured out so he shut it quickly. Behind the next door a girl named Kate and a guy named James were all over each other. When we opened the next door we found what we were looking for.
"Finally!" Sawyer said with a mischievous look on his face. At first we didn't see anything out of the norm, until we looked on his desk. When I was moving things around I accidentally moved his computer mouse and his screen lit up. Both of our jaws dropped and we burst into laughter. There was a picture of Cecelia Gates and Ashton and he was kissing her on the cheek. Ashton hated Cecelia; at least that's what he made everyone at school believe. Who would have ever thought that the whole "if he's mean to you he likes you" thing was true? Sawyer took a picture of Ashton's desktop.
"I can't believe it. I thought he hated her. And I thought he was dating Kate." Sawyer said as he laughed.
"Well we just saw Kate with James so either they broke up or they need to."
"Oh yeah, thanks for reminding me why I hate people." We both laughed at that because of how true it is. I quickly changed my expression to one of shock.
"You hate me?" I asked him with the best hurt face I could make without laughing. It was so hard to keep a straight face.
Sawyer smiled and said, "No, I don't hate you. But I only like you because you give me free food and snort when you laugh."
I gasped and made sure to act extremely offended. "I do NOT snort when I laugh! I cannot believe you would accuse me of such a thing!"
"Oh really?" As soon as he said this I started to back away, but he caught me and started tickling me. I do not like to be tickled whatsoever. I think of it as a form of torture, only you laugh instead of scream. And of course, like every time anyone tickles me, I started to laugh, a lot. And I got the hiccups which made me laugh even harder. Then it happened. I snorted. I couldn't believe it, but he was right.
At this point, though, we were both laughing so hard that we could barely stand up straight and there were tears running down my face so I really didn't care that I had snorted or that he was right. I was just having fun and forgot about all of my worries for the first time in a long time. When our laughter started to fade away Sawyer looked at me and reached his hand up to my face.
"You have tears running down your face." He brushed his thumb under my eyes and instantly my tears were gone.
"At least they're not tears of sadness."
Then Sawyer said quietly, "Yeah," and I could tell that something had changed by the look on his face. I then realized that his hand was still on my cheek and he was getting closer to me. Was he about to...kiss me? No, no, no. This can't happen. I don't want him to kiss me. Sawyer is like my brother, I just can't think of him that way. Plus, kissing him would mean that everything would be awkward after and I just can't lose my best friend. I started to think of all of the things that could go wrong if he came any closer, yet I didn't have the courage to back away. What if he was just looking at an eyelash I had on my face? That's probably all it was. Sawyer would never try to kiss me, he only sees me as a friend, or maybe a sister.
When his face was only two inches from mine we both realized what was happening, and he backed away hesitantly while I stood there with a surprised look on my face. Sawyer shook his head and covered his eyes, muttering something to himself quietly. He then looked at me and looked away a few times.
"Uh, I thought I saw something in your eye. It's okay though, it was just an um, eyelash. Still attached of course." Sawyer kept scratching his neck and looking at the ground as he said this, and I could tell things were going to be awkward if I didn't change the subject.
"Oh, yeah, of course. Thank you for your concern." I said and then I laughed quietly and changed the subject. "Do you want to go check out the rest of the party? There's got to be something fun to do here right?" I could tell his mood instantly got better when he realized that I didn't think it was a big deal.
"Yeah, okay. Let's go downstairs and see what everyone else is doing." Sawyer started to walk out of the door and I followed him.
My random thoughts about food and TV shows were interrupted as soon as I got to the bottom of the stairs. My eyes met with the most gorgeous blue eyes I had ever seen, and in a split second I had fallen on the stairs. No, I had not fallen because I was distracted; I had fallen because someone had left their drinks sitting on the steps. It really hurt actually, but I wasn't complaining because if not this never would have happened.
As I was getting up, the perfect guy sprinted up to where I was and grabbed my hand, smiling a perfect smile at me. "Are you alright?" he asked me. Even his voice sounded perfect. Once again I froze and completely forgot how to speak. I saw him laugh a little after he had been awaiting my answer for a moment.
"Uh, yeah, I'm fine. Thanks," was all I could say. Awkwardly, I looked down and started to walk back over to Sawyer who was waiting with a strange look on his face. Right away I felt someone's fingers wrap around my wrist and my head swung back around.
"Wait. What's your name?" the gorgeous guy asked me. Why would he care what my name was?
Before I had the chance to answer Sawyer walked up behind me. "Come on Scarlett. Let's go out to the pool." Almost the entire time he was speaking he was looking at this guy even though he was talking to me.
"Scarlett. That's a beautiful name. It's nice to meet you. I'm Owen." With a dazzling smile he stuck out his hand to shake mine, or so I thought. Instead he grabbed my hand and gently kissed it. My cheeks felt like they were on fire. All I could do was smile like a dork. Owen looks like he comes from money; I could tell by his watch that looked as if it cost $500, his Ralph Lauren button up, khaki shorts, and Sperry's. Normally I wouldn't be attracted to this type of guy because of the stereotype, but he was talking to me and seemed really sweet. What would be wrong with at least giving him a chance?
"I'm Sawyer, but there's no need to kiss my hand. I need to talk to Scarlett. See you around man." I could slightly sense a bit of annoyance from Sawyer, but I just shrugged it off because I know how quick he is to judge people.
"I'll talk to you later," I said to Owen, smiling at him. He smiled back and said okay before I followed Sawyer outside.
"What do you need to talk to me about?" I asked once we got outside. While I waited for an answer I sat down on the edge of the pool, took off my shoes, and stuck my feet in; Sawyer did the same.
"Oh, nothing really. I just don't trust that guy. He has the whole "rich kid-man whore" look going on that I didn't feel like being around." Sawyer smiled because he knew I hated when he did that. No matter what guy talked to me Sawyer always thought they were a player. I never really had a chance to find out if he was right though. I always ended up being too antisocial to actually go on a date which is why I've never had a boyfriend.
"What if I want to get to know him? Just to test and see if you actually are right about all of these guys. Maybe I'm tired of being single. Aren't you?" I hadn't really thought about it until now, but I kind of did want a boyfriend. Just to see what it was like. Just to have the experience. How could I know if I enjoyed being single more if I have always been single?
"Nope, I'm perfectly happy being alone, thank you very much."
Sawyer used to have all of the girls chasing after him until they found out he was pretty much un-dateable. He had only ever had one girlfriend and that was in our freshman year of high school. There had been rumors spread by idiots in middle school that he was gay, an alien, or hopelessly in love with me, none of which are even close to true. He was tired of these rumors so he said yes to the first girl to ask him out in high school. This turned out to be a big mistake because she was incredibly high maintenance and cheated on him with two different guys. That sure didn't make him feel any better about dating.
I believe that Sawyer is just shy when it comes to girls and can see past their fake eyelashes and money and straight to their cold, shallow hearts. I am not a big fan of females except for a select few. Sawyer has never really told me why he doesn't date any of the girls that come up to him, but he has mentioned how shallow some of them are. I can only assume that he feels the same way as me about the stupid girls at our school. Maybe he just hadn't found the right girl yet. Only he knows.
"I don't know if I like being alone anymore." I told him. Truthfully, I don't know what I want.
"But Scar, you're not alone," Sawyer said as he draped his arm over my shoulder. "You have me. I'm way better than any boyfriend you could have. Who wants to have to kiss people all the time? Yuck. Best friends are way better." At this, Sawyer and I both started laughing.
"You're right. Without a boyfriend I will save money on presents."
"You can still buy me presents if you want. Best friends do that. Please?" he poked out his bottom lip at me and pretended to pout.
"We'll see." I told him.
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Author's Note:
Hi everyone! Here's a new chapter for ya! Tell you friends about this book and help me get more reads! Let me know what you think in the comments!

QOTC(question of the chapter): What do you think of Sawyer?

Love, ivy