candy lovers | aspir | ✓

24 | sour worms

For the ones hurting,

"Numbing the pain for a while, will make it worse when you finally feel it."

- Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore.

___________

CH 24

If Chase had said these words in some other context, the first thing I would have done is that I probably would have laughed.

But now, it just feels like the wind has been knocked out of me. I involuntarily take a step back, not realising that I'm on a few stairs, and I lose my balance.

Before I can catch myself however, Chase stretches his hand out and grabs my wrist to steady me. The moment I'm standing straight, he retracts his hands immediately and shoves them deep into his pocket.

"Is this about Alex? Chase, just tell me what to do and I'll do it." My voice breaks but I continue with my ramble. "I - I can stop talking to him if you want. I won't go to his games anymo - "

"Okay I'll tell you what to do, and you do it alright?" He cuts across, his voice sounding extremely strained.

"What? What is it?" I ask eagerly as I take a step forward, which only results in him taking a step backward. As though I'm going to hurt him.

"Leave."

I muffle my sob, all hopes of sorting this going down the drain. His voice sounds so cold and foreign and I stare at him as the tears start tumbling down.

"Why are you doing this Chase? Why are you giving up on us?" And this time, when I step forward, he just stands there, doing all he can not to meet my eyes. I clasp the ends of his collar, while I look up at him and shake him vigorously. "What the hell, is wrong with you?! Huh? Talk this out!" And then I begin to cry freely as I limply hold onto his collar.

With shaking hands he removes my hand from his collar, and this time I don't protest.

"Good-bye, Fae."

He sounds like he couldn't care less. He sounds like I mean nothing to him. Well if he acts like he doesn't give a damn about us, then why do I see him run the back of his hand across his eyes?

XxX XxX XxX XxX

It feels like an eternity has passed, when I finally see Layla pulling up in front of his house. I'm seated on the front steps of his house, and everything has been numbed. I don't feel anything. No sadness, no pain, no heart-ache.

But the moment Layla steps out from her car, and walks up to me, everything returns in a rush, twofold.

I begin crying voraciously, even though my eyes feel too dry to produce any tears. "It's okay, calm down..." She hugs me tightly, running a hand down my back in gentle strokes. "You'll get over it..."

I nod into her shoulder, not even wondering how she knows. She pulls me towards the car. Once I get in, I reach for the front box of tissues in her car. "What's the time?" I ask out sniffily.

"Past eleven, and everyone was worried sick back at home. Even Jamie." She's in no hurry to leave however, as I notice she reaches into the back pocket of her jeans and pulls out her phone.

"But how did you know I was here, Layla?"

"Just one second," she says as she taps her phone. "Take a look at this." She stretches her phone towards me and I see a collage of the selfies that Alex took with me the other night. The night that Chase forgot about the date.