18 Days ➳ Riley McDonough/ Before You Exit Fanfic

20.

March 21st // 13th day

T O B Y

Well, Connor sure made it difficult for me to get to Jade because it was just a little bit past one in the afternoon and I was driving through some random forest, trying to find my stupid brother so that I could pick Jade up and carry on with my day with her. Thank God there was a dirt path somehow guiding me to wherever, or else I would've really gotten lost.

After about twenty-five minutes of following some old tire tracks on the ground, I heard some laughter coming from my left and I got so excited that I swerved and nearly crashed into a tree.

Whilst I was driving, trying to look through the gaps between the trees all around me for any sign of Connor and Jade, I was able to catch a glimpse of blonde and I immediately killed the engine and jumped out onto the dead grass, deciding to just simply walk to where they were because it would save me the trouble of having to back my car out of the clearing without crashing into anything. I just got my driver's license a few weeks ago, I wasn't all that good yet.

"Aw, come on," Connor groaned as soon as he saw me emerge from the trees. "You're taking her already?"

"Good to see you too, brother."

The two of them were sitting together on the ground as Jade clutched a bag of jumbo marshmallows in one hand while the other was shoveling them into her mouth. It was like all those bonfire nights we used to have before we found out that she was sick.

"Hello," Jade said, although it was slightly muffled due to all the marshmallows that she was attempting to chew all at once. "Marshmallow?"

I took a step towards her and dug my hand into the bag, pulling out about three before I shoved all of them into my mouth, smiling happily at her.

"Don't take her yet, please," Connor pleaded, tugging on my jacket as I swatted his hands away. "I didn't even get a full twenty-four hours with her." He'd stood up by now, looking me directly in the eye. Although, he had to tip his head upwards just a little bit because I had gotten taller than him over the years. "I only got, like, seventeen hours."

I had to choke down the marshmallows before replying, "It's my turn, Connor."

He looked over his shoulder at Jade who was still seated on the ground, munching on marshmallows as she watched our little exchange with an absentminded smile on her face and I noticed his lips curl up at the ends ever so slightly into a sad smile.

"Fine," he finally said after a while. Then he looked back at her and their eyes settled on each other, exchanging words that I couldn't hear. "Give us two minutes, I just have to tell her something, okay?"

My head cocked to the side as my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Now, I was aware of Connor and Jade and the days that we no longer talked about, but as far as I knew, those days were way behind all of us. That's why we no longer talked about them, but Connor was his own kind of unpredictable so maybe being alone with her in the middle of the woods sparked something back up.

"Did anything happen between you two during the night?" I asked and he immediately denied, holding his hands up in defense.

"What? No, no," he assured firmly. "I'd never do that to Riley. No." I nodded my head in reply, not entirely believing him, but there was nothing else I could do about it so I simply let the matter drop. "Just please let me talk to her, Toby."