Cognizant (Adopted By Alex Gaskarth: Book 2)✅

Chapter 15

I avoided Alex for the most part for the rest of the day as we traveled Chicago on foot. We spoke still, but he said nothing about what happened, acting happy like usually did as if nothing happened. But at the end of the day, Jack and I went out separate ways from the vending machine at the hotel, and I had to head to my hotel room that I shared with Alex, where I knew he would be waiting. I nervously screwed and unscrewed the cap on by soda as I finally pulled out the room card. I shoved it in the scanner with a sigh, silently opening the heavy door with a quiet click. 

Alex sat on the bed against the headboard, his legs extended out in front of him on the white sheets. He flipped the ID in his hands slowly, observing it. 

"H-Hey," I greeted softly. 

"Hey," he echoed emotionlessly without looking up. 

I swallowed hard and set my phone on the desk, along with my wallet. I wrapped my black hoodie around my body tightly, not removing it even though it was hot in the room. He still sat on his bed with an unreadable expression on his face. 

Why did I have to be such an idiot? I knew from the start it would be bad to do what I was doing in Chicago, I shouldn't have done it, and now I've pissed him off, and he probably won't ever forgive me for this. He doesn't even know everything that happened, and he's already mad, what happens if he asks for the whole story? 

I scolded myself as I crossed my legs tightly against me on my own bed, wrapping my arms around myself and staring at the floor.

He is the first person who's ever helped me. And all I ever do is go behind is back and do the things he's told me not to. And it's not as if he ever set strict rules, why can't I just fucking follow them? What's my problem?

"Ad," he said softly. I looked up, but avoided looking him in the eye. I made a small hum in acknowledgement. I vaguely saw him pull his legs off the bed to face me. I dropped my head back down with my eyes shut to stop the slowly forming tears to escape, wrapping my arms tighter around my stomach as I heard his footsteps lightly shuffle over to me. 

"Ad, look at me," Alex requested gently. I slowly opened my eyes to to look up at him, but he had already crouched down to make me look him in the eye. When I saw the soft expression in his eyes, I looked back towards my lap. "Look at me," he repeated, placing one hand on my face. "I'm not mad." He brushed away the tear that had already begun to fall. "I'm not mad at you, Ad, I promise."

As I opened a mouth to speak, a sob wracking my whole body escaped unwillingly. "B-But you're the first person who's ever tried to help me, a-and- and I'll I've ever done is do the shi- stuff you've told me not to, and it should-shouldn't be that hard for me to not do it, and I," I began frantically.

"Ad, Adelpha, look at me, and listen to me, okay?" I silently obeyed him, more hot tears begin to float down. "I'm not mad. Yes, I am upset that you would turn to doing this and the other things you've done to hurt yourself, but I'm not mad... I want to overlook this, unless you're wanting to talk about it. In the year that you were gone, we both did things that we aren't proud of, things I did that I haven't told you, and don't plan to. Unless you want to talk about it, we can stop and start over from all the stuff that happened. The only time we will have to actually talk about it is if you try to do something again. Okay?"

How can he be so understanding about this? Why isn't he mad?

I finally detached my hand from around me and used my sleeve to wipe my eyes as I nodded. "I'm sorry," I managed to squeak out. 

"It's okay, kid, you don't have to apologize."

I nodded again and let him embrace me tightly, hugging him back.