The Bridesmaid

41|Explanations

"Is he just going to sit there," Adriana whispered to Natalia and Anthony.

Natalia groaned as she curled deeper into Anthony's side. All she wanted was to sleep, and slip off into dream world for the 3 hour flight, but it seemed impossible with Adriana and Anthony's constant conversing.

"It looks like he doesn't want to talk," Anthony whispered back.

"Well, he has to. He's been so off lately, and then this happens? It's not right," Adriana sighed.

"You know what's not right," Natalia asked as she glared at Adriana, "The fact that I can't get any sleep because you're both nosy."

"Put in your headphones," Adriana retorted as she stuck her tongue out.

"Or you can stop talking," Natalia said as she also stuck her tongue out.

"Are you both always like this," Anthony asked with a light laugh.

"Anthony, meet playful Natalia," Kris said as he sat down beside Adriana, "We haven't seen her like this since well, high school."

"He's not wrong," Adriana agreed, "Nat got boring in college."

"I'm right here, you know," Natalia whined.

"Hey, so um," Adriana began as she lowered her voice and looked back at where Jessie was wiping Tyler's cuts, "Do you know what the deal is?"

"With Tyler? Not really," Kris sighed, "All I know is that he got into some kind of fight."

"I could've told you that," Natalia said, "One look at his face, and we could all say that."

"What's got you so bitchy today, Nat," Kris teased as Natalia flipped him off.

"You," she said as she stuck her tongue out.

"'Natalia, what have I told you about that? Only unladylike girls do that. Keep that up and you'll never find someone,'" Adriana joked as she mocked Catherine's voice.

"Lord," Natalia laughed as she covered her face, "My mom gave me so much crap for the smallest things."

"We have to find out what he's doing here," Anthony said in all seriousness. He may have been relatively new to squad, but it didn't take a genius to figure out how uncomfortable anything revolving Chase made Natalia feel.

Natalia turned to look at Tyler who was flinching away as Kylie attempted to examine his bruises. "We just need to get him talking, and I have just the way."
-
-
-
Natalia mindlessly played with Anthony's fingertips as she watched Adriana go through her emails. They were still on the plane, but were set to land at the private terminal at O'Hare in half an hour.

"I have an email from Victoria's Secret. Why do I have an email from Victoria's Secret," Adriana asked as her voice softened to a whisper.

Natalia dropped Anthony's hand as she put her full attention on Adriana. "Didn't you go to that casting some time ago?"

"Yeah, but my manager never heard back," Adriana said in dismay.

"Open it, you idiot! What if it's about the casting," Natalia said.

"I can't," Adriana said as she pushed her laptop away, "I've been dreaming of this since I was a little girl. Everyone thought I was stupid for picking something so 'risky' as a career choice, and I wanted so badly to prove them wrong. What if I open it and it just proves them all right? I'm not meant to be a model."

"Adriana, don't say that! Karl Lagerfeld hand chose you for his ad campaign. Vera freaking Wang is making our dresses as a favor to you. Tom Ford idolizes you, and Michael Kors just hired you as his new face. You have proven them wrong! Time and time again!"

Adriana smiled, but still said, "You open it. I can't read it."

Natalia playfully rolled her eyes as she grabbed the laptop from Adriana and opened the email. She skimmed the email, but she immediately stopped as she read the words "Congratulations Adriana! We'll see you in a few weeks for the first fitting."

"You got it," Natalia yelled as she hugged a shocked Adriana.

"This is the big leagues, Nat! If I do well, they'll hire me again, and if I do amazing, they'll make me an Angel!"

"I'm so proud of you, A," Natalia sighed as she looked at her best friend.

"I need to talk to Mason as soon as we get off this plane. I need to call him," Adriana smiled.

On the opposite end of the jet, Jessie was trying to get Tyler to talk about what had happened to him.

"I can't help you if I don't know the whole story," Jessie softly said as she bent down to look at him.

As upset as she was at his actions, Tyler was still her brother, and quite frankly, the only family member who supported her in everything (a/n you all remember why he left Chi in the first place right? Jess doesn't 😉).

"It's not that big a deal," Tyler tried to wave off, but winced as he tried to smile.

"It's obviously not, Tyler. Clearly it was bad enough that you had to leave Vegas. Do mom and dad even know you're here," Jessie sighed.

Tyler softly shook his head as he looked at her face. "I didn't have time to stop at home. I couldn't."

"Why couldn't you? What were you running from? I can't protect you if you don't tell me anything, Ty. Please let me help you," Jessie begged as she grabbed his hands.

She felt like crying as she heard the next words that came out of his mouth. "You can't help me out of this one. I got myself into this one and I payed the price. Chase made sure of it."

"Chase did this?"

"It's my fault. We had a disagreement and he didn't like that," Tyler said.

"A disagreement on what," Kris asked as he sat down beside Tyler.

Jessie sent him an annoyed look, but he ignored it as he focused on Tyler's response.

"He was blackmailing Natalia with the wedding. I didn't like that for a variety of reasons, and he didn't like that, so here we are," Tyler retorted as he gestured to his face.

"He was blackmailing Natalia? With what," Jessie asked.

"With the wedding and mom and dad's blessing. When he found out you all knew, he got mad that he lost his leverage," Tyler said.

"Before you got into the disagreement, did he say anything to you? Is he planning something," Jessie asked.

"All I know is that Chase is angry, and Catherine is doing something for him. In the past two weeks, I've seen her leaving his house 4 times."

"If Catherine is involved, this is going to get messy," Jessie said as she turned to see her smiling best friends.

Natalia, Kylie, and Adriana were all wearing bright smiles as they looked at something on Adriana's laptop. Jessie took note of the light in Natalia's eyes, and felt her heart break a little bit. Natalia was only 16 when she had met Chase. She could've never expected the problems their relationship would cause, and now, nearly 9 years later, she was still suffering the consequences.

------------
So Tyler is back, but the questions is: can he be trusted?

btw, I'm sorry for the lack of updates! School just started, so I'm messing around with my schedule to see what works and when. This next week may be a weird week for updates, but I promise that we'll get more Anthony/Natalia moments!

Until next time,
Gabby