Falling Slowly

Pt.3|Ch.13

•••••Austyn's Perspective

The tension in the atmosphere was unbearable.

Someone was going to snap soon.

The only question was, who would it be?

"I can't do it!" Josh suddenly screeched, falling backwards into a starfish position on the floor. "I just can't do it!"

"Ha!" Ben shot a grin at Sky. "You owe me five bucks."

I gasped and elbowed him in the ribs. "What have we said about placing bets?"

"He plays Race." Josh defended Ben from the floor. "The mannerisms are rubbing off on him."

"Fine." I relented with a sigh. "As long as you don't start smoking profusely and flirting with every girl you see."

Ben smirked at me. "You're the only girl who's fun to flirt with anyway."

I rolled my eyes and addressed the rest of the group. "Do we want to do another silence contest, or...?"

Aiden shook her head. "I don't think Josh can take it anymore."

Josh stuck his bottom lip out. "Being quiet is very hard."

"There are a couple of board games in the closet in our room." Sky suggested. "We could play one of those."

"Which board games?" Aiden asked.

He shrugged. "I don't remember."

"Let's go find one that would cause the least amount of emotional damage, shall we?" She headed off in the direction of the boys' room, with both Sky and Josh at her heels.

When they were gone, Ben sat back against the couch and let out a breath. "I'm so happy that Sky finally worked up the courage to propose to her."

I rolled my eyes. "Are you going to start every conversation this way from now on?"

"Hey," he raised his hands in defense, "I've only mentioned it seven times today, and it's four o'clock."

"You had two hours of your day removed by a matinee." I reminded him. "And the show tonight will take up another two hours."

"I don't see your point."

I sighed. "You got up at eight o'clock this morning. That's five hours before the matinee, and then there's four hours in between—"

"Stop that!" He covered his ears. "You're hurting my brain!"

"It's just math, Benjamin."

He wrinkled his nose. "I hate math."

I raised an eyebrow. "You need math to survive."

"That's what calculators are for."

"But, wouldn't it be easier if you just did it in your head?"

"Nope." He shook his head. "And I'm still not sure how we got from Sky and Aiden to math."

"I was trying to show you that your accomplishment of only mentioning their engagement seven times today actually isn't that impressive, because there were segments of your day in which you couldn't have mentioned it due to being on-stage and in character—"

He interrupted me. "Ah, I see. You were trying send me into self-deprecation."

"No, I was just—"

"It's fine, I get it." He crossed his arms and looked away. "I know when I'm not loved."

"That is not what I meant at all!"