The Middle - Volume Two ✔️

Chapter 25

Jamie

I'm on auto pilot as I walk back into Marley's. I've been gone for almost a half hour, and I know my dad is gonna be pissed. But I'm finding it hard to care. I'm still wearing Noah's hoodie, too. So what?

"Where the hell have you been!?" My dad asks, alarmed, as I sit down next to him at the booth. I don't look him or Patrick in the eye. I'm in a daze. A state of shock.

"The park." I whisper, taking in the half eaten burgers and bowls of fries on the table. They ordered without me. That's cool.

"With Noah?" Patrick asks, and I blink up at him. He looks worried. Dad does too. To hell with this.

"Yeah, I talked to Noah. It's over now." I say, tugging at the sleeves of his hoodie.

"I thought... I mean, I thought it was already over?" Patrick says, nervously glancing at my dad. He obviously hasn't given my dad full details about me and Noah. Great.

"Yeah, well now it's really over." I say, before clearing my throat and snapping myself out of it. "Sorry I fucked off like that. I saw him in the bathroom and..."

I shake my head. I can't admit to climbing out the window and running off to the park like a total drama queen.

"Jamie, is everything okay?" Dad asks kindly, putting an arm around my shoulders. "Is this his hoodie?"

I nod my head. "I was cold."

"Well, that was nice of him, right?" My dad offers. He has no idea what's going on. I need to give him something.

"I was cold, so he told me to put it on. I'll give it back to him next week." I explain. "Dad, Noah and I have... Well, I guess you can call it history now."

He smiles at me sympathetically. "Yeah, Patrick filled me in a little. You wanna talk about it?"

I shake my head. "Can we just go home?"

"You need to eat, kiddo."

"There's cornflakes in the house. And ice cream." I inform him, and he gives me a small laugh.

"I'm not surprised." My dad is well aware of my obsession with cornflakes. "Let's get out of here then. You want me to drop you off in town, P?"

"Um.." Patrick looks at me for assurance. I give him a small nod. I don't wanna talk about it, not even with him. "Sure, thanks Mike."

Once we're back at home, I focus on completely bombarding my dad with updates about school, and the band, and anything besides my sorry excuse for a love life. I didn't wanna tell my dad about Noah, but he knows. I don't think he'll grill me about it too much, I mean, he's seen first hand the effect an interaction with Noah has on me. My dad will see that it's a touchy subject for me. I hope.

This sucks, because it's something I'd like to think I could have talked to my mom about. When I head up to bed, I find myself feeling worse than I did after Noah ran away from me in the park. Thinking about my mom like this sucks, because I'll never know how she would have responded to my dating boys, or what advice she would have given me in this type of situation. She wasn't around long enough.

I plug my phone in to charge as I lay my weary head down for the night. No sign of Benji. He never sleeps with me when dad's at home. I always get ditched, even though I'm the one that feeds him and walks him when my dad's out of town. Maybe I'm just fundamentally unlovable. Christ, I hope not.

Because I wanna fall in love. I want a life partner. I want someone to make me feel how Noah makes me feel when he kisses me. All the time. Not just in moments of weakness when Noah decides he's gonna give in to the pull between us. It's not good enough. I deserve more. I deserve the real deal.