South of the border || Ethan Dolan

Cabin in the Wood Part Two

Haley's POV

After taking a frigid cold shower, I still felt like absolute shit. And eating half a dozen doughnuts in the car most certainly didn't help. But am I going to go and eat the other six now? Oh absolutely.

"By the way, the hot water here is shitty." I said, walking back into the main room of the cabin. "Just warning whoever takes a shower next."

I laid on the floor in the living area with my knees bent, staring at the fire that someone had built.

I heard footsteps approach me and I turned my head the other way to see Ethan standing over me.

"I made you a hot chocolate."

I sat up, crisscross, and reached my hand out for the cup, not saying a word to him. He's not the only one who can play the not talking game.

"I put a little caramel in it for you." I nodded slightly and he sighed, sticking his hands in his sweat pants pockets.

"Right, well, I'm going to go help Grayson get more firewood." He said, rocking back and forth on his heels for a second, probably waiting to see if I was going to say anything, before he turned around and walked out of the living room.

"Silent treatment?" Jaelyn asked popping down on the couch behind me. "How long do you think that's going to last?"

"Oh my bets on no more than an hour." Cameron said, walking around and sitting in the rocking chair.

"She's hot headed. She'll last at least three hours."

"She can hear you." I said, taking a sip on the hot chocolate. "And she's not in the mood so you shouldn't test her."

"Okay, but like, what's your plan to make Ethan talk to you?" Ally asked.

"You're looking at it." I said, gesturing to myself.

"What? The silent treatment? That is not a plan." Jaelyn said.

"Actually," Cameron pipped in. "It's so simple, that it just might work."

Ethan's POV

"She's giving time the silent treatment now." I said, piling more wood into the wagon.

"Well, I don't blame her. You're not talking her so why should she talk to you?" Grayson said.

"I'm going to talk to her." I sighed.

"Dude, when?" He asked, stopping what he was doing. "The longer you wait, the more pissed she is going to be when you finally do."

"I know. I'm going to talk to her after we eat dinner, if she'll talk to me."

"Have you thought about what you're going to say?"

"Yeah. I just hope it works."

...............

"Haley, if the whole teaching thing doesn't work out, you definitely have being a chef as a back up." Cameron said, pushing her plate in front of her. She's right, Haley really does know how to cook.

Again, she says nothing. She usually doesn't shut up, which isn't a problem, but now all I want is for her to just talk my ears off about anything.

"Ethan, you're starring." Grayson said leaning into me. I shook my head and noticed that everyone was staring to clean up the table.

"Alright, who's down for a movie?" Ally asked. Everyone kind of mumbled a variation of sure and started walking towards the living room.

Now's my chance. Here goes nothing.

I walked up behind Haley and grabbed her hand gently, getting her to stop walking. She turned around and looked at me.

"We should go talk." I said, looking into her eyes, trying to read her emotion. She nodded and started to walk down the hallway.

I followed her up the stairs and into the bedroom at the end of the hall. She sat criss cross on the bed and stared at me, waiting for me to say something.

I took my phone out of my pocket and unlocked it, laying it beside her.

"Feel free to look at anything." I said.

"I'm not looking at your phone Ethan. I don't want to look at your phone. I just want you to talk to me and tell me what's going on." She said, crossing her arms across her chest. So she's over the silent treatment?

"The top message thread in my phone. Her name is Claire, she's an old family friend." I said, leaning against the dresser and crossing my arms across my chest.

"Okay. So an old friend has been texting you. Why did you feel the need to hide that?"

"Because she's not-"

"She's not just and old friend." She said, her face dropping. "She's your ex."

"I tried to tell her about you, but she was very persistent in trying to get in contact with me."

"What, um, what did she want?" She asked, looking down at her hands and picking at her fingers. "Is, does she want to get back together with you?"

"I don't think so. She just said she wanted to talk sometime and catch up." I sighed.

Haley scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Right. I'm sure that's all she wants."

"What do you-"

"You told her no right?" She asked, looking up at me.

I didn't answer her, because I knew she wouldn't want to hear the answer I had.

"Ethan, you told her no, right?" She asked, standing up off the bed.

"What was I supposed to say? We've known each other since we were in preschool."

"You should have said, I can't given our previous history because I'm in a committed relationship and I don't want to do anything to jeopardize it." She said, walking closer to me.

"I know and I'm sor-"

"Unless that's what you were trying to do. Find a way to get out of being in a relationship with me without breaking up with me. You'd just get me so pissed off that I'd just break up with you and you'd have a clean conscience."

"That's not what I was trying to do at all." I said, reaching out to grab her shoulders.

"Then why didn't you say no?" She said, getting louder, her voice breaking at the end. "Are you not completely over her?"

Her question took me back for a second. Of course I was over Claire, I was over her two years ago. I guess my hesitation was enough to send her over the edge.

"Right." She said, shrugging off my grip on her shoulders. "Well, I should have just listened to my gut about us in the first place."

And then she stormed out of the room and down the stairs.

"Haley, wait." I yelled after her, running down the stairs after her.

"Just leave me alone." She said, grabbing her jacket off the coat rack and sliding her shoes on. "And don't follow me."

"Where are you going?" I asked.

"On a walk. I just, I can't be here right now."

"Baby-"

"Don't." She pointed at my face. "Don't 'baby' me. You've lost the right."

"You can't go outside. It's been snowing for like three hours now."

"Like you actually care." She said, opening the door and going through it. She slammed it behind her and I sighed, leaning against the door and falling to the ground.

What the hell did I just do?

Hehehe sorry to end on a cliffhanger (actually I'm not but 🤷🏽‍♀️🤷🏽‍♀️)

Love you guys 💓💓💓💓💓