Taste the Rainbow (Editing/Rewriting, slow progress)

XXIV.

chapter twenty-four: party favor

***

The house is already full of teenagers when we enter and the music resounds through the whole house. A lot of the girls and boys are dancing and I can swear that a few of them are already drunk.

No one welcomes us but it doesn't matter, because it would be way weirder when someone would welcome us at this kind of party then if no one does. So we enter the house and I look around.

At first there are no faces that I'm familiar with but then there seem to be people I know popping out of the crowd. The first one I notice are Amera and Daphne who are talking to each other. I look at Carly and she nods when she spots them too. We walk up to them and greet each other with warm hugs.

"It's great that you're here," Daphne says with a smile that looks way too forced. 

"It's great that you're here too," Carly says and I can see how Daphnes smile changes from really forced to a little bit natural. Carly really is a magician when it comes to cheering people up.

We talk a bit about school and other stuff. At some point Hotaru and Marcus go and say hello to Marcus friends and don't come back. Carly and I look for the the whole time but we can't find them and after some time we stop looking for them. 

"What have you two been up to the last few days," Amera asks us and I look at Carly so she knows that she can start.

"Nothing much," she starts, "I've been in school, have cursed Charles for breaking up with me, written a few stories about love and hung with my friends." 

Amera nods, smiling, "Well that's what everyone would do." Then she looks at me and I know that I have to tell them what happened. The only thing that bothers me is that I didn't actually do anything else then watch Netflix, get Daphne back in the team and kiss Carly. 

I decide that it would be a good time for me to tell Daphne that she is back in the team. Even though I think that it would have to be Carlys job. She's the captain of the team after all. 

"I didn't do that much," I admit, "I watched Netflix, went to school and got a few parents to make Clearwater let you back in the team." I look at Daphne when I say the last thing and can see how the boredom she had been feeling the whole time. At first she doesn't believe me and she doesn't try to hide it but when Carly agrees with me she holds her hands in front of her mouth and squeals in happiness.

"Are you serious?," she asks and Carly and I nod in unison. 

"Yeah, finally!" Amera yells and hugs Daphne. It looks like she wants to squish her to death.

Carly and I laugh while Daphne trys to free herself. "My lungs," she says and Amera lets her go.

We talk about how I got so many parents to join the idea for a while and joke about how Clearwater must feel now. Amera makes some comments about how we could prank him or embarrass at the last day of school. 

After some time spotted Hotaru and Marcus sitting with a few lacrosse players at the fire place drinking and laughing. From what I see Marcus is already drunk and Hotaru seems to be the only sober one of all of them. Even though I know that she has already drunk something but with her it doesn't actually show for some reason. She always is the last one of who you realize that they are drunk.

Carly, Amera, Daphne and I walk up to them and sit down after Carly asks if we're allowed to. I can see the strange look on her face when she looks at Charles who is smiling up at her. 

We all take a seat. Carly and I sit next to each other the most afar from Charles but he has the audacity to stand up and take the empty seat next to Carly. She grabs my hand when he does and I can feel how much she's sweating.

"Hi Carly," Charles says and smiles in a apologizing way.

"Hi," she more frowns then says and tries to smile back but the smile looks as forced as the one Daphne had had before. 

"How are you?" Charles continues and sits closer to Carly which makes her cringe and slide closer to me. Now she's nearly sitting on my lap.

"I'm fine," Carly says and eyes him up and down, "What about you?" I can hear that she didn't actually want to ask him that but she still does because she is a nice girl.

I for myself would have not asked him. He's the one who broke up with her after all.

"Not that good," he admits and looks down on his hands, "I broke up with Jennifer." Carly doesn't answer this time. She just nods and looks at him with a disgusted face as he slides closer towards her. 

"Could you please stop that?," I snarl at him and his eyes shoot up for his hands and look at me.

"What?"

"Trying to get closer to Carly," I answer, "Are you too blind to see that she doesn't want you to?"

He eyes me and seems angry. "You don't know what she wants." 

"She does," Carly jumps in before I can. Now Charles looks quite surprised and wants to say something but she doesn't let him "First of all; I don't want you to come any closer to me. It makes me uncomfortable. Second; I don't want to be your girlfriend again. You broke up with me and I was really happy about it if you didn't know." 

"You cried!" he shoots back, "You weren't happy!"

A lot of the others have stopped talking and look at us. In a lot of their faces I can see confusion and embarrassment. 

"It wasn't because of you but because of the whole stuff that had happened before that," Carly says and still sounds very controlled, "I actually didn't even love you." 

Ouch. Now I'm a little sorry for Charles. It isn't normal for Carly to hurt someone this much and I can feel the shock going through the others. 

When Charles jumps up and runs away we all look at each other and Hotaru awkwardly picks up her glass and cheers to us with weird smile. The others quickly pick up their drinks as well and everyone takes a sip. 

We stay quiet for quite long and just look around without talking. At some point Hotaru starts another conversation and we all join in as much as we can and with time the situation eases a bit. 

Charles doesn't come back and we aren't mad about it. It's good that he isn't there anymore because finally Carly goes from being a little closed up to talking as much as she can. 

Gif is Hotaru awkwardly cheering the others when Charles leaves

***

Wow... I can't believe that this is already chapter twenty-four... Time goes by pretty fast, doesn't it? 

Well I hope you enjoyed this little thing. I know that I have no idea about parties but I hope it's okay.

See you tomorrow on the other side of the rainbow

xoxo

Leo♥