Only the Beginning

Chapter 8

***Amazing banner by the lovely bookaholic14 <3***

||Carmen Anders||

I knocked on the door and nervously waited. I was really starting to regret this, coming here.

I could just apologize to him at school tomorrow. I mean, it was kind of rude coming to his home uninvited.

And to make it worse, Dylan and Kyle dropped me off and immediately ditched to go to MayFord's Diner.
Even after I had told them not to leave me here alone.

The door slowly creaked opened, but not completely. A little boy hid his body behind it and poked his head out.

I smiled at him and squatted down to his level. "Hello there."

Only then was I able to take in his features. He had deep, blue eyes like Ryder's and a cute little button nose.

"Hi." He said shyly.

"You must be Ryder's brother."

He smiled."Yeah, Ryder's my brother."

"Well what's your name, buddy?"

"Alden. My name's Alden Byers." He told me as he opened the door completely and stuck his hand out for me to shake.

I chuckled as I shook it. "Well it's nice meeting you, Alden. My name's Carmen. Carmen Anders."

"Well c'mon in, Carmen." He said as he stepped out the way to let me in.

I almost lost my nookers when I saw the inside of his house. It looked seemingly big from the outside but the inside was huge. I didn't even have enough time to marvel over it before I heard his voice.

"Alden!" I heard Ryder shout. He sounded angry.

"Oh no," Alden whispered.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"I stole his phone to play a game, he's coming for me." He whispered and ran off.

Ryder came running down the stairs and his eyes landed on mine.

"Have you seen Alden anywhere?" He asked me as he brushed passed me.

"Nope," I smiled, amused as I watched him check all the closets.

He was obviously too distracted to notice that it was me. I just stood there patiently waiting for him to realize the situation.

He stopped dead in his tracks.

There we go, I thought.

He turned around. "Carmen?"

I gave him a cheeky smile. "Hi!"

"What are you doing here?"

"I came to talk to you, you ignored me the whole of today in school."

"My parents aren't home. What if they come back?" He said ignoring what I'd just said.

"Then I'd meet them, I'd love to meet your parents."

"You know what they'll think if they see you here."

"And what is that?"

He gave me a look.

"What?" I asked genuinely confused.

He looked around, I assume, to check if Alden was within ear shot. "They'd think you came over here so we could..."

"We could?"

"Hook up."

"What?"

"Have sex."

My eyes widened and my stomach did a flip. "Oh my god. Why would they think that?"

"You need to leave."

"Look, I just wanted to apologize. Ryder, I-"

"There's something called texting."

"Well that wouldn't be efficient enough. I'm honestly really sorry about the whole situation."

"You see this," he pointed at his black eye, "When it fades away, I'll accept your apology."

He walked passed me and headed back up the stairs.

"Oh c'mon, it's not like I was the one who gave it to you." I told him getting slightly desperate as I followed behind him.

"I had to tell my parents I fell down a flight of stairs!" He retorted.

"They bought that?" I asked.

He turned into a room, which I was guessing was his, and was about to slam the door in my face but I quickly stopped it with my foot.

I pushed it open and walked in taking a seat on his bed.

His room was a lot cleaner than I expected. The bed was made, his desk was clean, there were no clothes on the floor and it kind of smelled like cinnamon.

"I went to Asher's house to apologize," I told him.

"Really? What a great idea, you probably went alone too, didn't you?"

"He wasn't going to try anything. His parents were there."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"It isn't," I informed him,"but they were just so happy to see me after so long."

"And?"

"And I wasn't happy to see them."

"Yeah, I'm gonna guess it's because their son's a dick."

"Ryder."

"What?"

"He's not that bad once-"

"Why do you keep on defending him? What has he done for you?"

I looked away.

"I don't know much about your past with him but I'm sure as hell he's hurt you and he'll do it again."

I looked back at him. "Why do you care so much?"

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Because you deserve better, Carmen."

"I know." I say because I know I do.

He opened his mouth to speak but his eyes shifted behind me.

Following his gaze, I turned around and saw Alden standing by the doorway watching us closely.

My cheeks start warming as I wonder about how much he'd seen.

He looked at me with a glint of excitement in his eyes.

"I think he was gonna kiss you." He whispered to me as if Ryder couldn't hear him.

I was sure my cheek were a bright red by now and I mentally cursed myself for it.

"Alden, where'd you put my phone?" Ryder asked him appearing completely unaffected by his little brother's comment.

He pulled it out of his little pocket walking over to him and placed it on the palm of his hand.

"You shoulda kissed her." He told him and then walked off.

~*~.

(A/N): AHHH! HI!

Sorry this took a bit too long but I hope you enjoyed it. I'll get to editing chapter 9 right away so that it won't take as long.

For the first time, I really don't have much to say.

I mean apart from ... well yeah.

Uh anyway let's get on to the questions :)

Question(s): What do you think about Alden? Do you think Ryder would have kissed Carmen or was Alden just going off of nothing?

Please don't forget to vote, comment, and share with your little brothers!! ;P

~ M.