An Inconvenient Bet

Chapter Seventeen

"Hey," I said when I reached Aria's room.

She was in bed surrounded by chocolate and sweets, watching Mamma Mia. She looked up at my voice and I walked round the bed, crawling in beside her.

"Everything ok?" she asked.

I shrugged. My head was still spinning after everything from this morning. I knew that Carter and I wanted more than just sex, but that didn't mean we both wanted a relationship. I wasn't ready to tell the entire world about us and that was what a relationship did. I was happy in our bubble, but I knew it wouldn't be long until it burst.

"Let me guess, Carter problems?" she asked sympathetically.

I nodded.

"What's happened?" she asked, pausing the movie.

"Everything is oddly perfect and it's terrifying. Carter and I aren't supposed to be these people. It was weird enough when we started sleeping together and now, we both have these feelings that neither of us want to deal with and I don't know what to do," I explained.

"Do you really think it's that weird, you both together?" she asked me and I wasn't expecting her to say that.

I looked at her confused, "what do you mean?"

She sat up and looked at me properly, "It's always been obvious that Carter has wanted you," she said.

"We're just friends," I lied.

"You two couldn't be just friends even if you tried," she scoffed.

I sat up too, making myself level with her, "yeah we all know he's been wanting to sleep with me for years, but that was only because I was the only girl who wasn't. Carter wants what he can't have," I explained.

"If that's true, then why hasn't he moved onto his next conquest?" she asked, giving me a look.

"Because I don't know we have started developing these weird feelings for each other. I actually like him Aria, he's not as much of an ass as I thought he was," I said, not believing the words coming out my mouth.

She scoffed and began to laugh.

"What?" I asked.

"He's never really been an ass to you. He's been teasing you for years, flirting and you've fallen right into his trap," she said.

I sat there speechless. He had always been teasing me and making sexual innuendos, but maybe Aria was right, maybe it had all been a massive decoy just to get me into bed.

"So, you're telling me this whole time his big goal was sleeping with me? I already knew that," I said rolling my eyes.

"No, that's not what I said," she replied. "His whole goal was simply, you."

I burst into laughter, "that's ridiculous! Carter only thinks with his dick, even he isn't that smart," I laughed.

She shrugged her shoulders, "if you say so."

There was no way in hell that Carter Hughes had a crush on me all these years. Carter was the boy who had pushed me over as a child, only to nurse my wounds when I was hurt. Carter had been the guy who had danced with Britney but saved me from Justin. Carter had been there nearly my entire life, even when we drifted apart, he was still there. Carter had irritated me every day since I was five years old; every day until now.

"You're basically dating," she added.

I scoffed this time, "I'm not his girlfriend. I'm more like his gum girl or bubble-gum; only interesting until I lose my flavour."

"Presume you aren't going to tell Noah?" Aria asked.

I shook my head. There was nothing to tell and certainly not to my brother. What would I even say? Hey Noah, you know Carter? Well I've been sleeping with him for the past month and we think we have feelings for each other, please excuse the fact he's a complete man-whore and makes sexual passes at me in public. No way. Over my dead body.

"I still can't believe you're sleeping with Carter," she said.

"I'm not the only one sleeping with someone from The Trio, so you can take that tone somewhere else," I said poking a finger at her.

"Oh my god, I have so much to tell you!" she said and as she burst into her running monologue of how amazing Dylan was, all I could think was that I had no idea what I was doing with Carter.

All I knew was that the more time I spent with him, the more I realised that whatever this feeling was in my stomach, it wasn't going away. What was worse was that I didn't think I wanted to and that in itself was basically suicide. Carter was a ticking time bomb and I was walking straight towards him and that had to make me the most stupid girl out there.

I still couldn't understand how Carter and I had gotten from where we were to here. I thought that despite my rules and back and forth with Carter that we had for years, that one day in a drunken haze we would find each other and that would be that. I wasn't a complete idiot to ignore how tempting spending the night with him might be. But I never had anticipated that I would choose to sleep with him stone cold sober and that my heart would skip a beat every time I looked at him.

After my dad had left, I didn't think I would ever let anyone else in and yet somehow, he had snuck up on me and now I was trapped in this on-going cycle of liking him and not wanting to like him. It was vicious and repetitive and it went against everything I stood for. Carter in general went against everything I stood for.

Carter was this obnoxious guy with the most caring heart, but he had this side to him like he didn't want to let himself be happy for even the smallest of moments and the anger inside of him seemed to dictate his every decision. And yet, he seemed to show me the same kid that I used to play with as a child, except this time he was this amazing, hot guy and the realisation seemed to knock me for six.