Courage || Carlos De Vil (Disney's Descendants)

Chapter 25

Carlos and Jay filled Lonnie and Meredith in on what exactly happened to Ben as well as what their plan was on their way to the Isle of the Lost. It took a while to make sure that they all memorized it by heart, and once they were confident that they knew it, they lapsed into a silence. It wouldn't have been such a big deal if it wasn't for Carlos and Meredith sitting in front of one another, making the mood unnecessarily tense. The last few days had been the same whenever they were around each other, of course, but that same atmosphere inside an enclosed vehicle was even more suffocating beyond words.

"So..." Meredith began when she couldn't take it anymore. "When were you going to tell me that Dude can talk now?"

"Oh," said Carlos. "Well, we weren't talking, so..."

He mentally facepalmed himself for saying that. He was sitting across her inside the limo, having chosen to stay there instead of riding in the front seat beside Jay in an attempt to resolve things with her. They didn't talk the whole way since they left Auradon Prep (except for when he and Jay explained their plan to save Ben), but now that they were crossing the bridge that connected the two islands, Meredith had broken the silence and he just had to reply with that.

"Right," Meredith said awkwardly. "About that time we, uh, fought..."

"I'm sorry," they said at the same time. Jay smirked from the driver's seat, glancing at the mirror to look at Carlos's reaction. He then exchanged knowing looks with Lonnie, and the two of them kept quiet as Meredith and Carlos talked things over.

"You first," Carlos offered.

"Okay. I... I guess I overreacted when you kept asking me about Chad," Meredith mumbled. "You were right — I do complain about him a lot, so it must've been surprising to you that I agreed to go with him."

"Oh, yeah," Carlos nodded. No, I was annoyed because I wanted to go with you. "Well, it was your choice, and I shouldn't have questioned you about it so much."

"It's alright."

"Are you — are you really going with Chad, then?"

Meredith wanted to say that she only said yes to Chad because she assumed Carlos was going to ask Jane to the cotillion. She wanted to say how if she had the choice, she would've asked Carlos. There was a small part of her that wondered if she still could, but she remembered him calling Jane's name that day at the amphitheater when they watched the Swords and Shields Team practice — that must've been when he asked her to be his date. Besides, she couldn't ditch someone she already agreed to go with just because she wanted to go out with her crush. So, she kept her mouth shut and nodded instead.

Carlos's heart dropped at her answer. He was secretly hoping that she had somehow turned Chad down after coming to her senses that she didn't want to go with him even though he was a childhood friend. But apparently, he still was her date, so Carlos's plans went down the drain. At least we got to apologize to one another, he thought somewhat bitterly.

"Cool. Uh... are we okay?" he said instead. He wanted to be completely sure that they were friends again even if he couldn't take her to the cotillion as his date.

Meredith felt the same way. She just wanted to be friends with him again after such a petty fight, even if it meant that he was going to such an important event with her roommate of all people. So, she nodded again.

"Yeah, we're good," she smiled in a way that made Carlos's heart flutter. From the front seats, Jay and Lonnie nodded approvingly, glad that the two of them were friends again. But Jay also felt bad for his best friend since Meredith was still going with Chad. It didn't make sense to him, though. He was so sure that the feelings between Meredith and Carlos were mutual, and both of them just didn't want to admit it.