Chances

by: skyz

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters.

A/N: The prompts for this were second chance and drunk. And this is what I wrote. Hope you enjoy and thanks for reading.


9.

Sometimes he had trouble remembering what he'd done yesterday and other times he remembered the past with vivid clarity. With age and the added aid of alcohol his memories dimmed and blurred into an incoherent mess most times.

He thought that this was a good thing. Took away the pain of remembering the lives he'd destroyed. The pain he'd caused everyone who had ever cared about him.

Today however was a day he was certain he would remember forever. It would be branded into his brain in a way that would never escape him. And if even the hint came that he was forgetting then he would remind himself of why he had to remember.

Silently he took the pen his lawyer held out to him and skimmed his eyes over the papers before him. He knew what they said. He'd gone over it again and again with his lawyer these past few days. Just to make sure she got everything she needed.

She had wanted very little.

He'd wanted her to have it all.

He scrawled his name at the bottom of the first page directly across from her own signature.

He blinked against the sudden sting of tears that threatened to fall. He had only himself to blame for this. He'd destroyed everything that had meant anything to him. Foolishly and arrogantly expecting things to forever remain the same.

He turned to another page where his signature was needed.

"Sharpay..." he said, suddenly. He glanced up and over across the long table at his soon to be ex-wife.

She met his eyes with an arrogant tilt of her chin.

He hesitated unsure for a moment what he wanted to say to her.

He had already done his groveling and it hadn't swayed her one bit. He hadn't really expected anything from her. He'd hurt her one too many times for it all to be forgiven because he was apologetic.

"What?" she asked tightly, still staring coolly back at him.

He sighed and shook his head going back to the paperwork.

"No, tell me. What is it Chad?" There was just the hint of a taunt in her tone.

"Nothing," he growled lowly and avoided her gaze. He wanted to tell her so many things in that moment that it overwhelmed him and he closed his eyes for a moment. He wanted to let her back in but even now he couldn't find the way to do that. He'd long ago closed off the parts of him that Sharpay had shanghaied leaving very little for her to manipulate her way back into.

"Give us a minute," Sharpay ordered the room at large.

Their eyes met for a brief moment as Chad looked up surprised at her request. The table full of lawyers got to their feet and trailed out of the conference room shutting the door behind them.

No doubt they were thrilled with the request because the longer he and Sharpay were here the better the bill would look for them.

He sat back in his chair and told himself to face this like a man.

"Why did we need privacy?" he asked after a while as she remained silent.

"Why not?" she shrugged delicately and gave him hard stare. "You want to say something to me." It didn't come out as a question and he didn't take it as one.

"I'm not going to apologize again. I know that it means nothing to you. We had some good times though didn't we? It wasn't all bad. I hope it wasn't all bad, Sharpay. I want you to know that I never set out to ruin what we had or to hurt you. I thought we'd be forever."

Sharpay gave a mirthless laugh as she trailed her fingers across the marble table top.

"Nothing lasts forever."

He acknowledged that with a faint smile.

"I realize that now. What are you going to do after this?" he asked, trying to hide his desperate curiosity.

"I start shooting with Steven in Toronto at the end of the week," was her bland reply.

"Ah..." he trailed off. He couldn't add anything other than that. He didn't know her life anymore. Didn't have the right to know it or her any more.

"Is that all you want to say to me?" Sharpay watched him intently as if looking for any sign of weakness from him.

He hoped she didn't see any. He'd prepared for this day and had steeled himself knowing that she would be out for blood.

"There's really nothing left to say," he murmured and looked back down. He stared blankly at the Mont Blanc pen clenched between his fingers and at the last empty page waiting for his signature.

Her next words made him look up in surprise.

"I never expected you'd end up a coward," Sharpay stated coldly while turning her gaze away to stare at some point above his head.

"Coward?" he repeated blankly. "I'm a coward? How so?" He glared at her willing her to look back at him and say it again.

"You're throwing everything away because you're a coward, Chad. A lying, cheating, horrible drunken coward who can't stand and take responsibility for his actions! You sit there with your hound dog expression and expect me to feel sorry for you! For you. The man who broke everything just because he could. Who told me he'd love me forever and turned his back on that without a thought. Well you can go straight to fucking hell. If you think I'm going to sit here and let you mope about because you're too dumb to fix it, you are mistaken."

She got to her feet almost knocking over her chair in her own haste. She glanced around for her purse and made to grab it.

He clambered to his feet and dove across the table snagging her wrist.

"You can't say that to me," he yelled. "You can't call me a coward and walk away from me! What do you want from me? What is it? You wanted this and I'm giving you this. I--I don't know what else to do for you. I can't read your mind. You said I'm too dumb to fix this but how can I? You won't tell me how to. Please...just explain what you mean and I'll never bother you again."

Angrily Sharpay shook free her wrist and glared down at him.

"Never bother me again?" she sneered down at him. "You are pathetic, Chad. What do you think I want from you? What have I always wanted from you? Do you think this will change anything?" she gestured down to their divorce documents.

He exhaled slowly while easing himself back to his side of the table. He stared at her seeing the Sharpay he'd known years ago. Seeing her anger and feeling it in her glare. Sensing her disdain like an invisible blanket draped over him. Seeing everything he'd missed in his own wallowing.

He'd had no idea what she'd meant until that moment. It all clicked into place and he slumped back into his chair, his knees suddenly weak.

"I thought you hated me," he found himself saying. He stared at her trying to see her again, trying to read her like he used to.

The years had done them both damage and his insight into her had diminished with the more alcohol he'd consumed. What remained of the woman he loved he couldn't tell.

She sighed and abruptly he watched her wilt. Her shoulders slumping and her face falling from its mask of ice. She sank into her chair again and covered her eyes with a hand.

He noticed the faint tremble it held and he reached out for her free hand clasping it firmly in his own. He gave it a squeeze and felt the faint returned pressure.

"I'm an idiot," he admitted gravely.

She nodded.

"You are," she agreed hoarsely."I've never hated you. I've hated what you've done. How you hurt me. The things you've said. I've hated a great many things about you. But I never hated you."

She lowered her hand from her eyes at last and gazed back at him through eyes clouded with tears.

His throat felt too thick and too tight and he couldn't breathe.

He cleared his throat, once, twice.

"If...if I asked you one day out for lunch what would you say?" he asked huskily, his voice thick with emotion.

She blinked back at him.

"I...might not say no," she admitted.

His fingers traced a path across wedding band and over the diamonds of her engagement ring.

"What if I asked you not to give up on me? Not to walk away completely... What if I said I needed you?" Those words he'd held hidden inside him. Never wanting to believe it. He'd never needed anyone in his life to help him, and especially not Sharpay, she had always been the one who needed him not the other way around.

Her fingers clenched tightly around his and she lowered her head.

"Look at me. Let me see, Sharpay," he pleaded in a whisper.

Her heard her take a shuddering breath and then she was looking at him. And he knew then that he'd been blinded by his own pain, his own troubles, so stupid...

She wiped angrily at the tears sliding slowly down her cheeks with her free hand.

"I love you," he told her firmly finally feeling as if he'd stopped treading water at last. That terra firma was within reach. "And because I do I'm going to sign this last page."

And he did signing his name quickly and decisively.

She'd lowered her gaze again and he inhaled shallowly as he turned her hand over in his. He traced the delicate lines of her palm feeling as if he'd run a thousand miles too far.

Slowly, gently he slipped her rings from her finger.

"And maybe one day if I ask again..." he paused to swallow, his face a grimace of suppressed emotion. "You'll let me put these back where they belong."

He brought her hand to his lips and he kissed the pale lines her rings had left.

A choked noise escaped Sharpay and he couldn't stop his own tears.

Chad rose to his feet her hand still in his. He only released it when he realized he couldn't walk around the table lest he pulled her with him.

The rings feel carelessly from his fingers and clattered to a rest against the table.

Sharpay was on her feet when he reached her and he wrapped his arms around her slender waist. She buried her head against his chest and he could feel every gasp and shudder that went through her.

"I love you," she whispered her face damp and her breath warm against the side of his neck.

And he knew she did because he'd finally allowed himself to see her again.

But this wasn't about love. It had never been about not loving each other, because that had never been their problem.

He buried his nose in her hair and inhaled deeply, pulling her scent, her tears, her love into him.

This was about second chances and taking them when they came.

He hoped this time around that he didn't screw it up all over again.