TEN (A/N: Mild profanity in this chapter.)
After her emotional encounter with Zach, the rest of Winter Break remained an uneventful affair, just as it usually was. She stayed in her room, catching up on CoveOps reports and COW study notes, cuddled under her blankets. It was her sanctuary- she'd always enjoyed the silent solitude that her room offered when her roommates were away. After all, one could only handle so much of Bex's snoring and Liz's constant midnight Calculus mutterings. One week had already passed by, which meant that she only had two more until her peace and quiet would disappear for another six months.
So naturally, Cammie was watching Friends reruns for the fourth winter in a row.
She had been in the middle of a particularly hilarious bit where Joey downed an entire gallon of milk- or rather tried and failed to down an entire gallon of milk- when she became alert of the quiet knocking on her door. Cammie groaned in annoyance.
"Nicholas Hale, I swear-" she began, tumbling out of her bed. She trudged towards the door, rubbing her eyes in annoyance and she grabbed the doorknob and swung the door open angrily. Nick greeted her with a smug grin, eyes crinkled in amusement.
"You look like a hag."
"So do you," Cammie huffed, stomping back into the room. "Why do you always insist on disturbing my well-deserved sleep?"
Nick stood at the foot of her bed, grinning at her irritated form. He was promptly hit by a mysterious flying pillow. "Well," he said, ruffling his hair after the pillow attack, "I need you to go and-"
"I'm not talking to Zach." This was the fifth time they'd had this conversation, and she was dead set on defying Nick's demands. She didn't care how many pillows it would take- there was absolutely no way she was going to talk to Zach.
"Why not?" Nick pouted.
Cammie glared at him, tossing another pillow. "You know why."
"Cam, please. He's been walking around the grounds like a bloody zombie for weeks. It starting to get on my nerves, really."
"Well that doesn't really give me much incentive to talk to him, does it?" she replied, adding a cheeky smile before her lips pulled into a flat line once again.
"This is not funny."
"I beg to differ."
"Cameron."
"Nicholas."
And so proceeded one the greatest staring contests to ever go down in stare contest history. Nick looked at Cammie, silently pleading with her with a hint of exasperation. Cammie, being Cammie, was unrelenting, and was "disinclined to acquiesce to his request". (She'd just been through all four Pirates of the Caribbean movies and the lines were getting to her. She was tempted to scream "Parley!" to Nick's stupid face. Really tempted.)
Nick sat up from the bed, arms crossed in frustration. "Fine, I really didn't want to do this but you have left me no choice, Cameron," he said, faking an apologetic look before tossing her over his shoulder.
:::
Twenty minutes later an angry Cammie Morgan sat upon one of the bar stools in the academy's kitchen, violently taking a bite from her sandwich as she burned metaphorical holes into Nick's skull. She swallowed the avocado and roast beef quickly, distracting herself from his impending questions. (Nick always asked questions when she ate- he was like a broken record that never stopped repeating. It was tremendously annoying.)
"Enjoying that are you?"
She ignored him, devouring her sandwich in rapid bites, swallowing when necessary. Nick stifled a laugh.
"Has anyone ever told you that you look like a bear when you eat?" he asked, to which she promptly flipped him off.
"No one cares about your stupid opinions, Nicholas."
They went on with their banter for another thirty minutes- Nick amusedly asking questions and Cammie giving snarky replies- until they actually started talking; their friendship thrived off of these conversations. It was the only way they ever got each other to open up. They sat on opposite sides of the kitchen island, eating the last of the fresh strawberries picked from the garden, taking turns to ask each other random questions.
"How was Kabul?"
Nick snorted. "Just as you'd expect. Hot. Dangerous. Surprisingly friendly people though, you know- despite all the insurrection and all. Almost got killed by a firebomb three times before I took my target out," he replied, grinning as if he hadn't been in a dozen near death experiences within the last week. The vast array of scars that Cammie had forced him to show her earlier proved the real danger of being in the field. "But anyways, I wouldn't recommend going to Kabul, Cams- you'd get burnt like tomato."
She rolled her eyes, scoffing. "You're crazy. A possibility of me going of to Kabul on a mission, and the one thing that concerns you is my skin? What about my wellbeing? Or maybe whether or not I might get blown up?" she huffed. "I thought you cared about me, Nicholas. This really hurts. I don't think we can be friends anymore." Cammie crossed her arms, turning pointedly away from him in mock anger.
He reached across the island to shove her playfully. "Cut it out, Cams. You're a terrible actress." She responded by sticking her tongue out at him. "You're no fun."
Nick laughed, leaning his arms onto the counter. "Okay, my turn now," he said, taking a sip of coffee from his mug. "Have you talked to Zach lately?"
Immediately, Cammie's soft smile disappeared. "Stop it, Nicholas. I don't want to talk about him."
"That is precisely why you must, Cam. You can't go on ignoring him forever."
"And you can't go on telling me what to do," she replied harshly.
His eyes narrowed. "Look, Cam- I care about you and you doing this to yourself is not helping. Your room is an absolute mess- well, more so than usual- and you don't eat and you don't drink and you don't laugh or smile and you don't talk to anyone because you don't even have the energy or heart to do anything but mope around and bitch about Zachary-fucking-Goode. I know you're hurting that him and Macey are together, but Cam," Nick took a breath, his face slightly red from emotion," you've got to-"
She laughed wryly. "I don't 'got to' do anything, Nicholas. Zach's engaged, I'm moping- what's new? So what if I'm crying my eyes out every fucking day? So what if I fall asleep with tears down my face because I know he lied and there will never be an us?" She looked at Nick across the counter, a sad smile pulled across her face.
Her lips moved ever so slightly as she spoke, her eyes glazed over. "So what if I'm absolutely in love with him?"
:::
Nicholas Hale was always one of the more perceptive people in life. He could see the things that were underneath- the secrets, the scandals, the embarrassing habits- all of it. He prided himself on being able to tell what people were people were thinking, what they were feelings. But it was different with Cammie.
Maybe that's what had drawn him to her initially- the sense of not knowing. She was hard to figure out when he'd first met her, and she still was. It was different, now that he didn't think of her in that way, but it still confused him all the same. He knew she was affected by the whole Zach-Macey fiasco, but he couldn't understand how she was dealing with it. It was normal for her to ignore Zach-naturally- but she'd completely abandoned Macey as well. (Well, to be fair, Macey was off in Barbados so there wasn't much Cammie could do to contact her.)
He watched her small figure as she slept on the couch, her legs dangling over the edge and her head in his lap. He could see the bags forming under her eyes- she'd been sleeping so little. Her formerly perfect figure was skinny and frail- she hadn't been eating much lately, despite Grant's adamant requests. Cammie was always a little more independent.
She began to shift in her sleep, mumbling incoherently. At one point, she'd lifted her head and slammed it down so hard (in her unconscious state, mind you) on his knee that he thought he'd broken a bone.
Ten minutes later, she woke up, shaking her head groggily. "Ungh- what time is it?"
"Ten."
"Morning?"
"Night."
She groaned. "Fuck. I was supposed to call Joe."
"When?"
She groaned again, sitting up. "Wednesday night. Is today Wednesday?"
Nick laughed softly. "Cam, Wednesday was two days ago."
She scrunched her eyes in confusion. "Are you sure?"
"I'm quite sure."
"Fuck. He's going to kill me."
She rolled off the sofa, crashing into the carpeted floor below with a thump. Nick watched amusedly as she searched the floor for her phone, cursing as she looked all around, only to find that it had been right next to the sofa on the ottoman. Nick grinned at her- she flipped him off, before walking into another room to talk to Joe Solomon, her godfather. (Though Nick expected the call to be more of a Joe-yelling and Cammie-listening before Cammie plays the little innocent girl card and Joe forgives her kind of conversation. That's how most of their phone calls usually went.)
He walked back into the lounge a good half hour later, sipping on a hot cup of earl grey, and found her sitting on the couch, pretending to leaf through a magazine. Per usual, she looked slightly miffed. She had a habit of getting a little angry during phone calls, especially with Joe. He sat down on the couch, allowing her to move before she slouched back onto the seat, landing hard on his knee. Again.
"Cam, must you destroy my knee?"
She snorted. "Like I care."
He frowned. "Fine," he said, standing up, allowing her head to fall unceremoniously to the cushion, and she glared at him. "Anyways, when you were busy chatting with Joseph Solomon, I went to talk to Zach."
She stood to her feet immediately, giving him a hard look. "You'd better choose your next words very carefully, Hale."
He smirked. "Fat chance, blondie. He's outside," Nick tilted his head in the direction of the closed glass doors that led to the balcony. True to his word, Zachary Goode stood behind the doors, leaning casually on the railing, watching her. Smirking, as usual.
Fuck you and your damned smirk, Zachary Goode.
She glanced at Zach for a second, before punching Nick square in the shoulder.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"You know what that was for," she retorted. "Now let me out of here. I'm not talking to him."
Cammie moved to go past Nick, but he shifted, blocking her path. "Let me go, Nicholas," she spat out through gritted teeth. "I don't want to talk to him."
A low laugh rang through the room. "Well that's funny, because I want to talk to you."
:::
Zachary Goode prided himself on making dramatic entrances. This was not one of them.
He had opened the door softly, keeping his eyes on the small blonde in the middle of the room. She was still arguing with Nick, presumably about him, until she turned around, her cold eyes glaring daggers into his chest.
"Fuck off, Zachary."
He smirked. "Nice to see you too, Gallagher Girl." Bad move number one.
She tilted her head in confusion, then her face contorted in anger. "Don't call me that," she hissed. "You lost the right to call me that a long time ago."
Nick took this as a sign to leave, slipping out the door quietly, not before giving a Zach a small smile of encouragement.
Zach walked cautiously towards her while she steeled her resolve. She slowly took him in- his broad shoulders, the slight bulge of muscle through his shirtsleeves, the faint outline of abs through his cotton shirt, jeans which fit perfectly around his legs- just like everything else about him. He always looked perfect. It wasn't fair. She hated him for it.
She refused to look at his face, knowing that she'd fall right away if she did. Every wall she'd built would crumble. She hated that about him- no matter how hard she tried, she would always love him.
Life is such a shithole, she thought. It's so unfair.
He was in front of her now. She had an extreme urge to say something snarky, something cold and rude- it was small, but she wanted to hurt him just as much as he had hurt her.
But she could smell him now (however creepy that may sound, but she could). Like pine and spearmint, just like he always did. And he smelled good. Like Zach.
Normally, that would have an effect on her, but she was angry as hell. So, as every self-righteous woman would do when her unofficial ex is standing in front of her, she punched him.
Hard.
"Ow!" Zach yelled in surprise, staggering backwards. Though she'd been out of practice for the past two weeks, Cammie landed a pretty good punch to the center of Zach's face. "What the hell was that for?"
She scoffed. "Like you don't know."
He stood straight, wiping his nose, a small trickle of blood streaming down the side of his left nostril. "No, I honestly don't, Cam. I really don't."
She turned towards the window, looking over the school garden in the background. She laughed coldly. "I figured as much. Guys like you really don't care- they never do. They never know what's wrong or what's right. They only care about what happens to them, what affects only them. Does that make you feel better about yourself? That you lied? That you never really cared about-"
He interrupted her, moving closer to her. "Don't you dare say that I never cared. I always care about you, Cam- I still do. And what I don't understand is-"
"I don't care what you do and don't understand Zach. It's none of my business nor is it any of my concern," she breathed out a small laugh. "God, Zach- you had me fooled. Really, you did. Had me thinking that everything was right in this world, that Earth wasn't some fucked up place where love and dreams didn't exist, and that for once, I did something right in my life. That I had something worth living for- that there was someone who loved me and really truly cared and would always be there-"
His fist slammed loudly on the table beside them. "I did love you!"
She whirled around, glaring at him. He could see the tears welling in her eyes, and he wanted nothing more than to wipe them away. He reached towards her face- but she immediately recoiled, shaking her head. A few teardrops fell softly to the carpet.
"You had a really odd way of showing it, Zachary," she said, her voice no louder than a whisper.
"You think I had a choice? I couldn't-"
"You always have a choice!" she yelled.
Zach's eyes narrowed. "Not that time!"
She shook her head sadly. "You always have a choice, Zach," she said softly, her head tilting up to look at him. His green eyes were just as she'd remembered them. Blazing like luminous green fire. There was a sense of hopelessness and sorrow hidden deep within them, but she ignored them.
"You always have a choice." She rose up to leave, turning back towards him at the last moment. "But that choice wasn't me."
:::
A/N: It's a little longer than usual, but that's to make up for the fact that I haven't updated in four whole months, which is atrocious. I apologize- but writer's block is real. You have no idea how many time I've rewritten this chapter, and it probably needs some serious editing.
Anyways, I hope you guys are still following this story and still actually want me to continue. It's been a while, I know.
I hope I'll update more often now, but exams are coming up, so no promises.
Zammie will come soon, but there's a lot of shit that these two have gone through with each other, so that'll have to get all sorted first.
Please review!
~ilovemesomecupcakes