Author's Note: I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm so so sorry. I know my updates are slow. This chapter was... Intimidating is a good wood. It was tense and emotional and it just refused to come out. But! I got a sudden dose of inspiration last night and it all just rolled out. So. (: I really hope you guys like it, hopefully it hasn't been so long that you don't remember it. :P
-x-
Alex cursed under her breath at the sound of a car horn and gave the button of her jeans a frustrated growl. She knew the button was able to go into the damn hole, it just wasn't cooperat-
"Ha!" She screamed in victory as that stupid golden circle finally accepted its defeat.
"Alex!" She double checked to make sure her phone was in her pocket, gave her reflection a once-over and hurried down the stairs.
"Bye, love you!" She called over her shoulder, waiting for her parents to finish their "I love you too"s before clicking the door shut behind her and hurrying to the passenger's side of Chad's jet black 2010 Camaro.
"Hey, you." Chad greeted her, giving her the award-winning smile Harper wouldn't quit begging her to catch in a photo for her.
"Hey." She replied, pulling the car door closed and reaching back for her seat belt. "Thanks so much for picking me up, Chad."
"No problem. I mean, I'm always up for canceling my date on a Friday night, the only day I have off, by the way, to drive my cousin to the studio." Alex's stomach dropped.
"W-what? I didn't know. If I would have, I never would have asked-" She caught the sneaky grin on Chad's face and smacked his arm. "You shit head!" She laughed, her stomach returning to its proper setting. "I hate you!"
"I love you, too, Alex." She mock glared at him, but couldn't keep the smile off her face. He got her. He got her good. "But really, why couldn't Theresa take you? I mean, I don't mind, I really didn't have a date or anything."
"My dad had an appointment, she didn't have time." She answered as nonchalantly as possible. The appointment wasn't a big deal, just chemo. Just chemo echoed in her head a thousand times before Chad responded.
"Oh." He nodded his head, sparing her a sympathetic look. She wasn't the kind of girl to want to punch someone when they said they were sorry, but she'd gotten so much of that from everyone, even Harper. Chad was a breath of fresh air, and she couldn't be more grateful for that. "So, why are you going to the studio?" The question was simple enough, but it made her brain go into overdrive.
"Just meeting up with someone." She mumbled, brushing something invisible off her jeans.
"Like... a date?" His voice was light and teasing and she knew he was just messing with her, but it didn't stop the heat from flooding her cheeks.
"No!" She answered a little too quickly, her voice an octave too high. "Not a date."
"Oh? Really?"
"Really." She felt like she was lying.
"Who's the lucky guy that you're not going on a date with?" Suddenly Alex really wished the radio was on to drown out the awkward silence. "Alex, you don't have to tell me." But she wanted to.
"It's not a boy." For half a second, she was hopeful that she'd spoken too quietly and Chad hadn't heard her, but he shifted in his seat to look at her out of the corner of his eye.
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"I'm not freaked out or anything, Alex. I'm not, like, a homophobe or anything." She let out a breath and smiled at him.
"Good." He returned the smile and the storm raging in Alex's stomach calmed. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me for that." Chad was definitely growing on her. "So, who's the lucky lady that you're not going on a date with?"
"I'm afraid I can't tell you that, Mr. Cooper." She said over a sigh and he gasped dramatically.
"But Alexandra! I thought we were so close!" She laughed and shook her head at him.
"It's complicated." She offered after they sobered up and got closer to downtown. He nodded, but didn't press on, but she found herself spilling her guts to him anyway. "I mean, we really aren't dating. Like, we really aren't. We used to. That's the complicated part. But, like..." She paused for a bit longer than she meant to, but he let her think. "I can't really explain it without explaining it, Chad." He laughed and gave her a smile, one that she found all too easy to return.
"It's okay, Alex." The lightness in her chest let her know that it really was. With Chad, anyway.
-x-
Alex leaned against the car, trying her best not to laugh at the sight in front of her. Sonny had her arms wrapped around a guy's neck, screaming and laughing about something that Alex just couldn't decipher. At first she was worried, since the guy was easily twice Sonny's size, but when Chad did nothing but grin she figured Sonny would survive.
"Give. It. Back!" Sonny screeched between laughs, reaching for the bright pink cell phone the man held just out of her reach.
"Who's Alex? Is that your boyfriiiend?" Alex felt her face flush and cleared her throat between their screams. The man whipped around, looking like a deer caught in the headlights, the same expression on Sonny's face. Sonny recovered sooner than he did and ripped the phone out of his hand, giving a shout of victory and sliding off his back.
"You're an ass, Rob." She laughed, fixing her shirt and shoving her phone in her pocket. Rob just reached out and ruffled her hair. "Rob." She whined, slapping his hand away and fixing her hair. "Rob, this is Alex."
"Oh!" His voice higher than Alex thought it should have been for just a moment. "Well it's nice to meet you, little lady." He offered her his hand and Alex thought that he couldn't have been more accurate when he said "little." His hand was huge. Like, the size of her face kinda huge. He'd make a great bouncer. "I'm the security guard." Well, close enough.
"It's nice to meet you, too, Rob." She released his hand and tried not to feel like an ant when he stood up straight.
"Gotta go, Alex." Chad looped an arm around Alex's waist and kissed her hair. "Text me if you need me."
"Kay." Alex answered, somewhat shocked by his sudden affection, and waved to him as we walked to his car. She faced Sonny again, suddenly nervous now that it was just her, Sonny and a massive bodyguard. "So..."
"Right, yeah. See you Monday, Rob." Sonny said, stretching to give him a bear hug. Well, a cub hug in this case.
"Have fun, baby." He answered before releasing her. Sonny smiled at Alex as she passed her to walk to her car and Alex waved at Rob.
"See ya, Big Rob." He gave her a peace sign back and she grinned before turning to catch up with Sonny.
"Big Rob, huh?" Rob nodded his head and started back towards the studio. "I think I like that."
-x-
"So, how do you know Chad?" Sonny asked after pulling out of the parking lot.
"Oh." Alex said, taking a moment to process that Sonny had broken the silence. "He's my cousin."
"Oh." Sonny nodded, tapping her thumbs against the steering wheel. The air grew heavy and quiet again. This silence was killing her, but she wasn't about to say something. She spent a good five minutes debating whether to ask Sonny to turn on the radio or just taking control of it herself. It's not like Sonny would yell at her, Alex could feel the nervousness rolling off of her in waves. Thankfully, Sonny made the decision for her and tapped the touch screen a few times before a vaguely familiar song by the The Script came on.
Sonny started singing under her breath at the second verse and steadily grew louder. Alex didn't think she even realized she was doing it. She'd forgotten how beautiful Sonny's voice was. The song was horribly ironic though, and Alex tried her best to focus on the trees and houses going by instead of listening to Sonny. It didn't go very well. The song came to an end and the words flew out of Alex's mouth before she could even realize she was speaking.
"I've always loved it when you sing." Alex bit her lip hard and looked down at her lap. She tugged at the material of her tank top and mentally slapped herself, repeatedly.
"Thanks." Sonny mumbled over the new Maroon 5 song taking over. Alex didn't dare speak again for the rest of the ride.
-x-
They finally pulled up to an abnormally quiet Starbucks ten minutes later and Alex tried not to show how happy she was to be out of that car. She was almost sure the awkward air would suffocate her. They walked in and placed their order, but Sonny refused to let Alex pay for hers. (Which didn't help her feel like this certainly wasn't the most awkward first date ever.)
The air conditioning was just a little too high in the coffee shop and the plastic booth felt like ice on the back of Alex's thighs. Not that she was complaining. The inside of Sonny's car felt like fire.
Alex busied herself with stirring the quickly melting whipped cream into her hot chocolate and tried to work up the nerve to say something. Sonny sat across from her, watching her patiently and tapping her fingers to the drum beat of a song only she could hear. Alex smiled. She probably didn't realize she was doing that, either.
Alex finally took a sip after the last islands of whipped cream disappeared and she took a deep breath as she set the hot cup back down.
"Why'd you leave?" She suddenly felt vulnerable, wide open and unarmed. She pulled her hot chocolate closer to her like a shield and listened to Sonny sigh, watched her finger still against her latte.
"I had to go home, Alex. As much as I wanted to, I couldn't stay in New York forever." She leaned back in her seat and sighed again. "I only went there for auditions. I'd heard of so many great opportunities there, I begged my parents to let me stay with my uncle." Alex tried to block out the memory of a man in a suit answering an apartment door. "I was back in Wisconsin long enough to pack and move to California. For auditions, you know. Well, and my mom and dad got divorced."
Sonny picked auditions over Alex. She dug her nails into the sleeve around her cup and reminded herself to be mad. Not upset or heartbroken. Mad.
"You could have told me. We could have made it work. You could have stayed."
"Long distance doesn't work, Alex." Sonny pointed out, but it sounded more like pleading. "I couldn't have stayed there. My mom wouldn't have moved to New York just because her fourteen year old daughter said she was in love."
"Are you saying you weren't in love with me?" A voice in the back of her head said that she was just being difficult, but she ignored it.
"What? No! No, that's not what I meant!"
"Then what did you mean?"
"I meant- God, Alex, you know what I meant."
"No, I don't!" She snapped, tightening her grip on her hot chocolate. "You mean you threw it all away, gave it all up, gave me up, for auditions? Your career was more important than me? Then obviously you weren't in love with me, were you? Was it all just some big joke to you, Sonny? Was I just some summer fling that you could completely forget about when you made it to the big time?" Her voice was sharp and she could almost see the wounds they inflicted on Sonny.
"No! Will you shut up and listen to me for a second?" A few heads turned towards their table, but their eyes didn't leave each other's. "Yes, I threw it all away and I'm sorry. I didn't think it would be like this. We were fifteen, Alex! I thought maybe your parents were right, maybe Harper and Justin were right. We wouldn't last, we fought too much and we were so immature and just..." Sonny closed her eyes and took a deep breath and Alex sat back in her seat, face blank and mouth shut.
"I'm sorry." Sonny's voice was quiet and shaky now. She sounded the way Alex felt when she brought this up. The way Alex imagined she'd feel if she could feel anything right now. "I loved you. I loved you so much, but I was scared and I was stupid and I didn't have enough faith in us and I'm sorry. I can't even imagine how bad I hurt you when I left, but I hurt too. I cried and I cried and I started to call you so many times, but I never knew what to say and hung up before the phone could even ring."
Alex couldn't look at Sonny anymore. Her eyes examined the half-moons left by her small outburst and she swallowed hard past the growing lump in her throat.
"I know it isn't enough now, but I loved you. I loved you with everything inside of me, Alex."
Alex didn't dare look up. She clung to whatever resolve she had left and Harper's words echoed in her head, but she was running on fumes.
"I... I can't even..." Her own voice was thick with tears that she swore not to let fall and told herself to hold on just a little bit longer. Sonny nodded.
"Come on. I'll take you home."
-x-
Alex slumped against the front door after she shut it behind her and breathed in the cool air in the living room, let it fill her stale lungs and reveled in the feeling. The numbness was swept away and she took full advantage of the content feeling she had now, which she was sure would be swept away, too, as soon as she stepped into her bedroom.
"Hey, honey." Alex opened her eyes and smiled at Theresa, wearing an apron and wielding a cooking spoon in one hand. "Have fun?"
"Yeah! Chad's a blast. I'm gonna go catch up on some homework though." Her mom gave her a shocked look, but she just smiled and started towards the stairs.
"Alex?"
"Not now, Justin." She groaned before running up the stairs as fast as she could without tripping.
Justin frowned at his sister's retreating form and the sound of her bedroom door being shut unnerved him. He checked over his shoulder to see what their mom thought of it, but she was already back in the kitchen. He gave the stairs a long, hard look before setting the remote on the arm of the couch and following his sister upstairs.
-x-
"I said not now, Justin!" Alex yelled at the fist on the other side of her door and looked back down at the box in her lap. Just when she thought Justin walked away, he hesitantly opened her bedroom door and poked his head in.
"Alex..."
"Go away, Justin." She mumbled, all the fight gone out of her voice. "Please." He swallowed and gathered up all his courage to step into her room and shut the door behind him.
"Alex, talk to me." She looked up at him with puffy eyes and tear tracks on her cheeks. To anyone on the outside looking in, Justin knew it probably seemed like Alex hurt him in life more than she ever helped him, but his heart felt like it was made of lead when he saw how broken she looked. He eased himself on the foot of the bed in front of her and gave the box in her lap a questioning look.
Alex sniffed and gave the picture under the glass a similar look. She had all the answers now and she wasn't sure what she was asking, but...
"What happened, Alex?" She thought she could hold it all in. This was only Justin, for God's sake. Her annoying older brother that always got in her way. But he was Justin. The Justin that always helped her when she got into trouble, always helped her with her magic homework and carried her in the house when she fell off her bike when she was six. He was the same Justin that came in night after night after Sonny left and just held her until her sobs died down enough so she could sleep.
She didn't know if she wanted to tell him or not, but she couldn't keep the words from spilling out of her mouth when she looked up at him. So she told him everything. About that first day at the studio, seeing Sonny again, screaming at her, about going to New York to ask Harper for advice, about Chad, about today. And when the story was finished and she couldn't get another word out, she found herself curled into his side with her tears on his light blue polo, just like those countless nights back home. He rubbed her back soothingly and Alex's frantic sobbing slowed to sniffles.
Her blinking turned into closing her eyes for long periods of time and she was almost asleep when she felt his chest rumble with his words.
"That's a hell of a story." She laughed shortly but didn't open her eyes.
"I know." She murmured, shifting closer to him.
"I'm always here for you, Alex. I know I'm not Harper, but I'm always here for you, okay?"
"Kay." The words woke her up just enough for her heart to swell and she sighed. "I love you."
"I love you, too, Alex." The rumbling of his chest lulled her to sleep.
-x-
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