AN: Ugh... I have got to stop giving Chuck so much shine. But he's so easy to write for! Anyway, someone asked me to update so here's another chapter! Enjoy! It's short, but I'm thinkin a few of the people who were trying to guess the pairings are gonna like it. c: Just stay on your toes, though. Don't get too comfy! (;


Charlie Finster
March 30th, 2010

When I get upstairs into the guest room and turn the corner, I see Maya sitting up in the bed. The crisp white blankets are curled under her fists and she looks a little bit annoyed. With good reason, I'm sure. I understand and I know what she's thinking. Here's another round of 'What were you thinking!?'s and 'We were so worried!'s.

Everybody's been up here already, and I mean everyone. I made sure to leave right after Carter told Tommy and I everything because I knew the entire house would be in total chaos the first few hours. Carter tried to convince me to stay but I had business to finish off. He was a little upset at me at first but I knew deep down he'd want it to be carried out. So I'm the last one to finally see her. I do have loads of questions but I figure she's tired of explaining herself. I just want to cheer her up. I force a smile and I say, "Easy, killer."

She looks down at her hands and cracks a smile. "Hey, Chuck…" Her voice is still hoarse from all that puking earlier. Kimi told me all that she could about what happened and whatever she missed, Lil filled in the blanks… so I don't bother to ask any questions. That's not what I'm here for, after all. Instead I plop myself down at the edge of her bed and I take a good look at her. Her hair is a wild mess and her eyes are red from crying. "What's going on?"

It's a little bit sad to see happy, bubbly Maya unnerved like this. But I know what to do. "I'm here to cheer you up." I say. I shift through my drawstring backpack. As I'm going through, it hits me that I'm for once genuinely freaked out to see all of the narcotics I have packed in here. I shift through clear plastic bags of pills, white powder, square tabs of LSD, bars of Xanax when finally I find what I'm looking for. I look up with a CD case in my hand and wave it once in the air. "With this."

I get up, pop the disk into the DVD player and press start. Then I sit back down beside her. When she waves me up closer, I don't question it. I just wrap an arm around her and she doesn't even flinch, stir… nothing. She's just staring blankly at the TV when pictures start to flash across the screen. Pictures of all of us at IHOP, the firework show at the beach, Lil hanging out downtown, Dil and I at Tommy's, and countless others. When she looks up at me, I know how perfect this idea was. "How'd you get these from my camera?" She asks, obviously surprised. The smile on her face is making her damn near glow.

"Your brother's help." That's all I say before I turn back to the TV screen.

I sneak a peek at Maya's face. She looks like she wants to say a lot, but instead she leans up and kisses me on the cheek. "Thanks, Chuck. This is awesome."

And as we sit in silence, our fingers thread together and rest against our thighs.