A crazy opportunity (ON HOLD)

Chapter 22

Jake, Owen, Jeremy, and Charlie all walk in, making me feel really vulnerable. Jake immediately comes up to me, so I pat the seat next to me, letting him sit down, and then cuddling into him and the blanket.

"Hey," he whispers in my ear, making me smile and turn to him.

"Hi," I reply softly.

"Feeling better?" He asks, making me nod my head.

The boys ask the same question as well, in various ways and by the time they're done fawning concern over me, I want to go band my head against a wall.

"I promise I'm fine," I sigh, exasperatedly. "And I'll let you know when I'm not."

Jake laughs next to me, "sorry," he mutters sheepishly.

I roll my eyes playfully, "You are not forgiven."

"Oh really?" He asks, wiggling his eyebrows. This just makes me laugh at his stupidity.

"We'll be right back," Charlie tells me, as he leaves the room with the boys. I hope he gets food. I'm too shy to ask, but I definitely wouldn't mind him bringing food. I mean, it's not necessarily that I'm too shy, I just think it's rude to ask for food at someone else's house.

"Hello? Earth to Aqua..."

"What?" I blink, confused, seeing Jake waving his hand in my face until he starts laughing.

"I was calling you for like, a year, but you were in your own world," he says, in between laughs. Huh, I really need to stop spacing out.

"Sorry, what were you saying?"

Just as Jake opens his mouth, the boys walk in, looking a little hesitant. But I don't pay attention to that. My focus is all on the tray of food in Charlie's hand.

Jake laughs again, noticing my fixation, and nudges me lightly to get me to stop staring. I meet his gaze and smile warmly, remembering a memory we shared a while ago.

Judging by his expression, he's remembering it too. We used to have so much fun at the beach house. Some of our most stupid ideas started there. And we had the best experiences too.

Charlie sets the food down on the coffee table in front of us, and the boys sit down as well. I wait until Jake grabs some pretzels before I reach for the bowl of grapes.

Sorry for all of the grape-haters, but they don't even know what they're missing out on. Grapes rule the world! I absolutely love them.

But I don't really like grape juice. It tastes funky. It's kind of like -

Jake nudges me again, so I turn to him with my eyebrows raised, silently saying 'quit it.' Can't he understand that I'm adoring my grapes?

"So," Charlie starts. "We wanted to talk to you about something."

"Sure," I grin at him, only then noticing the heavy weight in the room. When did everyone get so serious? Wait. How are the boys even serious right now? I've never even seen this expression before.

I mean, there's Pouty Charlie, but never Serious Charlie.

"Sure," I repeat again, a little slower. I look at Jake, seeing that he's just as confused as I am.

"We think you're being abused," Owen declares.

"Dude-" Charlie and Jer shout at the same time.

"That was not how we discussed it..." I know the boys are arguing, but I can't really hear them over the noise.

I feel someone grab my hands, but I feel lost, like I'm here but not at the same time.

"Aqua, just focus on my voice," I hear Jake's voice faintly, amidst the chaos.

"Can you hear me?" he asks. I try to nod my head, but I don't know if I managed to. Everything feels heavy.

"Ok, I just want you to focus on me, alright? Block everything else out. Just me." I try and do what he says, continuing to listen to him as he talks to me about random nonsense.

He walks me through breathing and I slowly feel a weight being lifted, as though I was drowning and he just pulled me out of the water.

"Sorry," Owen says apologetically. "I didn't think you'd react like that."

I notice they're all closer than they were before, meaning they moved.

"But that kind of answers the question for us. Why didn't you tell anyone?" Charlie asks me softly, his eyes swimming with concern and pity.

No. They can't know.

Everything would change.

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A/N: Hello lovelies! I'm so so so sorry for taking such a long time to update. I've had a crazy busy schedule. I'll try and update sooner, but let me know if you guys have any ideas for the coming chapters!

Please vote and comment. Have a wonderful afternoon you guys! Hugs and kisses.