'Safe with Rafe' Y/N x Rafe Cameron

Chapter CIX

John B stumbles away with Jj hanging off his side. The sight made Pope chuckle and you did too, hearing Jj shout gibberish in the distance.
"You need to get on his level after the day you've had." Pope says with a grin.
"You know what? I agree."
"You can help yourself to Jj's drinks now that he won't be needing them."
"You think he'll be okay with that?" You ask, softly.
"With you? More than okay." Pope laughs, making you laugh too before turning to face him again.
"Hey, I seen you with those girls." You smirk.
"Yeah, and?"
"You interested in any of them?" You wink smugly as you nudge him in his side, teasing at him in exchange for honesty and that, you got.
"Nah...I think I'm..." He hesitates with a sigh.
"It's Kie, huh?"
"Always has been, I think."
You smile sadly at him before reassuringly patting him on the back and leaning your head against his shoulder, feeling him lean into you too.
"Let's continue the Maybank legacy."
"You wanna get shit faced?"
"Absolutely."

After a few drinking games and shots after shots, you finally start to feel it.
That numb sensation that courses throughout a persons entire body that usually leads into dumb decisions and regret.

Pope wasn't one to try drugs for the sake of a bright future, but through a drunk gaze, you see him sitting down with a few of the islands tree huggers. They passed a blunt amongst each other in a circle and it looked like Pope seemed to be enjoying himself for a change so you stumble back to your cooler of drinks, prepared to pop another.

Your head spins as you lean down, stumbling and then catching yourself against the log as you pull out a red drink, popping it open like Rafe had showed you the night you met.
"Rafe..." Your eyes begin to sparkle with tears as you subconsciously mumble his name. You should've known better than to drink in a downer mood, but you ran out of options and in a weird, narcissistic way, you felt relieved to be taken away by the numbness. The excessive intake of alcohol was much more preferable than facing him.
You just couldn't do it.
Your tears finally drop to a fall, speckling your rosey cheeks when something startles you in the bushes from behind, leaves rustling loudly under something heavy and tree branches being broken as a figure comes into the moon light.
A part of you hoped it was Rafe, but alas, it wasn't. How ridiculous of you to even think so.
"I'm no Rafe Cameron, but I couldn't help but notice you're upset." Just your luck, It was the man from earlier. The weird one.
"You..."
"Hm?"
"What're you doing in the bushes?" You ask as you hurriedly wipe your cheeks dry.
"Never mind me, are you okay?"
"Yeah, just-" You pause mid sentence, feeling something come up from the deepest, most dreaded pit in your stomach and then it dawned on you, you're gonna be sick.

The man places a hand on your back but it does nothing but the complete opposite of comforting you. The touch of another man who wasn't Rafe, made you feel even sicker.
"Just aim for the bushes."
"Get off me!" You say sternly as you whack his hand away. Not quite a yelling level but you raised your voice enough to make his brows furrow lowly, casting a shadow onto his eyes that only stare.
You shakily stand up to go further into the bushes to release your body from its intoxicating fluids that turn and brew in your stomach but it seemed almost impossible to keep yourself upright. You stumble and you fall against a nearby tree before finally, your stomach relieves itself and coming up behind you was the man.
"I think it's time to go home." He says, plainly.
"Not yet."
"You can barely stand."
"I can if I try hard enough."
"At least eat something, there's a 24 hour gas station just down the road."
"Huh?" You look up at him with drunkenly eyes, intrigued by the mention of food.
"I'll treat you to something."

And just like that, you're a fish to a hook.

"Deal." You say with confidence and a smile to match it.
Deep, deep, deep down where the sober part of you was only just in tact still, hanging on by a thread, it felt like you were watching yourself through a window. Out of touch and out of control. The alcohol was in charge now, doing its part in making bad decisions and it was already off to a great start.

The man zips his jacket up before stuffing his hands into his pockets and checking his surroundings.
"You go on without me, I'll catch up." He says and you nod.

Nobody really noticed you were there tonight.
Not only because everybody was drunk or in Popes case, high; but because you isolated yourself in a leafy corner of the beach. So when you did leave, nobody even batted an eye.

You only stumble down the street, arms covered in goosebumps but you were far too numb to feel the cold. You felt ecstatic by the buzz of the tonic in your system, you felt like you could dance if only your body let you, but it began to fail you instead.
Your knees, they buckle under the weight of yourself like they never had before in all your time of being a pogue drunk on random drinks stolen by the reckless Jj.
This time, it was different.

You struggled to understand, not like your brain had the strength to understand anything at this point, so you take a deep breath and look to the stars and for a moment, you felt that if you were to look beside you, you'd see Rafe looking right at you as if you were taken back in time to the night on the roof.

The stars began to spin and then finally,
nothing at all.