The Girl Who Read The Dating Manual

rule twenty-three: food, friends and fairytales

Soundtrack:

Endlessly by Green River Ordinance – Candi & Will in the elevator

The Broken Ones by Dia Frampton – when Candi & Ava talk

Find A Way by SafetySuit (<- this song is my obsession) – end of the chapter

He hadn't made it very far by the time I caught up to him, and as I found him at the end of the hall stepping into the elevator, I hurried my pace to intercept him.

The metal doors were sliding shut when I threw out my arm and stopped the doors from closing. I pried them back open and stepped in, and he looked at me with a mixture of shock, heartbreak and convoluted anger.

"Will, wait," I grunted.

It was as if he hadn't heard me. He refused to meet my gaze, and instead reached out and pressed the button for his floor. My stomach flipped as the elevator began to rise.

"Will, listen to me."

He continued to ignore me, and it was one of the most frustrating things in the world I'd ever experienced. In a desperate attempt to make him listen to me, I reached out and hit the Emergency Stop button of the elevator, causing it to stop with a sudden jolt.

He reached out to press the button again, but I smacked his hand away. "No, not until we talk this out. Talk to me, Will."

"I don't even know what to say to you," he replied, and he looked at me finally. I almost wished he hadn't. His eyes were cold and blue, and I felt like I was falling off the edge of a cliff. "You love him?"

I ran a hand through my hair. "You weren't supposed to hear that."

He chuckled derisively, and I knew right away that was the wrong thing to say. "Oh, great. You can confess your love to someone, as long as your fiancé isn't around."

"I wasn't finished," I told him hurriedly. "Please, Will."

"Don't," he replied. "I need some time to think."

"Will..."

"Our wedding is in less than two days, and you're in love with somebody else?" he yelled, causing me to jump. He rarely ever raised his voice—and especially not to me.

"I'm not in love with anyone else," I told him matter-of-factly, reaching out to caress him reassuringly. He shrunk back as if my touch was poison, and I felt my heart clench. "I said I loved Chance. But not in the way I love you. He was my first boyfriend, and those feelings don't just go away."

"It's been two years, Candice," he reminded me. "And I know that he meant something to you, but I didn't realize just how much you still loved him."

"Of course I love Chance," I replied, throwing my hands up in the air. "And maybe I always will. Does that mean in a year I'm going to leave you to find him? No. It means that I don't want to see him hurt. Right now he's jumping on a plane just to get away from me so he doesn't have to watch us get married. I don't want him to go."

"Look, Candice, I have been so patient ever since your friends got here," Will replied. "You don't think I see the way he looks at you? You don't think a guy knows when someone else is in love with his girl? I know that a lot has been happening in your life, but it's not just hard on you. When Chance tells you he loves you, or when you question who you really love more between us, it doesn't just affect you."