When We Were 16...

Chapter 5

Natalie's POV

"You?" Mel questioned in utter shock.

"You?" Chase Walker questioned in reply and his face was a sight to behold.

"Us," Miley confirmed plainly.

There was a deafening silence. "Uh...I have to go to the nurse. My hair hurts and my teeth itch," Stace stuttered whilst taking a cautious step back.

"You, you, you, you," Chase's pitch got higher each time. "And particularly YOU," he finally pointed at Stace.

"Why do you keep 'you'ing" us?" I asked out of a mixture of annoyance and curiosity.

"Because you all deserve to be 'you'ed'," he actually reasoned with me.

"Cough up," Chase held his palm out in front of Stace.

Stace snapped her fingers as an understanding struck her face. She inclined her head towards his outstretched palm and coughed her lungs out. Chase retracted his hand swiftly and tried to remove the germs by swatting his arm repeatedly. I suppressed my laugh.

"You know 'cough up' is a phrasal verb informally used to imply the meaning 'to pay someone' and you seem to have mistaken," Stephanie explained. Miley smacked the back of Stephanie's head making her shut up.

"I think we are missing something," I thought aloud.

"She didn't tell you?" Chase wondered.

Our heads turned to Stacie who was crouched trying to pick up her scattered books. She looked up feeling our penetrating gazes.

"Did you forget to tell us something important? Like why you owe money to the drama queen here?" Mel motioned to Chase.

"Hey!" Chase protested but Melissa ignored him.

"Oh that," Stace smiled sheepishly as she stood up. "Do you remember what we did last weekend? You know, I woke you up at 7.30 and you even wore your favourite top and then we decided to walk instead of taking bicycles and then Miley said she was bo-"Stacie's ramble was cut out by Chase's flat look.

"Horrible dresses, six inch heels. Ring a bell?"Chase asked.

"Ohhh, so the 'source' was you," Stephanie stated.

"So it's your fault that we wore those torture devices as an excuse for dresses at the wedding crash," Miley accused Chase. "I still get nightmares with Stacie wearing that costume," she shuddered.

"Wedding crash? Never mind. So torture devices huh? Guess I did a great job as your stylist," he smirked.

Stacie was using the change in the conversation to her advantage. She stuck to the wall like a lizard and was inching forward gradually and successfully -

"Stace are you going somewhere?" Miley purposefully intervened - or not.

Chase swiftly blocked Stacie by placing his arm on the wall near her. Stacie stomped Chase's foot at the same instant with vehemence and bolted.

Chase was like, "Ow! Ow! Ow! My poor pedicured feet!" He hugged his leg and jumped around like a kangaroo that had too much Vodka. He stopped and looked at us finally and gestured to the direction Stacie took off.

"Help?" he asked us. But we averted our gazes away from him. "Of course," he huffed and started to limp away (to catch Stace I assume) jumping over the books Stacie dropped.

The last time I tried to get her to repay me, we somehow broke the arm of a jock and gave some random cheerleader a loose tooth because Stace tried to use them to hide herself.