All I Ever Wanted

Lunch and Punches

Chapter Nineteen

It had been two weeks since the incident on the beach and Julian had kept to his word. Over that time period he had asked me over and over again, making it harder to say no each time. A few times, I would almost consider saying yes, but I had a bad feeling about this so I continued to reject him.

The moment Grace had found out about what had happened on the beach, she almost ripped my head off. She kept on calling me a demented person for denying her brother’s request. She had this mad idea that Julian and I would end up married by the end of the summer. I told her it was because I wasn’t comfortable with dating a player, which was partly true, but that reason alone didn’t satisfy her. By the end of our conversation I had told her the real reason which changed her attitude towards the situation.

She and Chase were still going behind Julian’s back even though Chase tried to convince her it was time to come clean. He was right. Before, I wouldn’t have cared whether they told Julian or not, but now once I had realised that I had stopped hating him, I did care. Grace kept saying soon, but I didn’t know when soon was. I just hoped he found out from them and not from someone else.

Since Julian had been asking me the same question over and over lately, I wasn’t surprised when I heard my phone ring, his name on the screen.

“Yes Julian?” I sighed.

“Why, don’t you sound happy to hear me,” he said sarcastically. I could imagine him rolling his eyes.

“Before you ask, the answer is no.”

“I know what you’re thinking and that’s not what I was going to ask.”

“Enlighten me.”

“Well as you know, Grace’s birthday is coming up-”

Shit, I had totally forgotten about that. Some friend I was.

“-and I need to get her a present. And you probably have to too, so I thought we could go to the mall together?”

“Uh… yeah sure.”

“Great!” he exclaimed. I could hear the grin in his voice. “I’ll pick you up in fifteen minutes.”

“Just so you know, this isn’t a date,” I clarified. I wouldn’t want him to get any wrong ideas.

“I know,” he sighed. As soon as he hanged up I start looking through my closet for something to wear. I settle on a pair of light wash jeans and a black T-shirt that had ‘Save the Penguins!’ written on it. It wasn’t much, and I knew that any girl with a proper sense of fashion would be wearing something flashier considering that she was going out with a total hottie, but I didn’t really care. I wasn’t about to change my appearance for some guy. Besides, maybe this shirt will remind him of the poor penguins he kills every time he lights a cigarette. In my opinion, I would say that I was only doing the world a favour.

Letting my hair down, I went down stairs to tell my dad where I was going. As expected, I found him sitting in front of the T.V watching the news. Since he didn’t have any projects to do, it was all he did, plant himself in front of the T.V with a can of coke.

“Hey dad,” I greeted, plopping myself down on the couch next to him.

“Hey, sweetheart. Where are you going?” he asked.

“Out,” I answered vaguely.

“With?” he asked, not taking his eyes off the news reporter.

“Julian.”

He sighed, I knew he wasn’t really fond of Julian, but the guy was harmless, despite that he used to be considered a ‘violent teenager’.

“Where are you going?”