It's a Love-Hate relationship

CHAPTER 53: Are you drunk?

Right now, I want nothing more than to escape reality and travel to some faraway tropical beach, maybe sip on some Mai Tai's and ogle at the shirtless boys playing ball on the beach.

That still feels wrong though, I don't know why.

Or I did not also mind carousing shamelessly on my bed, browsing through the episodes of the Vampire Diaries, with no one constantly on my neck.

With that, I mean, the woman who lives in this house, calling herself my mother.

Yeah, unbelievable and utterly stupid, but I still haven't accepted her sudden arrival.

Admittedly, I have been obviously distracted with Jason and Caleb and break in's and what not. The mayhem in my mind at least terminated any abysmal thoughts on my mother but eventually, when I finally got to be alone, those thoughts and the heaviness they brought, kicked back in and I find myself in the same cycle again and again.

"You are awfully quiet and that scares me. Who else do you have to rescue, superhero sis?" Jason breaks my reverie, handing me a bag of chips and taking a seat next to me on the couch. I shake my head, not wanting to let him on in my perceptions. He would definitely lose his shit considering how happy he is after our mother's return.

"Hate to break it to you, but I think you're the only moron over here who can get himself into such shit," I say and rip open the bag, gluttonously biting into the chips.

"Blah, blah, blah. Where's your partner?" He asks while wiggling his thick eyebrows. My partner?

Huh.

Caleb and I did not talk much after the great rescue of Jason, mostly due to the fact that I had no will to talk to him. But yet, that did not mean he called a halt to the perpetual texts I was currently receiving from him. The fear of the mutual feelings we both have for each other is eating away at me, chipping away all common sense and only leaving a pit full of rhetorical questions and imprudent assumptions.

What is there to talk about? I think he should get the hint that I don't want to like him that way.

But I do like him that way. A lot.

Oh god. What am I going to do about myself and my stupid fears?

"He is not my partner, Jason." I roll my eyes and say. "Be glad he saved your sorry ass."

"Jeez, someone's overprotective."

"Oh, fuck off." I hit him with a pillow and he chuckles, pinching my leg and earning a glare from me.

"Asshole," I mutter before dragging my blanket over me and continue to dig into the chips.

"But, if it helps then I did thank him."

Oh.

"Really?" I ask while blankly staring at the screen in front of me all the while dancing internally at the celebration of my brother and Caleb erasing their frivolous, macho fights.

"Yeah. We...uh, actually just happened to bump into each other and then I thanked him."

"Mm-hmm. Interesting."

"You know, he's actually not that bad of a guy."

"Oh, really?" I turn, his statement suddenly piquing my curiosity, raising an eyebrow in question. Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't these two apparently boys who decided their egos were bigger than Canada, fighting over the pettiest things like girls, and glaring at each other as if with the aim of burying each other six feet underground?

"Don't give me that look, sis. I can be forgiving." He gives me a dismissive look and then proceeds to scrutinize the hem of my blanket pensively.