Crazy Love (mxm)

Chapter Twenty

James' POV

I woke up with aches all over my body. My head was pounding, my mouth felt like it had become a piece of the Sahara Desert, and Carter was glaring right at me.

I screeched like a little girl and launched myself away from him. "HOLY SHIT. My guy. Wow. You're just staring right at me, huh?"

Carter was positioned with his butt on the coffee table, facing the couch. The sun was peaking through the windows and Ronan's little voice was missing from the scene, so I figured it was early in the morning. I tried to figure out why on earth I would choose to sleep on the couch over Carter's bed, but had no clue.

"I'm not still mad," Carter began, taking a deep breath. "I was mad, but then I stayed up until three AM ranting about you in my brain, so I got tired of being mad and stopped."

Carter and I had been dating for under a month and I was already pissing him off? I straightened my clothes and tried to gather enough brain cells to pay attention to him.

"I have no friends," Carter said, with a tone that I was to blame for that. "Do you realize that? I have none. Like, I have my old college friends, but ever since I had Ronan, I just can't relate to them the way I used to."

I grabbed at my forehead, trying to put some pressure on the headache. I was actually a little nauseous, but something told me that interrupting Carter even to puke was a bad call.

"So, having Billy over was really important to me," he continued to gush. "And I want him to feel like this house is a safe place to have his daughter. You wanna know what's not a way to make an overprotective single father feel comfortable with a household?"

I shifted, a familiar sinking and uncertain feeling forming in my gut. "Uh...whatever I did last night?"

Carter nodded, but it was less of a 'yes' nod and more of a 'no fucking shit' nod. "I know you didn't know I had people over, and I'm happy you missed me, but...just...c'mon."

I scratched at my hair and tried to blink away the skull-splitting pain at the forefront of my brain. "Uh...would you mind, like, jogging my memory? A smidge?"

Carter buried his face in his hands and groaned. "What am I doing with my life?"

I figured it was rhetorical, so I didn't answer.

Carter peeked through his fingers to look at me. "Why are you the way that you are?" he sighed, looking kind of tired and exasperated.

That question didn't sound rhetorical at all.

I cleared my throat. "Um, did I happen to get drunk last night? I can't remember...which isn't to say that I had too much to drink! I'm just prone to...blacking out."

Carter glared.

I scratched my head. "Okay, I probably had a lot to drink. I was with Brian, right? I remember being with Brian."

Carter facepalmed. "Yeah, you were. And you got wasted. And drove over to my house—okay, wait, I'm still mad. What the hell is wrong with you and your fucking drunk driving? Do you have any idea how irresponsible that is? Not only do you clearly not care about your own life, but you also couldn't give less a shit about anybody else's life either. How am I supposed to be like, yup, this guy is a responsible adult to trust with my son, when you pull shit like that? I know you wouldn't hurt him, I know you wouldn't want to hurt anybody, but this drunk driving thing is basically asking to hurt someone."

As shitty as his rant made me feel, it was kind of adorable. He was breathing heavy and pointing in my face, but the second he realized how angry he seemed he dropped the hand and cleared his throat awkwardly.