The best year ever - An Ethan Slater fan fiction

Chapter 15: Take a break

I see heads turn towards us one after the other until I feel at least thirty eyes on me. I wait for him to reply, the only sound in the room being the thumping of my own heart. I just listen to it hammering against my chest making the wait unbearable.

It feels like hours but eventually he says something, something that utterly shatters my heart. With a beep breath Carter puts a stony expression on and simply says "that will be $75.99 ".

I bury my head in my hands as I struggle to fight the tears that are threatening to spill. I am so distracted that I don't even use my card to pay.

I see Carter's legs move away and suddenly spring out of my chair, I can't just leave it like this. I swerve in and out of the tables as I try to get to him. "Carter please stop, can I please just talk to you". Eventually I catch him by the arm "Carter, please" I beg as she first tears fall.

But without even looking he shrugs me off and speeds into the kitchen. I try to follow him but as I am about to go in Ethan pulls me away. "Hey Charlotte, just leave it, give him some time to cool off. It will be fine, trust me". He turns me around and tilts my head up at him as he used his thumb to gently wipe away the small tead drops gliding down my patchy cheeks.

I only begin to sob harder however. Ethan takes his hand away from my face and pulls me close, wrapping his arms around my small frame as he lets me cry into his chest.

Ethan half carries me out of the restaurant and we take our time walking back. Ethan having his arm draped around my shoulder the whole time as I walk close to his side.

When we get back to the apartment no one is home "they must both be at Danny's" I say, my voice sounding raw from all of my crying, luckily we also have tomorrow off.

"Sit down, I'll make you a hot chocolate" Ethan tells me while guiding me towards the sofa and I just obey. I know for a fact that nothing I can say will stop him so I just don't bother.

I hear him rummaging around a bit but it doesn't take him long, he has been in this kitchen enough times to know where everything is. After round about three minutes he walks over with two mugs of hot chocolate, topped with whipped cream, mini marshmallows and cocoa powder, just the way I liked it.

He just passes it to me, sits down and turns the TV on. I watch as he finds Disney+ and begins to play, Hercules.

We watch it in silence, and just after "go the distance" we pause to get popcorn.

It is getting near winter time so it's pretty cold in the apartment luckily I keep a blanket under the sofa so I pull it out. I spread it out only to find it wont fit both Ethan and I under it!

We spend around half of a minute working out how we ca both fit under this blanket. We end up watching the movie with me curled up on him with the blanket wrapped around both of us like a cocoon.

As we are watching I feel our breathing slowly begin to fall into place, like two peices of a puzzle. I eventually begin to drift off into a trance like state, only listening to the heavy beating of his heart.

It gave me some time to think about this sticky situation that I seem to have gotten myself into. Do I like Ethan, yes, do I like Carter, yes, do I know who I should be with, no.

My head is calling for one and my heart for another, I just need to figure out which is which. I can't become serious with either of these two boys until I know.

I know that this isn't just going to be some overnight revelation, I have to spend time on this. Neither of these boys deserve this but I think that they know all this too. And I wish that I could just wake up and know tomorrow but I can't lie to myself like that.