Page 72 of Chase
“I think deep down they always knew, they just never asked because I’m with Ashley.”
“Give it some time. We’ll figure it all out. You deserve to be happy.”
“Does that mean you’re sticking around?” Rhys asks. I’m glad he didn’t beat around the bush and asked the question.
“Yes Rhys, I’m sticking around. If you guys will have me. I know I have some making up to do. I just need some time to work through the crap in my head. It’s not easy for me to let people in. You guys are a lot to take on all at once,” I say returning his honesty.
“I know we’re a lot. I was you, not so long ago. I’m sorry if it seemed I didn’t like you at the beginning.”
“Can I ask why you didn’t?” Curiosity killed the cat. I’m aware Rhys could shut down at any moment. But at the party he said he never told them because they didn’t ask. Rhys likes direct. I’m hoping that is still the case today.
“It wasn’t that I didn’t like you. I saw how Chase reacted towards you. In the almost five years I’ve known him, he’s never reacted like that. Then Arden and Ally took an immediate liking to you. I didn’t like you because you changed them,” he says while picking at the wooden table. “Not in a bad way. I was just surprised. I didn’t want them to get hurt. I was trying to protect them. We didn’t know you. We’d never let someone sit with us before. You were different.”
“I didn’t intentionally do anything. You know that right?” I ask.
“Yeah I know. But I know I was a jerk. I need to tell you something. But I need you to know I haven’t told anyone.”
“What?” I have no idea what he needs to tell me. But the way he says it makes me nervous and on edge.
“I know what happened. I know why you moved here.”
I’m not sure what I was expecting. But it wasn’t that. “What? How?” My voice lacks the confidence it held earlier when I was asking Rhys for the truth.
“I found out the Friday after you arrived. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I needed to find out, I needed to know if I had to protect my friends from you,” he replies, trying to justify his actions.
It’s odd. I’m not really surprised. This is something I’d expect Rhys to do. I don’t know why I didn’t think about it earlier. It makes sense. He warmed to me a little more after that first week.
“How did you find out?” I thought everything was swept under the rug.
“I used some of Dad’s connections. Asked around. I even spoke to Jason,” he admits.
“You what?” I’ve spoken to Smalls almost every other day since we’ve been here. He failed to tell me this. My friend has some explaining to do.
“After I found out what happened I wanted to speak to the only friend of yours I could find. I wanted to know what kind of person you are. I guess you could say I ran a very thorough background check. I like Jason. He loves you. He promised to keep quiet as long as I promised to keep an eye on you and let him know if anything happened,” Rhys says.
“That’s why Smalls wasn’t surprised when I spoke to him yesterday to fill him in on what had happened. You’d already told him?” I ask. Smalls was a little strange during our facetime. I just figured it was because we woke him up early on a Sunday.
“Yeah, I spoke to him after we found Millie. I needed to know what to do.”
“What did he say?” This should be interesting. Smalls is a wildcard. He could offer great advice or something completely ridiculous. Kind of like Arden.
“He told me to give you a few days. That you’d need to sort out your head and feelings and the best thing to do is to let you get lost in some books. He then said if after a week you were still ignoring us and hiding to show up with a bunch of junk food and Disney movies.” As Rhys speaks, I picture Smalls giving the advice. He knows me too well. Dammit.
“Sounds about right,” I comment.
“Yep, so this is us giving you space. Well, kind of. This is us giving you space in our own way.”
“I appreciate the space. But since you know what happened, you know why I freaked out?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.
“Yeah, I figured it was the reason. It was why I tried to stop you from flipping out. Smalls said that there is very little chance of calming you down when you hit that level of freak out. I’m sorry Hayden was the reason behind it. I’ve spoken to him. He knows he isn’t allowed to turn his phone off when he is with the girls. I extended it to Julia as well. Because Arden would flip if he was unable to get a hold of her, especially now she’s let us back in.”
“Thank you. You didn’t have to do that,” I say in response.
“I did. Hayden knows better. You know you have to tell them what happened eventually, right?”
“I know. I just don’t know how.”
“We all care about you. We all want to help,” he says.
