More Than This

7 - Garrett

Song of the chapter - More Than This by One Direction

The words coming out of my mouth shocked me. It looked like Amber was equally shocked. I had no idea where they were coming from. It's not that I didn't believe what I was saying was true. I did. It was.

He doesn't deserve it. He doesn't deserve you.

He fucking didn't. That ass didn't deserve her time, her attention, her affection. Nothing. He deserved misery. He deserved to be alone. He had no idea what that was like.

But I did. That's all I fucking knew. My whole life that's all I knew. And I hated it. Every fucking second.

So standing there, telling Amber not to give in to him, I stopped thinking. I stopped planning out my actions. I stopped playing the roll I had to play to survive. Something else had taken over. I'm not sure what it was.

But she was looking me in the eye as I spoke, as I let emotions take over. My frustration came out. My fear came out. And something else I had never felt before, something that scared the hell out of me.

Shit. My fucking heart was in my stomach as I felt myself falling forward when her lips opened. I didn't realize what I was doing, I just did it.

And then my lips were on hers. I felt her surprise as she took in a breath. I think I did the same. My hands stayed at my sides, I had no idea what to do with them. It felt like an eternity was passing, but it was probably just a few seconds. I was frozen in that moment, my lips still touching hers. That's all it was really, a touch. Nothing like April and Nico put on display every freaking day.

Then, as if I had just come out of a trance, my brain finally started working again, and I panicked. What the fuck was I doing?

I pulled back and looked away from her, not wanting to know what her reaction was. It made me feel weak. I knew that being weak wasn't a bad thing, but in my life being weak meant being defeated. So I couldn't give in to weakness. I had to stay strong to survive.

I covered my face with my hand, the one that moments before had been touching Amber's, and mumbled, "sorry" trying to figure out what to do next.

"What?" She said, her voice full of surprise.

"I shouldn't have done that." It was the only thing I could think of saying.

She took a step back from me, "Then why did you?" I gave in to temptation and glanced at her. Hurt was all I saw. I had hurt her. Shit.

"I don't know" I whispered. It was the truth. I wasn't sure why I had done it. It was like my body had taken over, my brain shut off.

Amber just stood there staring me down for a few seconds, or maybe it was minutes, I seriously couldn't tell. Fuck, it made me nervous as hell! This girl made me more nervous than all the assholes I'd had to deal with in my life.

She stepped back into my space, still looking at me. "I suggest that the next time you kiss me, you should know why." She looked in my eyes a second longer, then turned and went back to the garage.

I, on the other hand, remained frozen in place, unable to move.

The next time? Was she expecting me to do that again? I wasn't. At least I didn't think so.

Fuck! She had me tied up in knots. I didn't like feeling so confused and fucked in the head.

I heard Amber tell April that she was ready to go. Damn, she was running away from me. I fucked everything up.

"What? Why?" was all April said in response to Amber's request.

"I'm just ready to go. I've...got stuff to do today after all." She explained. A lie, I was sure. I wanted to call her out on it. That's what I would normally do. But that guy who pulled her away from a d-bag of a boyfriend behind the cafeteria wasn't in me today. Instead I was left with a miserable excuse of a friend to her.