“No way. You couldn’t hurt me.” He laughed and played it off as if the idea was ludicrous.
“I’m sorry we don’t have more time,” I said. Time was ticking away, and soon my brother and grandparents would be on their way.
“It’s not a problem. We were able to have some time together.”
“We’ll have more time later tonight.”
Both of us quickly washed and rinsed off before I shut the water off.
“I’ll be back in a little bit,” Patrick said and then started out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist and his dirty clothes in his arms.
“Hey,” I called out to him. Patrick stopped in the doorway of the bathroom and turned to look at me. I wrapped the towel around my waist and stepped in front of him. I pressed my mouth against his and gave him a quick kiss. “Love you,” I murmured against his lips.
“Love you too.” A huge smile forced its way onto his face, and then he left the room.
I got dressed in jeans, a navy t-shirt, and put my shoes on. I went into the living room and looked outside. It was dark, but you’d never know it unless you looked straight up at the sky. The Strip was lit up brightly and it gave off a friendly, welcoming, and good mood vibe. The glitz and warm lights of the city could probably mask just about anything. But I was feeling pretty shitty.
I took a bottle of water and stepped outside onto the balcony. Though it was cold outside, the chilled air felt good on my warm skin. I sipped the water and set my hand on the railing. While I was lost in my thoughts, the ringing phone interrupted me. I headed inside and jogged to the phone.
“Hello,” I said into the receiver. I was pretty sure it’d be my parents.
“Hollis.”Chase!“It’s Chase,” he said.
“Of course, it’s you! Don’t you think I’d recognize you on the phone?”
My heart pounded in my chest. I was excited he was on the other end. Though we were brothers and had what I thought had been a best friend type of relationship, everything since last month had been so awkward. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing.
“I don’t know. I guess. Um, I’m sorry about the fight,” he said. I could tell by the tone of his voice that he felt the awkwardness too.
“Yeah. Thank you. It sucks for sure, but it happens.” I tried to sound as encouraging as Vin tried sounding earlier. I felt bad I had let Chase down … in a long line of let downs.
Patrick walked in and looked at me. I pointed to the phone and said, “Chase.” Patrick gave me a thumbs-up, nodded, and sat on the couch.
“Yeah?” Chase asked.
“Nothing, I was just telling Patrick that you were on the phone.”
“Cool. Tell him hi for me.”
“Patrick, Chase says hello,” I said.
“Tell him I said hey,” Patrick said in an eager tone.
“Did you hear that?” I asked Chase. I had hoped Chase had heard Patrick’s greeting because he sounded like he was excited to hear I was on the phone with Chase.
“I heard.”
Patrick and I both glanced at the door when we heard the knock. I made a face at Patrick and silently pleaded with him to get the door. He understood that I needed to try to talk to Chase at least for a few minutes. Patrick held his hands up and mouthed “relax” to me. I nodded and then walked toward the door to the balcony.
“So what’s new? What are you up to tonight?” I asked him as I stepped outside with the phone.
“Nothing. I got pizza with Mom and Dad, and we watched your fight.”
I clamped my mouth shut and tried inhaling air slowly and deeply. I felt even worse that they'd bothered to tune in to watch my fight, and I couldn’t even give them a reason to watch.
“Thank you for watching, Chase. It means a lot to me.”
“I’m sorry we didn’t come. I wanted to. But you know… Mom and Dad don’t want to add stress and shit.”
