♦𝕭𝖑𝖆𝖐𝖊♦

The waitress puts all our drinks in the middle of the table for us.

Isaiah, Ace and I instantly grab ours and pull it closer to ourselves, but Rose just sits there looking out of place. I'm not sure why, but her being that way makes me uncomfortable, but in a sad way.

Maybe she hates lemonade? Was I overstepping in some way ordering it for her? I saw the way her face lit up when Olivia mentioned it, so I assumed she was just too shy to order one.

But maybe I misread her expression and she doesn't like lemonade at all.

Dammit, I should have asked first.

"Do you not like pink lemonade?" I ask leaning closer to her.

Isaiah and Ace are busy talking among themselves about some movie they watched the other night.

"I've never had one, so I don't know."

Her answer takes me by surprise, I guess I did misread her face. It was plain old curiosity, not excitement over the drink. I grab it and slide it closer to her.

"Try it, and if you don't like it I can order you something else." I offer.

Her slender hands reach out for the drink.

I watch her expectantly as she takes the first sip. Her face scrunches up and my gut sinks a little knowing I ordered her a drink she doesn't like. I shift my body looking for the waitress, so I can order Rose something else, but then her face levels out and she beams up at me with a breathtaking smile.

"Like it?" I mouthed.

"Yeah." She whispers, keeping a smile on her face.

I don't know what this girl is doing to me. But just seeing her smile at me like that, it makes me feel like a damn hero.

Rose turns her attention back to her pink lemonade, stirring the ice cubes around with the straw. Her huge smile now turned into a smaller content one.

I feel one of the dumb asses across from me kick my shin, causing me to turn my eyes away from Rose to glare at my 'friends' in front of me.

Isaiah slides over a napkin with writing on it and I pick it up confused. After reading what he wrote I quickly crumple it up and shove it in my pocket, this ass really just told me to stop staring at his cupcake like a crazed stalker.

I'm about ready to jump across this table and shove his face down a toilet. But I restrain myself out of respect for Rose and this establishment, so instead I grab the pen that was in front of him and write a letter back.

I'll have your head on a stick if you don't knock it the fuck off.

And slide it across to him.

He read it and mocked hurt with his hand over his heart, then his face turned to one of fake sorrow, confusing the shit out of me, that is until he turned to Rose. "Cupcake, look what Blake did. He threatened to kill me for no reason." Isaiah holds the napkin up in front of her while continuing to be sad.

A sad, that Ace and I know is an act, but by the wide eyes Rose is looking at the letter with, I highly doubt she does.

My grip around the pen tightens, this guy is really testing my patience right now. And I'm just about at the end of my rope.

"I was joking." I try to make my voice light, to convince Rose I wasn't serious about killing him. Although, now I wonder if I at least shouldn't drive him into the middle of the woods and leave him there for a few days.

My attempt to convince Rose doesn't seem to be working, her eyes shift from Isaiah and I, uneasiness pouring off of her in waves.

Fucking Isaiah, I really want to shove his face in a toilet now. I'm trying to make this girl comfortable around us and he's painting me like a murderer.

Her eyes travel down to my hand, her pupils dilate as they zone in and then she quickly looks away.

Her hands shake slightly as she reaches out for her pink lemonade again. I look down at my hand to see the death grip I have on the pen.

Fuck. Dropping it I wipe my hands off on my jeans and look over at Rose again.

She sits up straighter and closes her eyes, when they reopen her face that was just filled with unease is now void of emotions and her eyes discreetly scan the restaurant.

I know what she's doing, she doesn't know if it's all a big joke or if Isaiah is being serious, and it scares her to the point where she has to pretend that she isn't scared for her own safety.

She's looking around the restaurant to memorize where all the exits are just in case she has to make a run for it. Isaiah doesn't catch onto things like that as fast as Ace and I do. We both lived a life where we had to pay close attention to people's emotions and actions, to figure out what they were going to do, before it was done.

So while Isaiah is only playing into the act trying to have a little more fun, Ace glances over at me worried, because he sees the same thing I do.

"Isaiah, stop." I grit out. But he doesn't.

"You see how mean he is to me, Cupcake? One of these days he's going to rip my head clean off." He pleaded with her and I noticed her breathing pick up a little.

Fucking hell, I want to knock his lights out right now. If he doesn't stop, she's going to bolt.

And I wouldn't blame her, she doesn't know us, she's sat with three guys she doesn't know at a restaurant, while one of them tries to convince her that another one is about to kill them.

I flash my eyes over to Ace not knowing what to do. If I try to reason with Isaiah, he's just going to play off of it. And I can't keep my tone friendly right now, so anything I say might only make Rose more frightened than she already is.

Ace nods at me in understanding.

"Knock it off, Isaiah. Rose, everything is cool. Isaiah just likes to cause drama, I can assure that Blake won't actually kill him... even if he deserves it." Ace says gently until he grits the last part out as he turns to look at Isaiah.

Isaiah instantly dropped his act when he heard the tone in Ace's voice and realization crossed his face. Yeah, he knows he fucked up and took it too far now.

"Shit, sorry, Cupcake. I was just joking around. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable." He rushed out.

Rose nods her head and slowly slides back in her seat that she had started to slide forward on ready to get the heck out of here and away from us.

"It's ok... it didn't bother me." She smiles up at us, blowing the whole thing off.

Lie, it bothered the fuck out of her, she just doesn't want anyone to know it.

The three of us look at her, not believing a word that just came out of her mouth, but not knowing what to say to her without making the situation worse. The awkward silence is cut just seconds after it started as the waitress comes over with a tray full of sandwiches and starts passing them out.

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The boys and I finished our sandwiches already and Rose is waiting for a box to put her leftovers in. She only managed to eat half of it and that's somehow very unsettling to me.

The waitress comes back with the box for Rose, Olivia's food and the check and places it all on the table.

"I'll be back to collect that in just a second." She says referring to the check, then rushes off to another table.

Isaiah leans over and grabs it, placing Olivia's credit card inside and pushes it back to the end of the table.

Rose shifts as she digs around in her pocket pulling out the money Olivia gave her for cleaning the gutters before we left, and tries to place a ten in the checkbook.

I reach my hand out to stop her before she can. "What are you doing?" I scolded, then moved her hands away from the checkbook and back to her lap.

She peers up at me, her green eyes clouded with confusion. "Paying for my food?" She tries to say it as a statement, but it comes out as a question.

"Nuh uh, Cupcake. Mom will get pissed if you pay. She doesn't even let these two goons pay when she sends us for food." Isaiah pipes in.

"Dude, remember that one time after you got your first winnings, you were all high and mighty and tried paying for your food when we ate at that Chinese restaurant with my mom?" He questions Ace.

"My ears still hurt." Ace shutters at the memory.

"She dragged him outside by the ear, then yelled at him for a solid ten minutes." I spoke, smiling at the memory.

It's to this day, still one of my favorite memories. Because Ace is tall, and Olivia is much shorter than him, he was practically folded in half as he was dragged out of the restaurant.

"Yeah, and my mom would never do that to you. But she sure as hell will do it to us if she finds out we let you pay. So put that money back in your pocket." Isaiah pleaded.

He's already in deep shit with his mom for the way he's been skipping out on family dinners lately, so the last thing he wants is another thing added to it.

Rose places the money back in her pocket reluctantly after she figures there is no way any of us are going to let her pay. The waitress collects the card, then returns it moments later.

"Alright let's get this food back to my mom, I bet she's impatiently waiting to chow down." Isaiah rolls his eyes. He loves his mom a lot, but she can be a little much sometimes.

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Once we made it back to Olivia's house, Rose grabbed her things and left.

We almost forgot to give her the apology gift, but Isaiah remembered and ran it out to her car. I didn't want her to go, for some godforsaken reason I wouldn't mind if she glued herself to me and never left my side.

And that scares the shit out of me. I've never felt that way about anyone, never even thought about feeling this way about someone, and I sure as hell didn't think it would happen so goddamn fast.

"He's in love." Isaiah mocks as he rummages through my fridge, even though we just ate, he still tries to eat me out of house and home.

After Rose left we decided to head back to my place, and I should have left that fucker at his moms.

"Shut the fuck up, Isaiah." I grumble. In love is too much, too fast. In love is something I never thought I would experience. I won't deny that I'm interested in the girl, there is something about her that draws me to her, but I'm not in love.

So he can shut his damn mouth.

"Oh come on. You went all protective over her, you can't deny it. I've never even seen you pay attention to a girl, and you almost had an aneurysm when she slipped on the roof." He states, causing my body to tense up.

If she fell off that roof, she would have been seriously injured, and that's only if she managed not to hit her head and die.

"What did you expect, she could have died. Did you expect me to let her fall?" How low does he think of me?

"Nah man, of course not. But if it was any other girl, you would have quickly let go of her once she was safe, and leave it at that. Not scold her like you did. You looked like it was your life on the line, not hers." He pointed out, and I hate him a little for being so observant in that moment.

"It scared the shit out of me." I admit, because it did. And it still does, the thought of her getting hurt in any way makes my gut twist unpleasantly.

Isaiah whips around to face me as the words slip past my lips. "So you admit it! You're in love!" He yells, way too excited.

"Hold up, I never said that. I'll admit I'm intrigued by her, but that's it. Besides, it doesn't matter, she's scared of me." I grumble. Taking a seat at the small island in my kitchen I flick a crumb off of the counter top.

"She's not scared of you. Well maybe a little, but given the circumstances, I think anyone in their right mind would be a little leery. And my whole stunt at the sandwich shop didn't help, but we cleared that up." Isaiah says meekly.

She's scared of me, like Isaiah said, who wouldn't be after all the stuff that happened. But it still hurts to know that she is. I wouldn't hurt her, never.

"We have a bigger issue though, because you fucked up." Ace speaks up from his silence in the corner of the kitchen. My blood runs cold, shit what else did I do? As If reading my mind he speaks again.

"It's not what you did. It's what you didn't do. You didn't ask for her number." He emphasized.

To be honest, I didn't even think about it. Why would I ask for her number when I knew there was no way she would want anything to do with me after all the crap I put her through. But the idea of never seeing her again hurts my soul.

"Doesn't matter. She wouldn't want anything to do with me anyway." I shrug like it's no big deal, but in reality the words I just spoke tasted bitter in my mouth.

I stand up and grab a soda out of the fridge and take a sip, like that will somehow wash away the bitterness of the words.

"Ok, no one panic. I'll just ask my mom for her number." Isaiah rushes out.

He whips his phone out of his pocket so fast it slips out of his hand, he catches it just before it hits the ground. He pays no mind to almost ruining his phone, and starts typing with a smile on his face.

I shouldn't get my hopes up, but I can't help it. Maybe we can at least be friends, even if she's scared of me. At least I could make sure she's alive that way, instead of keeping myself up at night wondering if she fell off a roof or not, or into a pool and drowns, or is stranded and starving on a roof with no one to help her because she works alone.

As his phone dings indicating he received a text back his face falls. "Sorry man. She never got her number." Isaiah says and my heart drops.

"It's ok, like I said, she wouldn't want anything to do with me anyway." Who was I kidding, even if he got her number, she would never want to be my friend. She's too small and adorable to be friends with a person like me. I swipe my keys off the table.

"I'm going to the gym to work off some energy." I say. But I mean, 'I'm going to the gym to get rid of this aching feeling in my chest, because I know that I'll never see her again and it hurts like hell.'

They both grab their keys and follow me out the door. I guess this is going to be another messed up group therapy session we have when words are better left unsaid, and feelings are better dissolved by the sting of split knuckles pounding into punching bags and heartbeats running wild as feet pound against pavement for miles on end.

What up my homies? Hope you enjoyed that chapter.

~Whitetigerpaw

☟Quote☟

Perhaps I don't deserve nice things cause I am paying for sins I don't remember -Rupi Kaur