"How was I supposed to know Rhys was butt naked? Oh my god, Christian you can't take me back there, I'll kill you and I'm not playing!" Christian's whole body shutters as he's laughing at me. I hate him. He shakes his head, pulling up at a red light. Still laughing.

I smack his head lightly. "Dude, I will jump out of this car. Take me home." He finally composes himself a couple of seconds later, but he's still having trouble getting a full sentence out. "No, Novalee, you have to finish your speech with me! And I told you, he's not home. He's out with Xander." Christian laughs again.

I cross my arms over my chest and look straight ahead at the road as we inch closer to Chris's house. "I promise, I'll make sure you avoid him if he ever is here when you come over." I turn my head slowly, glaring at him. He pulls into the driveway, still giggling at the thought of me seeing one of his roommates naked.

I could never unsee it. His dick wasn't all that terrible, but it still didn't make every single interaction with him any less awkward.

"And you ask why I hate you." I open the door to his car and shut it behind me. He follows me on the path up to the townhouse. "You love me." He smirks, looking back at me as he opens up the door.

We walk down the hall to the living room, hearing multiple voices. God, if I see Rhys I will literally evaporate on sight. I hide behind Christian just in case and he laughs when he notices me. The room goes quiet when he walks in and then I hear Cgc. "Rhys isn't here, gorgeous."

Great. Everyone knows I saw him naked.

I open my eyes and let go of his shirt that I had been holding onto so that I didn't fall. "Who's your company?" Chris asks. Then my eyes meet his. His. Not Chris', not Cgc's. Not Rhys'. Although in this moment, I wished it was Rhys.

I can't seem to peel my eyes off of him until I'm attacked with a hug and gasps throughout the room. Chris backs up, looking confused. "Surprise! Nova also goes to Oak Hill. She just moved here this semester actually."

Time feels frozen as my former best friend doesn't loosen her grip on me. What. The. Fuck. McKenna finally pulls away and I can see the excitement in her eyes. I on the other hand? Am still shocked. "I missed you, Nov. Oh my god!" I fake a smile.

"Move Ken!" Camila says, pushing my brunette friend. She pulls me in for a hug, short and sweet unlike McKenna's. Then her boyfriend, Kaiden, does the same. The only people left are the people who kind of destroyed what I thought friendship and love meant.

"Hey." I wave awkwardly to Tyra and Devon who I notice aren't close to each other as well. They both give me awkward 'hey's' and waves back.

"This is one of my roommates, Chris, guys!" I turn to see Cgc with his arm wrapped around Chris' shoulder. "Hey, nice to meet you all." He nods his head once to them. "Is he your boyfriend, Nov?" McKenna comes up next to me, slithering her arm through mine, looking directly at Christian.

Hell no.

I let out an awkward chuckle. I never told them about Chris, thankfully. "Oh, no. We're just friends. I met him though Cgc." I lie. Both of them look at me confused. I'll have to explain later. Luckily, they don't add to my story.

I loosen my grip from Kenna and slide over to Christian's side. "Well, we have work to do, but it was nice seeing you guys. Bye!" I grab Chris's arm to pull him, but he stops me. "No, Nova. You haven't seen your friends in a while. We can all hang out down here together." He smiles down at me. Would it be bad if I flipped him off right now?

I was using him as my escape route and now he ruined it. "Yeah, c'mon, Nov. It's been a while since it's been the seven of us." Cgc smiles. I look at my friends who wear his same expression. I look at Chris and then back at them. "Sure!" I try to sound excited.

They all cheer a bit, except two people, and head back to the couch. I only agreed to this because Chris will be here and he will definitely be the one to save me from this overwhelming anxiety. I make sure to catch a seat next to him, but I'm placed right in the middle of him and Devon.

Great. In between the two boys who fucked with my feelings at some point.

I try and be friendly for about two hours as we all catch up. I keep on tapping my foot against the ground, something I thought Chris would notice since he always does, but he's oblivious. I kind of feel bad for him though because he's kind of being left out, but honestly I feel left out too.

Don't get me wrong at one point the people in front of me were my best friends but ever since they graduated, they haven't made much effort to keep in touch with me. The only time I saw them was after the first year of college when they all came back for the summer.

After that, no one came home for a while. If they did, I didn't see them.

It seems like they didn't miss a beat with Cgc though. Or maybe it's just because he's known them longer.

I also seemed to notice the elephant in the room between Devon and Tyra. I heard they got back together once freshman year of college started even though they went to different schools. They don't look so together now though. I still catch her stealing glances at him though and vice versa.

Whatever. I don't care.

"Down?" Chris says, saving me from my thoughts.

"Oh, yeah!" I agree even though I have no idea what he's talking about. Cgc stands up after my answer and he goes into the kitchen. I see him pull out a bottle of Malibu. The one we didn't finish last time. I stand up and go to the kitchen.

I stand close to him as he pours the alcohol into numerous shot glasses. "Why didn't you tell me everyone was coming over? And why exactly are they here?" I try not to sound upset, but I don't think I'm doing a good job at it. "I wanted it to be a surprise, I know you haven't seen them in a while. And also we do this every year." He says.

I feel like he just punched me in the gut and then he realizes what he said. "Shit," he turns his attention to me. "It's just because of everything between you, Tyra, and Devon. We didn't want to make things weird." He explains.

"Oh, so now you guys decided to include me? Because they broke up? Thanks, Cgc." I roll my eyes and walk away before he can answer. It's not like I can't coexist with them. They dated in senior year and didn't bother rubbing it all in my face. I'm over it.

I sit back down next to Chris. "You okay?" He asks. I don't look at him. "Yeah, fine." I lie. He fails to get in another sentence because Cgc comes back with the glasses, placing them on the coffee table in the middle for everyone to grab one.

We all do a quick little cheers and down the first shot.

Not bad at all. Cgc picks up the bottle from the table and fills everyone's glasses again.

We do another one. Then another.

Then...more.

Luckily, I'm not a lightweight. A couple of hours later, most of my friends are drunk. Rhys and Xander joined us a while ago too, but they left again shortly after. I can tell Chris is slightly buzzed as am I.

Everyone else besides Chris, Cgc, and I? They're drunk.

"Remember when coach Graham made us run all those laps because we showed up to practice hungover?" Devon laughs. Kaiden makes a disgusted face. "Don't remind me," he gags "I can still smell Cgc's vomit."

The girls and I laugh, making faces at this story. Gross. "He threw up all over the middle of the gym. It smelled fucking terrible." Devon recalls the story to everyone.

The three of them became friends when they were kids. They all played basketball together. Cgc was always better at football though hence why he stuck to it even now.

"Hey! You fuckers threw up too." Cgc retorts.

"In the actual trash can, man." Kaiden adds.

Cgc rolls his blue eyes. "You guys made me take so many shots the night before." He shakes his head. It's obvious he's not actually mad, just defending himself from an embarrassing situation.

"That's also the night Tyra and Devon hooked up before they got interrupted by me of course." McKenna slurs. I feel my face heat up. No matter how drunk they are, both Tyra and Devon shoot daggers into my former best friend.

I don't because I'm the victim here. That was the night I got cheated on. For the second time. McKenna walked in on them and no matter how long her and Tyra had been friends before I arrived, she told me.

She's a loyal friend, I'll give her that.

Despite the fact that I believed her, I still ended up getting back together with the guy a month later. So fucking embarrassing.

I don't know why I decide to speak on it, but I do. "I remember that." I fake laugh, throwing back another shot. The room fills with awkward silence. "We didn't hook up." Tyra defends.

She's right, they didn't. But they would have if McKenna hadn't walked in on them making out. "Still made out for the second time." I murmur. I didn't think anyone heard me, until Tyra speaks out again.

"Oh please, stop being so bitter. It was years ago, I thought we were passed that." Were we? After he cheated on me the second time, yes the second time, I finally called it quits with him and Tyra.

I couldn't be her friend when she had betrayed me twice. I ended up forgiving both of them again senior year. Our relationship was different, but we all stayed friends. Then eventually, they started dating.

I just let them be happy. It was obviously never going to be Novalee and Devon. It was always supposed to be Tyra and Devon.

I let out a small chuckle. "I'm over it, I just think it's funny." I shrug. Devon stays quiet but I see him finally attempt to open his mouth, but Kaiden cuts him off. "I mean you knew Devon had liked Tyra since like middle school." He defends them.

Is he actually defending them right now?

"Yeah, Nov," Camila shrugs "Dev did always have a thing for her. Even at the beginning of junior year he told me he'd make her his girlfriend that year."

What the fuck?

I didn't know Devon liked Tyra because I had just moved there. I didn't learn about that until shortly after I actually started getting feelings for him. Camila used to defend me when Devon cheated and now she's against me?

"Until you came along." Tyra basically finishes Camila's sentence.

I feel Chris shift uncomfortably next to me although I can't see his face. He didn't know about this. That I got cheated on or that I used to date Devon. I don't like mentioning that relationship for this very reason.

"Oh, sorry for ruining your fairytale love story then." I retort, glowering at one of my former best friends. "You know before you started growing feelings for me how much I cared about Tyra," Devon finally found his voice I see "I think everyone could see it."

Lovely.

I shift closer to Chris so that I'm inches away from Devon. "Yeah, Nov.." Camila says in a soft voice.

I barely notice that I'm tapping my foot against the floor again. I'm not even slightly buzzed anymore. I start to wonder if they're still drunk because they sure are sticking to their game plan of ganging up on me and making me look like I'm playing the victim for getting fucking cheated on.

"What the hell? Cgc stands up, and everyone shifts their attention to him. He struts over to me, grabbing one of my hands and pulling me up from the couch.

He warps his arm around my shoulder. He's much taller than me, so I look up at him confused.

"You guys are really blaming Novalee because these two idiots," he points to Tyra and Devon "decided they wanted to fuck?" Nobody says anything. He scoffs and I automatically feel small.

He's sticking up for me. Me.

These are his best friends who he's known for years. I didn't want him to ruin that for me.

"You guys sound fucking stupid. First time cheating is already questionable but doing it a second time with the same girl? If you didn't want to be with her, you could've just said that. You could've dumped her and then have gone and fucked whoever you wanted. But no. You wanted to hurt her again. Both of you."

All eyes are on us, and I can't help it, a tear slips down my cheek. I wipe it away quickly and attempt to hold myself together. I hate crying.

"Don't be bashing a girl because you fucked up and are too immature to accept and realize your mistakes." He finishes.

No ones looking anymore. They know he's right and that's why they can't look at us.

"Call a cab. Y'all need to go."