Endless Bonds Copyright © 2016-2017 xXMopelXx All Rights Reserved.

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pick up Cher around quarter to noon.

She's already waiting downstairs for me with all that bronze hair open and her signature black beret missing.

I would have been disappointed, if it weren't for the fact that she's wearing a pair of beat up converses, a tight black shirt, and shorter than sin shorts.

She resembles the old Cher she left behind. I like it.

Cher crosses the short distance and smiles as she slips into the passenger side of my SUV. "Hi."

I smirk back. "Hey."

Her eyes roam the length of my body. I do the same to hers. Fixing on the cleavage revealed by her neckline. She notices and blushes. I don't say a word.

I drive out of the parking lot. None of us mention yesterday morning, when we both saw each other in the hallway. I'm tempted to ask who she screwed, but I don't. It's none of my business.

Even though it took me a while to get the image of her long bare legs, mussed hair and swollen mouth out of my head. Which is messed up because Cheryl and I are friends. Or, at least, we're trying to cross the bridge once more after an absence of nearly two years.

"Where are we going?"

"It's a surprise," I tell her.

"I'm not big on surprises," she laughs.

"Deal with it, sweetheart."

I hand her over my phone so she can pick whatever music she likes. She settles on rap music politely – probably for my sake – and plugs in the aux cord.

Cher crosses her legs and stares ahead into the windshield.

The silence in the car is not bad. I'm comfortable with it, but I don't know if she is. I don't know if she wants me to talk - to hold a conversation. It was never like that between us. We used to be okay with mutual silence. Is it still the same?

I don't think so. She seems a little tense. There's a mask she's slipped into in the last years, as if cautiously holding herself behind that façade. I don't like it.

I'm hoping we can fall back in our old patterns.

The song changes. The atmosphere in the car, however, doesn't. My knuckles tighten on the wheel until they're almost white. Cher crosses her legs even tighter.

I can't stop looking away from her slightly tanned skin. I need to soon. Or else I'm going to cause an accident.

So I think of other things. I think of how Cher and I used to sometimes lie down on our backs and gaze at the stars in the old abandoned field not to far away from my house. Some nights we'd talk. Other nights the silence floating between us would do the talking.

"So, um, this is unexpectant," she breaks into my thoughts. "How come brunch?"

"We're trying to be friends again, no?" I frown. "We used to do brunch all the time."

Cher nods. "Yeah. Friends. Brunch. Of course."

I shoot her a strange look. Then I add, "I just missed you, Cher. I wanted to catch up."

Her face softens and she exhales, fucking finally, uncrosses her legs. A fruity and florally scent wafts my way. "I missed you, too. Thanks for offering, Trent. I appreciate it."

The place I've chosen is a small popular Parisian-themed bakery called Le Petit Moulin. I figure it'll remind Cheryl of her home away from home in case she's feeling homesick.

She's jumping excitedly when I parallel park my car in front of the shop. "Oh, my God. This is Tee's cousin's place."

I smile at her. "Apparently, they have a good breakfast menu."

Ten minutes later and we're seated in a little corner booth fit for two people. The waitress hands us our menus before wandering off.

Cher's eyes are stuck to me as she watches me take off my pair of aviators and beanie. I put them next to my cutlery. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me." I lean forward on my elbows and watch her. "I want to know."

She flutters, "I'm just thinking how much you've changed. You look a little different – taller, bigger, manlier – but you're still the same guy underneath it all."

I weigh her words for a second. "Um, I'll take that as a compliment, Cherrycakes?"

She grins and playfully footsies me under the table. "You better."

"For what it's worth, you look different, too. More stunning than before."

She clicks her tongue mockingly and rolls her eyes. It's kind of hot. "I bet you say that to all the girls."

"I take a swig of my ice water. "Obviously, I do," I lie straight through my teeth with a smile, because it's expected of me. I didn't earn my rep out of nowhere.

Cher laughs incredulously, tipping her head back. I've loved and missed the sound so much. "My God. No wonder you're always getting laid. A new girl every week."

I used to be committed before, so I was always getting laid by the same girl. I liked it that way. Coming home to the same person. Having that sense of familiarity and security that Rose provided me with. Still, I don't let Cher's harmless insult ruin our light banter.

"Oh, yeah," I play along. "Rarely do I need to use my right hand when I've got so many eager hands and mouths at my disposal."

"You're so nasty!" she laughs some more. "I can't believe you."

I give her a wink. "You wouldn't have me any other way."

There's an awkward moment where we just smile at each other, after letting all that out.

The waitress interrupts us.

I order a black coffee, a BLT on a croissant and a Nanaimo bar because Natalie got me hooked onto those before she left for NYC.

She orders herself a cappuccino and a handful of colorful looking cookies called macaroons.

I don't know how to hide my scowl. "You need to get yourself some real food into your system. Not a bunch of sugary cookies," I chide, then look at the waitress. "She'll have that fancy mac n cheese on your menu and a plate of scrambled eggs as well."

"Sure thing," she winks at me and gives me a suggestive once-over. It couldn't have been more obvious.

Cher looks a little rattled.

I'm used to it. I'm not blind.

"Trent, I can't eat all of that," she mumbles.

"But you used to love scrambled eggs." I know this because I used to make them for her every first Saturday of every month and she'd make me PB&J. It was a weird tradition of ours. Did she remember?

"I know," she says. "But I'm trying a new diet."

"Look at what you just ordered..."

"It's my cheat day!"

"Deal with it," I tell her and try to hide my smile as she huffs. "Your figure's fine, by the way. You don't need to diet."

I'm not lying. Cher's slim but has angles and curves where God intended them to be.

There's pink tinging her cheeks. Her lashes lower. It's cute. But I don't comment on it.

"So what are you studying?" I scratch my head. "Nat, uh, once mentioned something with linguistics."

Cher nods. "I want to double major in history and French. Maybe be a history teacher like my mom. Or be a French one. It's undecided right now."

"That's cool. You, um, used to mention how you were passionate about learning French and going to France."

"Well, mom is half French, but she can't speak the language for shit," Cher says with a devilish grin. "Figured one of us should learn about our roots. So I made France happen. What about you?"

"Well, you know I got a scholarship coming out of high school. I play football for the university. My scholarship pays a little bit of my tuition, but I provide the rest myself. I'm studying Business in case I don't end up playing football professionally. But I want to maybe switch into Sports Therapy, since I have all the prerequisites."

"How do you like business?"

"It's not really my thing, but my mom does business and it seemed like a fitting and safe career choice. We'll see how that goes."

She tucks her chin in her hand. "I have a class called Sports and Nutrition. It's complicated and boring as hell."

"Hit me up if you need help," I say. "I know a lot about nutrition in sports since our coach is a hard ass and demands all his athletes stay top notch."

This time she winks at me. "I'll take you up on it."

Our food finally arrives and we get a little break as we dug in. My BLT tastes incredible and I'm already halfway through it when I realize Cher's barely eaten her food. I slow down to be a gentleman, giving her enough time to catch up.

Then I ask the question that's been plaguing my mind for too long. "Why are you really back home, Cher?"

My words cause her a freeze a little. She deposits her fork back on her plate and wipes her mouth with a napkin. Her gaze is now fixed on the window next to us. She does that a lot. Looking out into the distance. "I just needed a reality check. I love Paris, but I missed home – my real home. I missed mom and all my friends."

"That's understandable," I whisper.

She's not done though. I let her get it off her chest. "I missed Tara, Jared, Oliver...Quentin. You. So much. I still miss Teagan and Nat. They're so far away. I haven't seen them in forever. I missed the simplicity and normalcy in my life. I love Paris, but sometimes it was just too fast-paced for me. It was a fun, lavish and different lifestyle for me – one that I got accustomed to – but I still missed my home. Nothing ever compares to home."

I can't understand what she must have felt like, but I can only imagine. I give her some of my truth. "When you stopped talking to me, I can't even explain what that felt like. No longer getting your texts. No longer getting your calls. No longer having someone who you could rush to when you wanted to say what was on your mind."

"You had Rose," she whispers to me.

I lean forward and whisper back, tenderly. "It wasn't the same."

Cheryl was my best friend, my confidante, my...a lot of things in between. Sometimes she understood me more than my guy friends did. All I've ever wanted was someone who gets me like I get them. Cher was that for me. Her pulling away sucked. It hurt. I felt like I'd been hit by a bulldozer when her presence just...disappeared from my life.

"Tell me," I'm pleading with her now, my voice sounding a little ragged. "I need to know for my sanity. Why did you stop talking to me? I've replayed every moment with you and wondered if it was something I said, something I did, something I didn't do. Yet for the life of me I couldn't figure out what I did wrong and I can't come up with anything."

"You didn't do anything wrong."

I flinch. My body jerks straight like a taut bowstring. "No."

She chews her bottom lip until it's red. When her shoulders deflate, I know she's caved in. "Swear you won't get mad at –"

"- I swear it. Please. Just say it." My stomach is churning. If I didn't do anything then what in the fucking world is she talking about...

"It's...It was because of Rose."

It feels like I've been slapped.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" I growl, no longer able to keep my emotions in check. Anger shoots up my veins at the mention of my ex-girlfriend.

"Oh, God," Cher drops her head in her hands. She's embarrassed to admit this. "Okay. So. When you and Rose started dating, she asked me to stay away from you. Said I was coming between her relationship. Didn't like having me around so close to you because she was afraid it would, uh, compromise her relationship with you. At that point I was a stupid sixteen-seventeen-year-old who didn't want to hurt her best friends' happiness or overstep any boundaries, so I played her game and stayed away from you thinking I was doing you both a favor."

"Fucking bxtch," I ground out through clenched teeth, running my hands over my head in frustration. "She's so lucky she's not here to get a piece of my mind."

I have so much to say. I'm feeling so much right now. Yet I don't know how to formulate my coagulated thoughts into sentences.

"You...You're mad at her?"

"Livid," I state, pushing away my plates of food. "I wished you'd come to me sooner, Cher. I wished you'd said something all those years ago. Rose was being territorial for no reason," I laugh bitterly. "I don't fucking get her. I give her everything I have. I fight with everything I have. Then she throws it all in my face. Says we'd never work out. Jokes on me."

"She is a bitch, eh?" Cher adds in a shaky voice.

"Yeah," My own voice is weak. "She's a bitch. But she's a bitch that I loved. I'm so sorry Cher, for what she put you through. I had no idea my own ex-girlfriend had told you those things."

"I didn't say anything to you because I didn't know if you'd believe me. You were so fixed with her...I was sure in your mind you thought that she could do nothing wrong. I thought that maybe it was all for the better. You'd chase the girl for so long...You deserved to finally have happiness."

She's right. I was so wrapped up in Rose that I probably wouldn't have believed a word Cher said. Now that I know, I'm so angered. I wish I could say something. That I could cuss Rose out. But the truth is she was probably already in Australia right now. Far, far away from me and my relationships with others.

"Cher, I'm so fucking sorry." Because it's all I have to say right now.

She sniffs a little and still smiles despite it all. "It's okay, Trent. It wasn't your fault. I'm sorry for hurting you, too. Please know that I didn't mean to cause you pain. You were as important to me as I was important to you."

There's a strange feeling in my throat as I listen to her forgiving words. I can't say anything so I manage a quick nod and look away.

We sit in silence. Cher's façade has broken. The mask has slipped. This is the realest conversation I've had with her in awhile. I soak it all up. The silence is finally comfortable and mutual.

I join her and gaze outside the window, seeing nothing and everything at the same time.

"You know..." she says breathlessly. "This is a lot of food your ordered for me."

I appreciate her effort. Ever so slowly, my lips tip up in a half-smirk, the emotional moment no longer lingering, but defining how we felt right now. Her eyes light up the way they used to when we'd be making trouble. "Deal with it, sweetheart."

And she does.

Digging into her food with false repulsiveness, trying to pretend she doesn't like what I ordered for her. Making faces she thinks are disgusting but are actually really cute. I laugh until my stomach hurts.

And I deal with it Cheryl, too. In my own way.

* * *

After brunch, I drove us back to campus. Cher went to her classes and I went to mine. Coach called in an optional practice and I attended it.

When we finish up, I'm sweaty and sticky. I take a quick shower in the locker rooms.

I'm on my way back to my dorm room, when I notice a sliver of light peaking through underneath the door. That's weird. I didn't leave the lights on when I left this morning.

Cautiously, I insert my key and push open the door.

I'm dumbfounded when I see a girl sitting on my sofa, her face held in her hands. Blonde hair cascades around her like a protective curtain.

I'm alarmed. "Excuse me?"

Her head snaps up. A familiar pair of brown eyes greets me. I have the wind knocked out of me.

I stumble inside and shut the door. "T-Teagan?"

I don't recognize her. She looks different.

Her eyes sparkle with unshed tears. Fuck alarmed. I'm panicking at this point. Teagan's supposed to be in Boston, studying. What is she doing back here?

"What's happening?" I'm walking towards her. "What's wrong? How did you get in here?"

Her lips tremble as she stands up. "T-Trent. I-I need your help."

It's not long before the waterworks begin and she starts bawling all over the place. I hold her close and let her take it all out.

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Questions, Comments, LOL, insults? Hope you're loving EB as much as I am :) Cher finally told Trent why she stopped talking to him! What do y'all think?