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.

I had fucking hurt her.

Before I had a chance to go over to the garage, Amber walked back outside with April on her heels. She was carrying something I hadn't noticed before.

Walking right back up to me, no hesitation in her eyes, she handed me whatever it was she had been holding.

"Here." She said, "Merry Christmas"

My mouth fell open, not knowing what to say, but I caught the look on her face. This time she didn't look hurt. She didn't look mad. She looked strong. Stronger than I had noticed before, and I had always seen some strength in her eyes.

So I took what she held out to me, saying "Thanks" and then she kept walking. She jumped in April's car to leave, but I could hear the last thing she said before they drove away.

"April, will you teach me how to drive?"

I don't think my feet had moved an inch since I kissed her.

Shit! I had kissed her! It was completely fucking me up inside. I shook my head to try and clear it out. Like that was gonna effing work. Then I went back into the garage.

"So what the fuck happened out there?" Nico asked from under the car.

"I kissed her." I admitted, sort of shamefully.

Then I heard the clatter of tools dropping on the concrete. "You WHAT?" Nico yelled as he slid the dolly out from under the car.

"You heard me." I wasn't saying it again. It had probably been a huge mistake to tell him in the first place.

"I like it. Laying claim on your girl. Nice move, playa!"

I grunted in response, covering my face with both hands. "No, the opposite of nice move, more like worst move in history." Lesson learned, don't let emotions take over.

"Nah. It was only a matter of time. But why the hell did she take off? You two should be snuggling on the couch right about now." Nico said with an eyebrow wiggle.

"Ha! Right. I'm sure she doesn't want me anywhere near her anytime soon!"

"And once again I ask, why?"

"Because I told her sorry, I shouldn't have done that. And when she asked me why I said I didn't know. Then she said to figure it out before next time. Or something like that." Fuck my life.

Nico eyed me for a second. "Hmm, that's not as bad as you might think. Sounds like she's leaving things open to you."

He took a few strides over to where I stood "As soon as you know what the hell you want, let her know. I like her, you need to keep her around." He finished off while tapping my temple.

I just looked at him, no visible expression on my face. It was clear that I wasn't ready for all of the emotional crap. I just wanted to forget about it all.

"What's that?" Nico pointed to the large Manila envelope that Amber had handed me on her way out.

"I don't know. She gave it to me and said, 'Merry Christmas' before she left."

"Well, open it up and see what your girl gave you." Nico smirked.

The day that I finally decked that fucker was approaching quickly.

"Shut up, dick." I muttered through clenched teeth, yet not making eye contact. I couldn't think of her like that. Yet. Shit, maybe ever. Fuck.

"Just open it lover boy!" Nico laughed and walked back over to the Camero. It was gonna be a long ass night if he was gonna keep that kind of shit up.

I pulled open the envelope and slid out its contents. I took one look at what she had given me and my stomach clenched.

Immediately I knew what she had done for me, and I realized it was just more evidence that I had no idea what went on in the female mind. Amber had painted a watercolor image of the sick Mach five we had seen at the car show. It was done to look like the car was speeding down the highway, so the strokes were blurred to give the feeling of movement.

It was amazing. She had so much talent, something I never would have guessed because she didn't talk about art. She must love it to be so good, and to have spent the time creating this for me.

I felt so much worse than I had before. There was no way I could handle much more drama this weekend either from one of the girls dogging my mind or my rat of a cousin, so I carefully slid the painting back into the envelope and sealed it tight. Then I went back to working under the hood of the car, pushing thoughts of Amber out of my mind.

Thank God Nico never asked me anything else about it. He seemed to realize that I wasn't in the mood. Or he was saving it up for later. Fuck.

*****

A week went by and Amber didn't come back over. I half expected her to show up at my house with April the next night, Sunday, when we all hang out with my mom.

But she didn't, and neither did April. They must have been hanging out together but I refused to ask Nico about it, not wanting him to give me any shit. And the fucker didn't bring it up either, even though I was pretty sure he figured I was curious.

April stopped by a few times toward the end of the week as Nico and I were installing the newly upholstered seats. We had spent the first part of the week painting the car and the last half were all about the details.

She never brought Amber with her, but she did glare at me often. She was also giving me the cold shoulder. Obviously she was pissed. Which probably meant that Amber was pissed. Fuck me and all the females in my life. I just didn't understand any of them.

Before I knew it, we were back to school. The break was over and hell had returned.

I parked in my usual spot in the front lot, and was surprised to see April parking there as well. She had been fine parking in the back with all of the non-jocks and un-populars. Guess things had changed.

Amber of course was with her but neither of them looked my way. The whole damn student body filed into the building in a herd and then split off to their various lockers and first period classes.

Not me. I walked around to the back of the building and through the side door toward the quad. I made my own path to avoid all the shit that went down before first bell. Unfortunately for me, the shit seemed to be waiting for me.

Amber was already in the quad and she was talking to Matt. I could feel my frustration build watching how she laughed at whatever he was saying. He was looking at her with one of his phony ass smiles and talking about whatever bullshit he was trying to sell her.

Where the fuck was April? Why the hell wasn't she there to watch over Amber and make sure that d-bag didn't do anything he would need to pay for later?

I pulled out my phone to text her just that question.

Where the fuck r u?- G

It didn't take long for her to reply.

What the f is it to u?-April

U should be watching out for her-G

Oh, now u worry? Figure it out G, u don't own her.-April

What the hell? That's not what this was about. I just didn't want anything to happen to her. April knew that, that's why this whole thing started.

I looked up to check on her and was startled to find her staring back at me. Matt was no where to be found, little ass, but Amber just looked at me with a strange expression. When would I finally be able to understand what the hell that look meant?

That feeling in my stomach, the one that I had every damn time I looked in her eyes, was something I could identify. Before it had felt like being sick to my stomach, but without the sick part. After everything that had happened between us, however, now it did feel like I was sick. It was a sense of dread, things had changed.

Amber still stood there, that unidentifiable look still eating away at me. It wasn't pissed, or hurt. Not exactly sad, but I wasn't too sure. Before I could put my finger on it, she seemed to sigh and shake her head, then she turned to walk down the main hallway.

I stood there, frozen in place again, replaying the whole scene to try figuring it out. My palms were sweating, I realized, and my stomach was once again in knots. What the hell was wrong with me?

^^^^^^

Please don't kill me. And don't give up on the story yet, because there is SO MUCH MORE!!

I know this is what you all wanted:

And now you're all

Or just generally

Sorry. Seriously I am. No really. At the end of this story I plan to add a Behind the Scenes section, which I do with all my full length stories, and I will let you know all about my agony over this part.

The feels are really real even when the characters are not. (OMG, I added a vid of Keith and Watts hot make out scene from Some Kind of Wonderful up top ⬆️ as a peace offering!)

Part 8 will deal with the aftermath of the sort-of-kiss and be in Amber-Matt-Garrett order. Plus we will return to the 90's music scene.

Funny story, I had completely forgotten there was a song titled More Than This by 1D when I chose my title. But once I realized it, and listened to it again, I realized that it was Garrett's subconscious talking. Kay, I'll leave it there.

[There should be a GIF or video here. Update the app now to see it.]