Chapter 8
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Is someone squeezing my head? 'Cause it hurts so badly I feel like it's being juiced out.

I wake up with my head throbbing and the bed sheet rustling beside me. I turn my body around and open my eyes. Blurry at first, a figure of a man on his phone stands in front of me. I slowly sit upright, my hands on my pulsating head.

"Lev?" I say when his figure becomes clear. He looks at me after I called him, startled by my sudden call. He's dressed casually from top to bottom–a white polo with one end tucked in his black pants. I assume he's going somewhere. The question is where, though.

He ends the call. "Oh, you're finally awake. How are you feeling?" he asks, striding towards the bed and sits back down.

"Ugh. My head hurts so much. What in the world happened yesterday?"

I have no clue on what I did that night after I drank multiple shots of that drink. I really regret taking all of that in one go. Now I know I have low tolerance when it comes to alcoholic beverages. I don't recall any memories, not a single bit.

Being drunk and not remembering what you did sucks.

My eyes trail down to my clothes as I feel different from what I'm wearing yesterday. It's comfy, unlike the ones I wore last night.

Did he–

My eyes widen in the presumption my mind formulated as I glance up at him and pull the sheets closer to my torso.

He didn't see me naked, right? He wasn't the one who changed my clothes either, right?

Looking like he knows what I was thinking, he denies it in an instant. "No no no. It's not what you think," I see a little blush forming on his cheeks. "I called Amy to take care of you when you started vomiting."

"I puked?"

"Yeah, it smelt pretty bad, honestly." He sniffs. "And you still do."

I playfully slap his arm. "Oh, shut up! I smell–" I bring my arm near my nose and smell the sleeve, "–good, okay?"

He stands up, chuckling. "Of course it smells good. That's my shirt you're wearing."

Oh. No wonder it's so comfy.

"Well, I have go. Amy dragged me to accompany her somewhere I don't even know."

I tug a bit of his shirt, trying to stop him from going. "Wait...you haven't spilled me details on what I did yesterday."

I'm getting quite curious. Is he diverting the topic into a new one because he doesn't want to talk about it or am I just overthinking? By the looks of it, he appears to be avoiding it. "I didn't do something unusual, did I?"

"Uh...not that I know of. You were pretty chill which was surprising taken from the condition you were in."

"Really?" I don't know, but my gut is telling me there's something else more than that. Something he's hiding.

And most of the time, these gut feelings are accurate.

He extends his right hand and lands it on the top of my head, messing with my hair. "Really. Now get up. Ace is here if you need something."

I flop myself back on the bed and grumble. "I don't want to get up. The world seems to be spinning around in my eyes. I don't know if I can stand."

"Now you know how we feel every time we get drunk."

"Yeah, and I don't want to feel it again. This is the worst."

He looks over his watch. "Oh shit. I'm late." He hurries to the door and exits. Minutes after, he comes back saying, "Ace asked if you want to eat or something. He'll cook and bring it to your room, in case you still don't want to get up."

"Yeah, no. I'm good. I'll rather get up than let him cook," I respond. There's an unwritten rule that Ace should never touch the stove. Heck, he's even forbidden going near it. Ace being a horibble cook is an irrefutable fact. What's odd is that it may look pleasingly appetizing but once you have a taste of it, that's where it goes downhill. I'm not kidding when I say there's a time when the four of us fell sick due to his so-called dish.

Lev already left the penthouse as I heard the click of the door a while ago. I stare at the ceiling–a habit of mine I appear to be doing recently. My mind tends to fly like a rocket, travelling to an unknown destination. Only an external force should be act upon it to make it stop.

My mind wanders to the thought of my parents possibly knowing I drank last night. I know I'm going to be confronted by my actions, but it still somehow scares me. How will they react? What would my consequences be? Am I going to be grounded?

Remember the external force I've just said? This is one of it. My thoughts are too loud; it snaps me out from a deep oblivion.

This is no time to be overthinking. I need to tell them the truth.

My hand motions to the bedside table where my phone is located. I scroll through my contacts. As the caller ID "Dad" shows on the screen, I press it and dial him.

Our conversation went by smoothly as I expected it to be. When Dad answered, the first thing he did was to greet me and asked me how I was doing. He was in a good mood which made it harder for me to admit my wrong doings. "Ha! A perfect timing to turn his mood upside down," I sarcastically thought.

Prolonging the secret would only make a worse reaction than if I say it earlier. So despite the hesitation, I bluntly told him that I drank last night and now I'm having a hangover. There was a long pause before he reacted which cause tension over the phone. But surprisingly, he said, "I know." Apparently, Lev spilled the beans to Dad the same night. I felt bad he was apologizing for thinking he's not being responsible enough when I was the one who did wrong.

Another unexpected response came after that. I don't know how, but he kind of predicted that I would someday disobey his regulations. "The more I become strict on you, the more rebellious you can get," he said. I kind of agree with what Dad said, but I'm no rebel. It was just at that time, temptation won over me.

In contrast to how Dad reacted, Mom was proud I broke my own shell and stepped out of my comfort zone. She wasn't mad on the fact I drank, but rather, on the fact that I didn't tell them beforehand.

So with all that revelations, those three rules evaporated into thin air. Although they had given me the permission to drink, I can still envision myself refraining from doing so. Well...maybe a few shots, here and there would do. As regards to the other two rules–kissing and making out–I'm positive I won't be doing that any time now. Gosh, I don't even have anyone to kiss to begin with.

The door opens the same time I decided to get up and put my feet on the ground. "Ah! Sleeping Beauty has awaken!" Ace announces in a dramatic way, imaginary royal guards with trumpets appearing on his side.

"Indeed, I am." Once and for all, I stand up and drag myself off of the bed. I need to be productive today, and I won't let this hangover prevent me from being active. Most people would love to sit and lay their asses on the bed, but it's the opposite for me. It ticks me off when I have nothing to do.

I go to the bathroom and wash my face. I stare at my reflection in the mirror, ice cold water streaming down from my temple. I can't help but think that something happened last night since Lev isn't acting himself. We're one soul in two different bodies, and there always has been a radar inside me that lights up whenever I feel that something's off about him.

Gosh, I need to know whatever I did when I was drunk.

I flee these thoughts away and start my day without thinking about it. It would only get me worked out so I choose to deal with it later on.

As I twist the door knob and go outside, I see Ace placing stuff to cook on the kitchen counter.

Oh no no no. Not this time, Ace.

"What do you think you're doing?" I ask, sending him warning signs through my eyes. I walk straight at where he is and stop him from doing anything further.

"Erm...cooking for you?" I thought I already informed Lev that I don't want any of Ace's cooking, but it seems like my words didn't get to him.

"Okay okay, let me explain. I know you have hangover and stuff, so I didn't want to bother you. Let me take care of this. I got it," he tries to reassure me, but fails miserably. "I've improved you know," he defends as he senses the doubt written on my face.

"My hangover will probably worsen if I let you cook. I appreciate the thought, but let me do it."

After rounds of arguing, Ace finally settles in and helps me as I make some breakfast. I go for the meal I always cook as a cure for hangover whenever these three go out partying–the classic bacon and eggs, together with chicken soup. Ace is in charge of cutting the vegetables for the soup since it's the only thing he's good at while I, on the other hand, fry the bacon as well as the eggs.

Throughout the process, Ace finds himself singing along to the music in the background. I connected my phone on Lev's Bluetooth speaker a while ago to play some songs that goes along with our current mood.

"You know, there's a superstitious belief in our culture that when one sings while cooking, having a spouse is out of the picture?" I inform him as I put aside the cooked bacons on one plate. Because of this belief, I refuse to sing whenever I'm cooking. It's not that I'm scared of dying alone. It's that I sometimes get jealous of people finding their true love.

"Really? That's probably why I don't do relationships, huh? I'mma stay single for life then," he says, facing me as he shrugs his shoulders like it's no big deal. I sometimes wonder when will Ace ever find that one girl that'll change him.

Couple of minutes after, we finish eating our breakfast. I put the leftover food in the fridge for Lev to eat later if he suddenly becomes hungry. Ace is currently washing the plates we ate on while I lay myself on my bed to get some rest. Even after eating some remedies to alleviate hangover, it seems like it didn't change a bit; I'm still dizzy. I feel myself internally crying, hoping for this headache to be gone.

"You're still not okay?" Ace's voice fades in as he enters my room. I look up to him for a second and close my eyes after. I mumble a faint 'yeah' in response. "How do you do it? I see no logical reason as to why you three keep on drinking when all you'll have is hangover the next day."

He sits beside me. "Well, we're not a weakling compared to you," he jokes. "It'll pass by don't worry. That's just a little headache."

I scoff and glare at him. "Little? Easy for you to say." I stand up from the bed, grab Ace by the collar of his shirt, and push him to my study chair.

"Woah woah, mi amor. What are you–" Before he could finish his question, I begin spinning the chair around. As it gets faster and faster, I stop it when it's enough for him to feel what I'm feeling right now.

"Feeling dizzy there, no? That's my condition right now." I say, hands on both of my hips.

"Gosh dang it, Val. You didn't have to do that," he replies with his head curled on his lap, as the chair slowly reduces its circular motion. "I've been there so–"

My attention to him changes its direction to the sudden ring of someone's phone at the dining area. I face Ace, who's head is still bowed down, and ask, "Is that yours?" It doesn't take him a second to respond as he quickly shows his phone from his pocket. That only leaves me with one answer which is my phone. I must've forgotten to bring it here with me.

The ring ends as I go outside to receive it. I go through my calls and see that it was from Amy. What could she possibly need?

With that, I try to call her again. Although it was interrupted when I hear a noise coming out from my room. I shout, "Is everything okay there, Ace?"

"Yeah! Just tripped!" he shouts back.

I hear the rounds of rings stopped. Immediately, Amy's voice takes a trip to and fro my ear as the signal becomes chappy. "Hello?" I greet, although I am replied by a bunch of inaudible noise.

I walk around the house in search for the perfect spot which then leads me to the living room.

"Hello? Can you hear me now?" I ask once more.

"Yeah yeah. I'll make this straight, okay?"

"Okay..."

She takes a deep breath and says her next word with a sense of urgency.

"You need to come here. Now."

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A/N:

Sorry it took so long even when this chapter is just one of the filler chapters of this book. I just couldn't write well this past week since I really don't have the motivation to keep my previous momentum. Also, sorry if you find this chapter crappy. I just forced myself to write this during my writer's block soo XD

Comment down below your thoughts about this chapter! Why do you think Amy called Val? What would this urgent business be?

That's all for today! Happy Reading~ ♡