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© 2016 Shay Spencer. All rights reserved.

The Buddies Rule

Chapter 4

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The entire ride back to campus, there wasn't a single word spoken. The silence ate away at me with every passing minute that we sat in the car. At least Lewis had been able to ride along in the back seat, simply scrolling on his phone. I had been stuck up front, sitting right next to the mad man himself. Even when getting out of the car, Chase strode off without a word.

"Chase!" I tried calling after him, only to be left stuck in the same silence from before. Chase had left both Lewis and me without one explanation as to why he had been acting so weird. I was still just as confused as I had been before.

I rolled my eyes as we watched Chase's figure slowly fade into the distance. The bell would be ringing any minute now, and I wouldn't be having any other classes with Chase for the rest of the day. I wasn't even completely sure if we shared the same lunch period. There was no way to know when we would have a chance to talk about this.

"What crawled up his-"

"Stop it," I warned, holding up a finger to Lewis to stop him. "I hate it when you say stuff like that." Lewis held up his hands in defense, the two of us walking along the black pavement together.

"Did something happen before that? Before Zac asked you out?" Lewis spoke, following just behind me as I stepped up onto the sidewalk. I shook my head, not wanting to discuss this with him. "It sure seems like more's going on."

"No."

My friend laughed gently and shook his head. "You sure about that? Cause you said you two got in a fight before you met up with me-"

"Okay." I groaned, running my fingers through my dark brown hair. "Maybe Chase and I got into a fight last night, too. Things started to change a couple of weeks ago. We started fighting, and I really don't know why." I finally breathed, feeling a slight weight being lifted from my shoulders. I hated talking about Chase and I's friendship if things weren't going as they usually do. The only good part about talking things out was Lewis understood. Especially since he was on the rocks with Alan right now, as well.

"What have the fights even been about?" Lewis scoffed. Seeing as Chase had gotten so angry over the stupidest of situations, I wasn't surprised that Lewis was asking.

"Nothing," I said honestly, my mind falling back to the night before. "We're not even fighting about anything."

"And you two were fine last time we saw you guys," Lewis recalled, motioning to me as he did. The four of us had met up nearly two weeks before for dinner at one of our favorite pizzerias in town. Everything had been fine until then. But since that dinner, things had been off between all four of us. Forgetting the fact that Chase and I had been fighting, or that Alan and Lewis were on the outs with one another, the four of us hadn't met up as a group since that night.

"Yeah." I nodded as I came to the realization. Chase and I had been perfectly fine until that dinner 'date' with the boys. "Did he and Alan ever talk, alone?" I asked, trying to remember for myself. Alan knew how I felt about Chase and had for a while now. If he really did have feelings for me and said something to Chase the other night, our group really was in big trouble.

"You think Alan said something to Chase? Like about his feelings for you?" Lewis asked, his eyebrows popping up in surprise. I shrugged, almost feeling exhausted by the conversation. Which, was the last thing I needed considering I still had classes to attend. It was barely ten in the morning.

"I don't know. Chase will be fine. Let's just drop it." I spoke gently, trying to brush off the topic.

"No, he's not," Lewis kept on. "He's got something going on, and I think the term we're looking for is jealousy," he sighed.

Lewis did have a point. Though I wasn't taking his side about the jealousy thing, there definitely was something going on with Chase. I just needed to figure out what it was, on my own. Getting Lewis or Alan seriously involved in my little Chase investigation, could ruin our friendships. Besides, Chase was my best friend. What would he have to be jealous about?

"He is not jealous." I shook my head, clutching my phone tightly in my hand. I always found myself trying to squeeze the life out of inanimate objects whenever Lewis got this persistent about something. "And what would he be jealous of? Your killer bowling skills?" I shot back snidely, giving Lewis a quick glare as we continued down to the center of campus.

"He's jealous of Zac, idiot," Lewis laughed smugly. "One thing you might be blind to is just how much Chase is in love with you. And it's evidently the same from you to him since we all know how in love with him you are." Lewis' voice had carried just enough to catch the attention of the man walking ahead on the path. At least twenty paces in front of us, the man stopped and turned around to reveal one of our best friends. A best friend that I hadn't seen in what seemed like forever.

"Alan?" I called, watching as a smile spread across his face. I picked up the pace of my steps, trying to get to Alan as quickly as possible. I knew just how awkward it would feel to be near Alan now knowing his true feelings for me, but Lewis was getting on my nerves with the whole jealousy thing. I would much rather stress over keeping up a conversation with Alan than having to discuss Chase's feelings for me. Or my feelings for Chase, for that matter.

"I thought I heard you and Lewis talking." Alan greeted happily before he lazily tossed his left arm around my shoulders.

"It's kind of hard to miss one of Lewis' rants." I laughed back at Alan. Lewis raced to catch up to us, his breathing becoming irregular by the time he was able to stand next to us.

"Hey, buddy," Lewis mumbled, fixing his hands around his backpack straps. Alan nodded over towards Lewis as a reply. The two weren't even trying to seem cordial with one another.

"How was bowling, Bree?" Alan mused, pulling me forward with our third member following slowly after.

Lewis' face scrunched up at the mention of our first class. There was a weird air between the two of them, one that I had never felt before. Alan and Lewis had always clicked in the way that best friends usually do. But things seemed to be changing a lot within our group. "Why should we tell you?" Lewis muttered, cutting into the conversation as his sight fell to his feet.

Alan quickly let out a sigh as he shook his head. "I was just asking Bree how she thought things went. No need to get defensive. I'm sorry that the admins messed up my schedule-"

"Oh yeah." Lewis laughed, a snider tone to his voice. "The admins messed it up."

Alan rolled his eyes. "You already interrogated me about this once. Why go through it again?"

"Because," Lewis paused as we came to a stop outside the school's newspaper classroom, "we made a pact. The four of us were going to take one class together every semester, and then you had to go and f- it up." Lewis reminded without skipping a beat.

Around mid-first semester last year, after the four of us had met at one of the infamous university donor parties, we had made a pact to take at least one class together per semester. That way, we would still have time carved out during the school day to see each other. It was days like these that reminded me just how little the four of us actually saw each other. If Chase and I didn't live together, who knows where our friendship would be.

"Okay, okay." Alan let his arm fall down to his side, allowing for me to look him over. There was something off about Alan. It seemed normal to a point like I had seen him act this way before, but I actually knew what was different this time. The way Alan looked back at me, the way his eyes met mine, it was a look I hadn't really seen on any other person. He had love in his eyes for me, and it was kind of freaking me out.

I can solidly confirm it now: everyone was acting weird.

"Are you going to explain why you decided not to take bowling with us?" I finally spoke, breaking the seemingly creepy eye contact between myself and Alan. I glanced over to my left, watching as Lewis nodded vigorously back at his best friend. The look on Lewis' face was enough for me to tell that he was silently urging Alan to finally come forward. Come forward about the bowling class, and about his feelings for me. Not that Lewis hadn't done that already.

"I wasn't looking forward to having this conversation with you guys." Alan started as he tipped back and forth on his feet. "But I actually failed English last year... Both semesters. I needed the extra block of time to help me graduate with the credit this year." Alan finally revealed. I could feel my thoughts begin to cloud over with the mention of Alan retaking English three. No wonder he needed the extra time. He would be doubling English, taking both the three and the four classes.

"You're, not enrolled in the two-thirty, three-day-a-week class, are you?" I asked lamely, the hesitance evident in my voice. Every fiber of my being was screaming that I shouldn't have asked, that I should have run right down to the admin's office within that exact second just to change my course schedule for the year. Just to avoid having any extra alone time with Alan.

"I actually am." Alan smiled, a smile that took over the majority of his face. One that told me just what I needed to know. Though I had believed Lewis when he had told me of Alan's feelings, I could see clearly just how in love with me Alan was in this moment. "You're in that class?"

I was nodding before I even had a chance to catch myself. "Yep." I kept my words short, simple. Alan and I were already enrolled in the same majors, as it was. We had both gotten into English, separately. I was going after a minor in creative writing and him with a minor in journalism. The whole reason we were standing outside of the newspaper classroom was because we had journalism together this hour.

"Well then. I think it's going to be a good year." Alan mused with a wide grin. I nodded, instantly regretting even bringing it up. Without another word, Lewis turned and stalked off in the other direction, leaving me alone with Alan for the first time in weeks. "You ready to make up some school news?" Alan teased before holding out a hand to me. I smiled numbly as I took his hand. Before I knew it, I was sitting next to Alan and being assigned as his journalism partner; for the entire semester.

How lucky am I?

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Kind of short, but it does the job.

How did everyone like Alan? He's got a creepy lover vibe going, but that's Bree's third love interest if you've been keeping track.

Side note:

I've felt insanely bad over this last month for hiding these chapters from you guys. I've had them both done for weeks now, and I thought that was getting stupid.

This story will now be updated once every two weeks! That means one chapter every two weeks instead of two, but the updates are more frequent.

The next update will be on the 14th of July!

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PS: Happy early 4th of July Americans 😜 and happy early 2 years of The Engagement Rule!