A Twist of Fate (Complete)

Ch. 9 - Heartbreak

"Brad?! What the hell are you doing here?" Everly shouted in shock, looking at him in disbelief.

Was he really standing there, she wondered or was she having some type of mental breakdown? Maybe she was losing it and seeing things.

Brad was standing in the hallway in a dark blue Yankees t-shirt and some faded old jeans with his hands buried in his pockets. His shaggy brown hair was swept to the side under his baseball cap and the last couple days under the California sun had already given his skin a golden glow.

This was the first time she had seen him in person since he hooked up with Amber and seeing him standing there in front of her was like ripping open a wound that had just barely started to heal.

Brad looked down into her face with his dark brown eyes and said, "I'm sorry to surprise you like this Ev but you wouldn't answer my calls or texts. I had to see you," he said with watery eyes, looking desperate. 

Her brain was still trying to process the fact that he was really here in New York City.

"You flew all the way here from California?" she asked in disbelief. "But what about your classes and baseball?"

"I'm missing my first day of classes and my coach is furious about me missing practice but I don't give a shit. I had to talk to you, This conversation was too important to have over the phone."

He exhaled deeply, running his hands up over his face and through his hair, gripping onto it as he started pacing back and forth in the hall.

He finally lowered his arms and looked at her with tears in his eyes. "I screwed up Everly. I know that and I hate myself for it, probably even more than you do. I can't sleep and I can't eat and I feel restless all the time. Seeing you with that guy has made me crazy and I can't stop thinking about what he said."

She could see the torment and anguish written all over his face and his bloodshot, baggy eyes looked like he was telling the truth about not being able to sleep. Even still he was really handsome. He always had been for as long as she had known him.

"Did you really have sex with him, some dude you just met?" he asked, scrunching his eyebrows with his nose wrinkled up in disgust, looking like it pained him to even say it out loud.

Everly looked down at the floor, picking at her fingernails and not answering him right away because she knew she was a bad liar and he would see right through it. She also didn't want to admit that Keaton made the whole thing up to get revenge on him and she just went along with it. That would make her look immature and petty. Plus she didn't want to let him off the hook and put him out of his misery just yet. He deserved all this torment he was going through after what he had put her through. She finally lifted her head and looked at him and he was watching her, waiting for an answer.

She dropped her head and looked down at her hands, and said, "Yes," quietly.

They both stood there in awkward silence for a few seconds before she finally lifted her head again and he looked so hurt, like someone had stabbed him in the chest with a knife. Pain and confusion were written all over his face.

"How could you do that?" he asked in disbelief. "I loved you more than life itself and wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, but that wasn't enough for you. I begged you for FOUR YEARS to sleep with me and you always pushed me away! But somehow this random guy you just met was good enough to sleep with?!" he shouted.

She stood there, stunned by him raising his voice at her. He had never done that before in all the years she had known him. She wasn't sure what to say to that.

"Do you know that literally every single girl in high school wanted me? Every single last one of them! But I turned them all down no matter how hard they threw themselves at me because I only wanted you!" he shouted, pacing back and forth and getting worked up.