My boots scuffed on the hardwood floor as I hurried to my feet and rushed down the hall. Once again, knocking was not a concept I was patient enough to use. I pushed through the door to Hunter’s room, taking a step inside.
Hunter sat in a position on the edge of his bed that mirrored his mother’s on the couch. He was hunched over, his face in his hand. His red flannel shirt was half untucked and torn on the shoulder. My lungs sucked in a breath as he looked up from his hands and his hazel eyes landed on me. The tired lines around his mouth and eyes had aged him a decade. There was a white bandage on his temple and a cut on his lip. Still, he blinked in surprise, and began to stand.
“Don’t get up.” I rushed him, reaching for the bandage on his head. “What did he do to you? Where are you hurt?”
Seeing the red beginnings of a bruise on his cheek was making my heart pound harder. Anger seethed in my stomach. Steven had done this. That hulking, nasty excuse of a man had hurt my best friend. I wanted to put the cuffs on him myself. He’d hurt the sweetest boy in the world. He deserved to be behind bars. Forever.
“Charlotte, the EMTs already checked me out,” Hunter muttered as I tenderly ran my fingertips over his temples, searching for anything they’d missed. It wasn’t good enough. He could’ve had internal injuries.
“I think you should go to the hospital,” I said, turning his chin so I could see the bruise on his cheek better. “You could have a concussion. Or a brain bleed. I heard about a kid who hit his head during football and had an aneurysm. You never can be too careful, you know?”
He grabbed both of my hands with his and pulled them gently down from his face. “Char Char, I’m fine. I promise. It’s just a little bump.”
“But you don’t look fine.”
His lips curved into the slightest of a teasing grin. “Yeah, well, you should see the other guy.”
I sat on the bed beside him, still holding tight to his right hand. He turned toward me, our knees bumping.
“What happened?” I demanded. “Bree said Steven came by.”
“Yeah, he came by alright.” He rubbed the back of his head and grimaced. “Drunk and spitting mad. He forced his way into the house, going after my mom.”
I squeezed his hand. My insides were a jumbled mess. Partly from the adrenaline still surging through my veins when I’d first heard about the cops. But also, because sitting this close to Hunter again, holding his hand, was still enough to make me melt like an ice cream cone in the middle of summer.
“What did you do?” I asked, trying to shove those feelings back down.
He wove his fingers into mine and held my hand tight. “What I’d wished I could’ve done a year ago. He punched a wall. Broke our TV. And when he wouldn’t back down, I took him down to the ground. Mom called the cops while I had him pinned. You should’ve seen his face, Char. He was so shocked. I proved to him I wasn’t that kid he could push around anymore.”
My heart pattered violently at the thought of Hunter facing that hulking man alone. I was so grateful he hadn’t been hurt more than a couple scrapes and a bruise. It could’ve been so much worse.
“I’m just so glad that you’re okay.” I stared into his eyes, hoping that I could show him just how serious I was when I said that. It didn’t matter that he didn’t want to be friends anymore. I would always care about him. “I really, really am.”
He stared at me for a few seconds, before flicking his gaze down to the floor. “I’ve got to tell you, I’m kind of surprised you came here.”
I shifted in my seat and huffed softly. “Why?”
“Because of the way I ended things between us.”
He shouldn’t have been so surprised. I was never one to do what I was told. “None of that matters right now.”
He winced and then his gaze slowly slid up to meet mine again. Heavy emotions burned in his eyes. “Okay, maybe, but I didn’t exactly handle things very well yesterday. You should hate me right now.”
Couldn’t he see that I’d never hate him? It was impossible.
I swallowed hard, feeling the emotions flood my voice. There would be no crying today. I had to say this. It was the only thing that had a chance of fixing us.
“When I heard you might be in trouble,” I said slowly, pausing to run my tongue over my lips, “I couldn’t think about anything else. I had to come to you. And listen, if you don’t have feelings for me, that’s okay. I’ll learn to live with that. But I won’t let it ruin our friendship. I need you in my life. I’m not just going to let you abandon everything that’s good between us. I won’t.”
I set my jaw and made myself meet his gaze with as much confidence as I could. I’d already been rejected by him once. My heart was still bruised from that experience, but it was telling me to stand my ground here. Hunter needed me. The defeated and tired way he was slumped on his bed told me that. The beginnings of a black eye and the bandage on his head told me that. Every bit of me needed him, too.
Even if that meant we were only friends.
I’d live with that.
I’d figure out how to muffle that part of me.
Somehow.
“Charlotte...” He sucked in his cheeks and his brows came together as if he were concentrating really hard on what he was about to say. I didn’t dare move a muscle and distract him from working through whatever was going on
