Below the Surface

Chapter Four: Dysfunctional System

Without thinking I raise my beer up, "Hey." I grumble as I sip my beer. He looks at me confused, but then notices Liam and turns his attention on him.

"Jay, this is Liam. Liam this is Jay." I hear Bella introduce them to each other, and I watch as more people appear to be packing inside the house.

"Hey, what's up man?" Jay sticks his hand out to shake Liam's, and I watch from the corner of my eye to see him take Jay's hand and firmly shake it.

"Nice to meet you." Liam says and I can just see the smile on his face as he says that. I mimic his reaction and put the rim of the bottle on my lips and start to chug the beer down my throat.

"I've heard so much about you. Bella is always mentioning you." I gasp midway through my drink, the drink hits the back of my throat and I hunch over as I start choking...again. "Whoa Gaby. You okay there?" Jay's voice echoes while Bella starts patting my back gently and I just throw a thumb in the air.

"We'll be right back." I hear Bella say as she leads me towards the kitchen. I finally recover as Bella hands me a glass of water with a towel wrapped around the cup. I raise my eyebrows at her as I take a drink.

"Thank you." I breathe out, placing the cup on the counter; I glance back to where we were and see Liam and Jay having what looks like a great conversation. "I need something stronger." I mumble looking around, but Bella lightly slaps my face.

"What is wrong with you? You need to relax." She tells me emphasizing on the 'need' and 'relax' I nod my head.

"Yeah, yeah." I mutter as I scan the area until I remember the reason I choked, again. I whip my head over to Bella, "What the hell. You talk about Liam to Jay? That's, like, a rule." It's a stupid reason, but I have nothing else.

"A rule of what?" she exasperates, "It's not like we were anything. We were best friends. You two were the ones that -"

" - Bella. Do not bring it up -" I shut up when I see them coming our way.

"Come on," Jay wraps his arm around Bella's waist, "Let's go outside and talk, it's kind of noisy in here." Bella nods her head and I stiffly nod my head in response. No one makes a move to go outside and when I look at them, I see them all staring at me. "Come on, Gaby. Lead the way." Jay points to the door to my right that looks so far away but in reality is more than five feet away. I look back over to them.

"What." It's more of a statement than a question and I see the panic in Bella's face before I see Jay cracking up, and when I look over to Liam I see him avoiding all eye contact with me.

"Lead the way." Jay repeats patiently, it's one thing that he is school smart but when it comes to socializing he has no clue what the hell is going on, example? The situation right now.

"Oh." I force a grin on my face and twist my body to move but I still can't move. I'm frozen. "I forgot my beer!" I cry out and before I can go and get it Liam sticks out an extra beer bottle in front of my face.

"Here, you can have this one." He says in a tense voice and I'm still stuck in the same place. I can't seem to reach and grab it because now my arms aren't working and all I can do is stare at him. Stare directly at him. I can't even stop myself when I notice him becoming uncomfortable under my intent look because his eyes start to dart in all different directions. Then, I'm being pushed forward, and when I turn to see who it is, it's Bella. Finally I'm moving on my accord and I'm able to lead us to a corner with a couple of sun chairs and a small, circular table. It's not as crowded as it is on the inside, but it is great to be outside to smell the fresh summer air and to hear the cicadas buzzing. I sit down to have Bella sit beside me, Jay sits next to her, and Liam beside me. One small circle. Bella hands me my beer and I sigh in content as I take it in my hands. I pop the top open and quickly sip from it.

Bella sits up in her seat with a smile growing on her face and she giggles, "Liam, I- I'm just so thrilled that you're here!" Liam chuckles nodding his head, smiling at her.

"Yeah, it's great to be back." I watch as Liam takes a sip of his beer with a smile on his lips.

"I didn't even know you were coming back. When did you get here?"

"Uh..." he scratches the back of his neck with his right arm and my eyes travel up and down his muscular arm. Where the hell did that come from? He was never a muscly kind of guy; back in high school he was the tall, lanky kid with little muscle, and now, wow. My eyes travel lower, down to his torso, and through his white t-shirt I can see he's even more muscle. I bite down on my lower jaw and look away in annoyance. How can someone get so fit like that? "I actually got here yesterday morning. I finished my finals last week and then went to visit Leila up in New York." I bring my attention back to Liam at the name of his older sister who I haven't seen in a very long time. "I wanted it to be a surprise. I didn't expect you to be at this party -"

"- Believe me, neither did we." I mutter quietly.

"I was going to come visit you first thing at the beauty parlor you work at this morning, but here we are." He shrugs his shoulders and smiles softly.

"Here we are." I mumble, taking a sip of my beer. I feel a sadness overcoming me, and it's probably because he hasn't mentioned me. He comes back home, and the first thing he wants to do is surprise Bella. Just Bella. There was no, 'surprising Gaby' or any mention of me. I guess that's how much he hates me.

"How long are you planning on staying?" Jay asks and I move my eyes to him and back to Liam scratching the back of his neck.

"I'm staying until the end of summer to go back to school." My eyes widen, my heart stops, and I choke on my drink. I sit up abruptly as I cough out the beer that clogs my throat.

"What!" I shriek in between my coughing fit. "End of summer?" I cough out again. My eyes meet Bella's wide ones and I clap my hand onto my thigh, "That's fantastic!" I exclaim as I clear my throat. "Wow. The whole summer..." I bob my head up and down, and roam my eyes around to see the others confused expressions. I stop at Liam, and I'm angry. I'm angry because he has this shield in front of his face that makes it hard for me to read any sign of emotion. It makes me want to scream. "Carry on." I smile, tipping my beer into the air.

"Anyways - before Gaby has another one of her choking episodes," everyone chuckles at Jay's 'joke' and I slowly start to chuckle, "what college do you attend?" Jay restarts the conversation and I want to slam my head against a wall. College, really Jay?

Hello Loves,

This chapter is probably really crappy, and I apologize for that. I hope you get through the crappiness and enjoy it.

Love,

Mar