What I Still Hate About You (#2 What I Hate About You) (Wattys 2019)

Chapter 21

I could go back to the hospital. But sitting beside my sister's bed while I'm a huge mess right now was not going to make me feel any better than I already was. And if Mum and Dereck are still there if they haven't already met up with their wedding planner, the last thing I wanted to do is face my mother, wishing I had listened to her all along.

I ended up driving to Nathan's. I know he would make me feel better until I was ready to go back to the hospital.

I dry my eyes as much as I could when I pull outside Nathan's house, but it wasn't enough to hide the redness in them. I walk up to the front door, doing the best I could to ignore the ache in my chest. Only I couldn't ignore it. I burst into tears again the moment I knock on the door. I wipe my eyes, not wanting Nathan or anyone in his family to see me like this, but the tears didn't want to stop.

I hear movement inside and the door swings open. Nathan's older brother Michael stands there.

"Hey, Alex, is everything okay?" he asks me with concern.

I shake my head as I couldn't find the words to form. Michael turns and calls up the stairs, calling for Nathan to come down here. Nathan runs down the stairs and sees me.

"Oh no." He jumps down the remaining three steps and hurries over to me. He passes his brother and steps outside with me and closes the door behind me. "Please tell me it's not about Lindsay."

I shake my head. "It's not," I say, but it comes out in a whisper.

Nathan pulls me into a hug. I sob louder and harder as I buried my face in his chest. He rubs one hand up and down my back, which instantly makes me feel better, and his other hand runs gently through my hair. He tells me it's going to be okay, but I wasn't sure if it will be.

I lift my head. "Nothing is going to be okay. I'm nothing but a fool."

Nathan pushes some of my hair away from my face, then wipes my tears. "You aren't a fool, Alex."

"But I am, Nathan. I should have listened to you, to my Mum and to Lindsay about my Dad, but I didn't."

I wait for him to say something, to ask what happened, but he doesn't. He leads me inside, telling me to go on up to my room while he made us a hot chocolate. I do as he says and climb the stairs, lying down on his bed. It felt good to by lying down after spending the night in a chair.

Nathan comes into his room five minutes later, holding onto two mugs of hot chocolate. I sit up on his bed and take one of the mugs as he hands it to me. I thank him, taking a sip of the hot drink with three vanilla marshmallows floating on top. Nathan closes his door and sits down beside me on the bed.

We sit there in silence with our drinks, sipping carefully so we don't burn our tongues. He hasn't asked me what had happened, but I knew he was waiting for him to tell him.

So I tell him everything that has happened back at the motel. All of the lies I had fallen for. Why did I make myself believe Dad had changed? Nathan sits there silently listening to everything I say.

When I finish talking and I was sure my tears had dried up, Nathan puts his arm around my shoulders, rubbing his hand up and down my arm.

"If there's anyone who is a fool, Alex, it's your Dad," he tells me. "He is the one who put all of this hope into you that he has changed, but really he hasn't. He was playing you all this time."

"I don't understand why he would do that."

"I don't understand either."

"I should have slammed the door in his face when he first came here."