Something between Us

Chapter 26.

The quiet is peaceful, Chase is working on piecing together his favourite clips of our video footage and editing them onto the hard drive. While I type up out our analysis of the process of working on the project together.
I being with talking about how uncertain I originally felt about working with Chase, compared to now and how I realise all along it must have been fate.
I go on to discuss my views on the purpose of the assignment, how I didn't really see much of a point to the project in the first instance. The project didn't really feel academic, it seemed pointless to reflect on a time that was almost over.
But then my mind completely changed.
I slowly realised that High School is the most important thing to me right now.
That one building and the people that filled it shaped me and changed me in ways that don't even seem possible when you're so young.
I believed I'd find who I am once I went off to college... But I soon realised, I was already on that path because my time here showed me exactly who I do and don't want to be.
I never wanted to be the stereotypical Cheer Captain mean girl, so I wasn't.
I wanted to love unconditionally and unapologetically and I have.
I wanted to learn the beauty of self love an I did.
High School feels like your whole world while you're in it and it's true. It nurtures your hopes and your dreams for years.
What I have leant is we shouldn't let the experiences we have during our time there define us or our futures. These moments should mould us. But they should not define us as we are always growing, forever evolving. 
I look up from the silver laptop screen to see Chase smiling at the camera.
I can hear in the background he's watching the footage of me talking about what being Cheer captain means to me. His eyes glisten in happiness as my high pitch voice talks to him on the video camera and I remember why we always end up back here.
After every fight and every tear. Because there something connecting our hearts in a way only we will ever understand.
When I look back at the laptop screen my delicate fingers type a little more.
I being to talk about how High School gave me the chance to learn every angle of love, and how my childhood was so focused on my friendship with Chase.
It was nice to find an identity of my own. As a child who I was rested in who Chase seen me as. In  High School is the place where I found my own independence and stopped relying on others for my happiness. It's the place where  realised I could have both.
I could love myself and be my own person with independence while loving another with every bit of my heart.
I allowed myself to let happiness in from other sources, not because I needed them but because I wanted them.
I stop typing for another moment, there's so much more I want to write  but I try not to over
do it.
I write the essay until I feel I've wrote enough for the day.
I need to figure a few things out before I categorically say what High School truly means to me.

The evening started off so tense.
Chase stood at my car nervously with his hands locked in his pockets waiting for something from me. 
Now, he's laid casually on his back with head head resting on a pillow bridge against my white walls, content in the silence watching videos of our time together the past couple of months.
He looks so at peace, so happy and so pleased. These are moments that remind me, I'm not ready to ruin them just yet.

Maybe I should have told him everything that happened with Charlie. Maybe I should have confessed my anger towards him because of someone else's actions. 
I could talk for hours of maybe's and what if's. 
But the truth is. I can't force myself to share a part of my history with someone when I'm not ready too. 
I have to put myself first in this and for me holding this information back from Chase s protecting me and believe me I need that protection for a little longer.

I know now Chase didn't tell Charlie we slept together. He told Charlie he was falling in love with me and planned to ask me to be his Girlfriend. He wanted to know how long he should wait to ask me. He didn't want his fathers advise he wanted brotherly advise. I hate that Charlie wasn't the brother Chase deserved. I despise that a woman like Julie and a man like Stuart were sent the devil's spawn. The didn't deserve that. He didn't deserve their loving arms and caring home.