Milas Pov
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"So I guess we aren't really a 'party friend group' huh?" The four of us shake our heads at Robert as he sighs.
Harrison had the bright idea of bringing us to his friends party so here we were, the five of us squished on a tiny couch in the living room as drunk idiots are dancing around us, including Robert.
Carter had fallen asleep five minutes in, knocked out on the arm chair opposite our couch.
"You guys!?!" Robert flops down on the couch beside Harrison.
"I've figured out our group name for the seven of us!" Blair narrows her eyes.
"Rob..There's six of us?" She points and his mouth drops open, being strangely offended. "Bartholomew? C'mon Blair you have to keep up!"
She sighs and throws her hands up, sitting on the arm of Carters chair. "We should be called the fluorine's!"
I have zero clue what reaction he was expecting, but by our very dull 'oo' I highly doubt he'd be jumping for joy.
"Get it? Seventh number on the periodic table?" Harrison chuckled to himself as I slap him on the arm, making sure Robert doesn't start crying or something, because he definitely would.
"That's nitrogen." I say out of reflex and Carter does the same, mumbling it slightly before his eyes open, looking directly at me.
"Okay... whatever so we are the nitrogen's?" We all remain silent, much to Roberts disappointment. "You're my thirteenth reason Rob." Harrison says under his breath and I scowl at him.
"Sorry buddy, maybe next time?" Blair pats him on the back before holding out her hand to me.
I reluctantly take it, letting her pull me out from my spot between Harrison and Bentley.
"Cmon you know you want to..." I roll my eyes as she drags me into the main area where everyone is dancing to the beat of the music. "Put your hands on my waist and just go with it."
Blair can be very convincing when she wants to, she used to be much more rebellious or whatever, and Adaline Crawford, her mom, always held a grudge against her.
Then again, It's not like Gabriel Crawford was much of a delight either when we were younger. Always was a stuck up asshole who believed no one was good enough for him or his family, including me. My mother was just another woman to him.
He always tried to convince my father that she was just a silly gold digger, now? She has more power in her pinky finger than he ever did.
"Lia, dancing is a verb, which you may find hard to believe, but it does generally require the movement of limbs attached to this very hot body of yours."
It was almost hard to keep track of all the nicknames I'd been receiving lately... Em, Blondie, Lia and of course, Mila. As Carter refuses to call me much else, unless he's feeling wild and uses the 'love'
It doesn't affect me at all, nope. Not in the slightest, if anything it turns me off, mhm...
Blair holds out my hands and spins me round, making sure I actually take part in the 'verb' she so kindly explained to me.
"Blonde guy. 10 o'clock!" Blair shouts over the music and I do a full three-sixty, totally oblivious to where on earth '10 o'clock' is.
"No you dummie, to your left. He's by the stairs." She waggles her fingers at him after giving me a quick wink. "You should go talk to him."
I glance over Blair's shoulder to see Carter, leaning against the wall, talking to Harrison. His arms are crossed as usual, the purple strobes of light from the projector are shining against his face.
I try my best to ignore his eyes on me, stroking my hands up and down Blair's arms as we dance together. I spin her around and she does the same for me, thankfully my back is to Carter now.
"So I take that as a no?" Blair asks again and before I can even shake my head, a shadow falls over Blair and I.
"Yes Crawford?" I grit out of my teeth as Blair takes a step back from me. "I'm gonna get a drink, okay?" Blair walks back to the guys and drags Harrison with her to the kitchen.
Carter nudges my arm, turning me around so I'm facing him. I try to continue dancing as normally as possible, maybe too seductively if I'm being totally and completely honest.
"Would you just dance with me and stop standing like an idiot?" He shakes his head, running a hand across his jaw, simply looking at me.
"You're not even attempting to dance with me Crawford?" I complain before his eyes drop to my necklace, his name still wrapped around my neck.
He leans down, putting a hand on my waist while whispering. "I'm trying to focus my attention on breathing, love."
I roll my eyes and stop dancing. If he wasn't going to cooperate, then I'd find someone who will.
His eyes burn a hole into the back of my head as I walk over to the blonde guy who Blair had mentioned earlier. He's tall, nice clothes and I suppose he isn't awful to look at.
Carters Pov
I shamelessly watch her ass as she walks away, I can be a gentleman ninety percent of the time, but when it comes to Mila. It's hard to not stare at every inch of her.
She says hi, flirts with him for a minute before his hands move to her waist. It stings a little but it shouldn't, because there's no reason for it to hurt.
But when someone touches what's mine...? I mean, sue me if I get annoyed.
Whenever I think about her, all I see is the song 'Iris.' Emilia Valentina Violet is the embodiment of it. Not necessarily the lyrics or title, just the general flow. Even when we were little, the song has always reminded me of her.
I forget that I'm even at a party when the music speeds up a little and Mila begins to twirl a piece of her hair around her finger, like she always does. Except this time, she was with another guy.
Her eyes don't make contact with mine, they are totally focused on this guy. But her pretty smile drops so quickly when his hand goes on her thigh.
I try to make my way over because I genuinely can't stand this boy, but people keep dancing in front of me and completely blocking my path. All I can do is watch, helplessly as he slides his hand up her skirt.
She tries to shove him and get away but he's got a firm hold on her.
It pains me until I cant physically breathe. "MOVE." I didn't mean to shout but there I was, shouting. People moved off to the side and finally, I make my way over to her.
She's squirming out of his grasp as my fist lands directly against his face. Mila falls backwards and practically lands on the floor while my entire body just takes over.
Harrison and Blair hold her upright when Bentley and Robert go to my sides. Bentley and I crack our knuckles as Robert grabs him by the arms, giving us better access to his stupid face.
"Fuck with our girl again? And we murder you. Got it?" Bentley spits in his face.
The guy is too beaten up to even respond, just sputters and collapses on to the floor when Robert releases him. Piece of shit.
Even the music has stopped and when I turn around, the entire party is looking at the six of us. "Turn the fuck around." Harrison shouts, picking Mila up as if she's a bride and we make our way out of the party.
I have a small, inkling of a feeling that we will never be invited back....
.....
"Blair, I'm fine. I can do this, I have the bloody ring and everything." Mila lifts her hand and shakes her ring finger in front of their faces.
"Yeah and I'm fine too, it makes the most sense for us to do it." They all seem unsure. I mean, I suppose they have a right. I just beat up the guy that Mila got assaulted by.
Both of us are probably not in the right state of mind, yet here we were, ready to play happy families.
"Okay fine, we will wait here." Mila gets out of the car as soon as Harrison agrees and slams the door in my face when she does. I could be mad, but i'll let it slide for tonight.
"Wait up. We have to be a happy married couple, remember?" She whips around to me as I get out of the car, giving me the middle finger.
I eventually catch up to her, sliding my hand in hers while she drags me into the liquor store. Before we even make it three feet towards the counter she's pulling me into the bathroom, ignoring my protests.
"Mila? What are you doing?" Her finger shushes my lips. Rude.
"You cut your knuckles! I mean how on earth do you even do that? Stupid idiot." She mutters to herself, pushing me against the sink and shuffling around in her bag.
After a couple seconds she whips out some bandages and appears back in front of me, unwrapping them until she bites the end of it, cutting the amount she needs.
"You're so stupid Carter. You could have gotten seriously hurt." I wish I could say she seemed annoyed, but it was more worry than anything.
"That's not fair Mila. He was trying to hurt you and I wanted to fight for.. you. I didn't want you getting hurt, I couldn't even breathe just watching it." My body shivers and she doesn't fail to notice.
"If somebody ever hurts you, I'll kill them. You got that?" I say quietly, trying to sound reassuring as she nods.
She continues to wrap my knuckles in the silence of just our breathing and a small drip of water from the toilet. "Our group of 'nitrogen' will get suspicious if we are gone too long."
Mila shushes me... again. Continuing to wrap my knuckles until tying a little knot with the bobbin on her wrist. "Now. Let's just g-"
I don't let her finish the sentence, nudging her chin upwards so our eyes finally, finally meet. Its only for a split second when her eyes go to my tattoos.
She does the usual, tracing a little star on my wrist over the inked star. "It's weird that we have matching ones without even realizing." I nod again.
"You're still wearing your necklace.. I thought you would have taken it off by now." She shrugs and takes a step away from me, opening the bathroom door, back into the liquor store.
"It's my first name until I can give you my last." Her eyes roll back and I cant help but smile, she's mad at me, so she's smiling. In her element I suppose.
I genuinely think if I even attempted to piss her off further she'd bite my head off, but that's just part of her charm.
I hop off the sink and follow after her, picking up the alcohol we need and going to the front of the store. "Can I see your Id?" The guy at the counter asks and Mila turns around to me before he can finish his sentence.
"Baby. Would you grab them out of your pocket." She has a tight smile, a southern accent for whatever reason and her eyes are looking to the pocket in my jeans.
"Sure... baby." I respond in the best accent I can muster up and the clerk raises an eyebrow at the two of us.
"How long have you two kids been together." Mila bursts out laughing, smacking the counter until she composes herself. "Met when we were eighteen and now... nine years later! Here we are, married. We actually have two kids of our own!"
She shoves the pink ring I proposed to her with in his face and his eyes are still narrowed, clearly not believing us. "Baby. I think I forgot our Ids.."
Mila acts surprised, almost like that wasn't totally and completely planned. "Well that is such a pity!" I nod and stand beside her, putting a hand around her waist.
"We really need these, we have to get to a.. housewarming." She says it slowly, thinking on her feet as she talks. And maybe, just maybe she's getting flustered when I place a kiss on the top of her head when she is mid sentence.
"Housewarming..? In the middle of the night...?" We both realized we're fucked when he looks us up and down. We also don't waste any time, Mila slyly takes two bottles from my hand while I hold the others.
Her hand slips into mine and we just fucking run. I hear him running after us, but we hightail it out of the shop, across the street and right towards Harrison's car.
The ground is pure gravel so the clerk behind us is loud and daunting almost, yet Mila's laugh just blocks him out. She's practically dragging me with her until we finally reach the car and Blair pulls us in.
Bentley shuts the car door and Harrison begins to drive and when the Clerk finally reaches us, it's too late. All six of us are laughing, even Mila doesn't have that cute little scowl on her face as always.
"Did our plan not work?" Robert asks and I shake my head. "Blondie over here is not great at acting, truly it was abysmal."
She smacks me over the back of my head, her face returning to the scowl she wears for everyone else.
"One of these days Crawford, I'll push you into oncoming traffic." I hear her mutter and this time I'm smiling.
"Aw, c'mon Mila, now who would challenge you to a periodic table battle if I was gone?"
It sounds stupid when I say it out loud, whenever we argue in class it's always stupid. But I wouldn't ever change that, I liked arguing and challenging Mila, even if she wore a scowl the entire time.
.....
"Does he always just sleep everywhere?" She asks and Harrison laughs. "Not really. Y'know, I actually read yesterday that if a guy can fall asleep around you... it's their inner child feeling safe and loved."
Mila sighs and continues to run her hands through my hair. I very accidentally positioned my head on her lap, then 'fell asleep' as Harrison and Mila just talked away on the beach.
At the start I was bored, pretending to be asleep while Mila told him all the gossip about the girls on their cheer team. But then Mila put her hands in my hair for the last hour and I've just stopped listening until now.
Bentley, Robert and Blair were in the sea, passing around a beach ball that Harrison bought for them.
"I'm gonna go join them, what about you?" He asks and she declines. "I'm kinda stuck here. And I don't feel like waking him up."
I hear Harrison run off towards the others and then it's just the two of us. After a couple moments I open my eyes, pretending to 'wake up.'
"Hi." She's looking at me, a teeny tiny smile on her face.
"Hi." I get up before she practically shoves me off and sit opposite her on the blanket. Her eyes follow my movements.
"You ever feel like you're in a constant dream, like none of this is real." She says quietly, fiddling with the end of her dress.
Whenever I look at Mila, it feels like everything but her is spinning yet she is deathly still. It's comforting, in a way.
"Not really, why? What's so unrealistic about all of this?" I question.
"It's just weird, I've never had a group of friends that I actually like, minus you of course. Harrison, for example, he gets me and it's so strange. I can talk to him for hours and I feel so comfortable. Then Bentley and Robert, they could put a smile on my face by just listening to any of their conversations."
"Blair? She's like a sister. Younger than me but I still feel understood or something, I don't know it's just weird having people."
"And for me? I keep you on your toes." I offer a small smile and she rolls her eyes, again.
"Sure, whatever boosts that ego of yours, right Crawford?" I'm grinning now, she agreed with me for once.
"After everything when I was younger, I mean, I got through it all. I survived. Which sounds stupid but it's true." It's fascinating listening to her talk, I'd genuinely sit here for hours just to hear her voice.
"Remember love, life isn't about surviving the storm, it's about learning to dance in the rain, remembering how bright those pretty stars shine, despite the clouds blocking it." I point to the sky and she glances upwards.
"You have a way with words, strangely." I fake gasp, putting a hand over my mouth.
"Wow Mila, I do believe that was a compliment, and for your sake... I'll ignore the 'strangely'." Her pretty eyes meet mine and she turns her head away.
"You think too highly of yourself Crawford."
"You think too low of yourself Violet." She scoffs, but I'm not wrong.
"Touché."
.....
Author's Note
I should have next chapter up by tomorrow :) As it's mostly written (kinda) But what do we think of Mila and Carter's relationship so far? I'm in love with them both. Cant wait to explore their pasts and everything.
Vote by tapping the screen and clicking the star in the bottom left corner losers.
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Date - 11/04/22
Words - 2983
Reads - 31.4k