It's scary when you've been so used to things for such a long time, you become familiar and acceptable with them. You surround yourself with that one thing because you hope that they won't change and you'll always have everything in order where you can control it.
Until you can't control it.
I couldn't control Shane, I couldn't control him to be the guy I wanted because unfortunately I was under his control.
But I can control the fact that I will no longer let someone hurt me the way Shane did.
I was going to spend this summer laying in bed, trying to think of ways to avoid my life. Maybe join a sex trafficking ring or even joining the circus, being the one who clean's all the elephant shit ya know? But instead I escaped for the summer, to camp.
Being at camp is a whole different elephant shit on it's own.
"Are we getting close yet? It's already dark out and if we keep getting any farther from civilization I'm going to start thinking you're trying to kill me." I said following in Carson's footsteps close behind.
"Be patient young grasshopper, besides if I wanted to kill you, I'd already done it."
"I'm a grasshopper now." I retorted while shaking my head, "What are you my sensei?"
"Is that our new sex role play? I chain you up and teach the ways of martial arts and in exchange you give me a b-"
"If you don't stop talking I will shove a turtle up your throat." He let out a throaty laugh at my response before looking over one of the tall trees and grabbing my hand.
"It's right up here." He quickened his pace and I could feel my heart beating faster and faster.
He was just holding my hand and I was having a mental breakdown.
"You like to hold my hand a lot." I said looking down at our hands connected but not intertwined.
"I like to hold my little sister's hand too." He said pulling me to make me walk faster.
Ouch.
That's when I saw it.
Carson looked over at me and gave me the hugest smirk, gazing upon my reaction. The grasslands were nothing compared to a fucking waterfall, it had a high jump and the water was clearer than Sebastian's fish bowl.
We'll talk about Sebastian's fish bowl later.
"How come we don't hear the water falling at camp?" I said completely confused at where he had taken me. "When I fell on that branch back there, was it because we were entering a different world and I was getting whiplash?"
"You caught me Jones... Welcome to Narnia." We both started to laugh but the sound of the waterfall died it out.
I walked closer to edge of the stream and stuck my hand in the water, I was immediately taken back seeing how it was surprisingly colder than I'd imagine. I turned around to ask why the water was so cold and found a stripping Carson, no longer wearing pants.
Jesus help me.
"What are you doing!" I turned away to hide my growing blush and mentally kicked myself for feeling this way.
"I'm getting in, c'mon Bree you only live once." He smirked before doing a giant cannonball in the water. It was dark but I could still see moonlight glistening upon his abs, and muscular arms. They shaped him perfectly and it was hard to admit how amazing his body actually was. Whether it was from soccer or baseball, maybe it was because sex, he did say 'fucking is a sport.'
I thanked the lord it was dark out because at this point I was the shade of Barbie's car.
"Are you getting in? The water's nice and cool." He was no longer facing me but I could still hear the subtle hint of amusement in his voice.
"You want me to get in that water wearing just my bra and underwear?"
"No actually I was wondering if you'd put on my clothes and then jump in." I couldn't help but laugh at his sarcastic remark as I watched him dip his head underneath.
Stay here and watch him be naked like a creep or get naked and watch him be naked like a civilized person?
Fuck it.
"Turn around."
"What? Why?" He playfully laughed and shook his head while turning around.
"I'm not giving you a full show without payment sir, that's not what my pimp says is right." I scoffed and turned myself around so that we were now back to back.
I wasn't as self conscious about my body as other girls, I have to wear leotards practically every practice.
But that was a gym filled with girls.
Not Carson.
I carefully took off my shoes and socks and I could hear Carson talking to me in the distance, "If I had a penny for every time you insisted on something and forcefully made me do it, I'd be rich."
"If I had a penny for every time I looked at you and saw a smart and talented young man, I'd be broke." I laughed at my joke before unfolding the flaps of my shirt and unbuttoning the top. It was times like these I thanked Jesus for blessing my mother to buy my bras and underwear for me.
If I bought them, they would be sport bras.
"Wow I'm glad you think about me a lot, it really makes me feel special. If I had a dollar for every time I looked at you and... saw... a..."
I threw my shirt on the floor and took my hair out of the usual messy bun that it was in, letting my hair fall down to my lower back. I turned around to see Carson's body facing me, but this time he was looking down at the water, his head was hung low.
"You okay?" I said wrapping my arms around my body to hide... well, my body.
"Yeah... I just... I turned... I saw..." I stared at him with confusion as he looked down at the water, he sighed before pushing his hair back and looking up at me again.
"I thought I saw a bear or something, but it was just you." He gulped and put on his smirk again, it was a faint smirk.
But it was his smirk.
"Oh shut up." I walked to the edge of the water and dipped my legs in, it was cold but not unbearable to the point where someone was going to have to thaw me out like a popsicle.
He walked closer to me and wrapped his arms around my legs. "How angry would you be if I dragged you in right now?"
"Beyond angry, the word 'angry' wouldn't even qualify to fit my adjective."
"I'll take that."
Before I had another word I felt him drag me down with him, sending the cold water everywhere. It gave me goosebumps and I was gasping for air by the time I came back to the surface, my hair was splayed out all over my face and I felt like I'd been slapped in the face by FroZone.
"You... d-dumbass." I said trying my hardest to keep my head over the water, you couldn't hear my splashing over his laughing.
"I know you get offended by people calling you short but, Bree you're short." I continued to struggle keeping myself up and Carson seemed to notice that by the way he grabbed my waist and pushed me to edge of the streams wall.
"W-what are you doing?" I said equally out of breath from him and the stream.
"I'm keeping you upright, I'll keep my hands on the wall and you just hang on to my arms. That way you won't be panting like a hyena because you can't even touch the stream's floor." He grinned down at me and I rolled my eyes. I tried to calm my breathing down but nothing seemed to be working and my heart kept beating faster and faster.
It wasn't the stream anymore.
"Calm down Jeez, you're going to over-hyperventilate and then people are seriously going to think I tried to kill you."
"You're like the guy from Saw, you torture p-people."
"That's a little over dramatic." He chuckled and raised his arms higher so I could get a better grip.
I was practically being straddled here.
"You have abs." He looked down at my stomach and my first instinct was to cover myself, even in this cold water...
Just a look from him makes my body on fire.
"Yeah well press-handstands and pull ups can do that to you, I don't really like them though. They make me feel all manly." I shook my head and looked down at my stomach.
"Manly?" He scoffed, "Bree you eat 3 hamburgers in under ten minutes and play baseball with the boys like a rabid dog, and abs make you feel manly?"
"I love meeting new people." I said trying to contain the smile on my face.
"Why's that?"
"Because when I beat their ass in a sport, the look on their face is enough to make my entire birthday."
"Wow. Creative." He laughed. "I'm more of a annoy you until you want to die kind of guy. I have to give it to you, you stuck with me for a lot longer than I anticipated."
"Like I had a choice, I'm just staying true to my end of the deal." I scoffed once again, this time grabbing my hair and putting it back into it's messy bun.
"Bree, the deal ended four days ago." He smirked down at me and grabbed my hair tie before ripping it with his teeth.
"It's not like I'm just going to see you in the dining hall and be like 'Carson, how've you been? Remember when I hung out with you for two weeks against my will?"
"So you're hanging out with me purely to avoid awkwardness?" He said with much amusement.
"Pretty much, also Austin, I'm hanging out with you because Austin. Oh and Mickey, can't forget Mickey. Sebastian too, on a good day. Plus your-" He covered my mouth and snickered.
"Okay I get it Bree, you're not hanging out with me because you like my company."
I licked his hand and he pulled away in shock, looking down at his hand.
"Did you just lick my hand?"
"No it was the bear." I bit my bottom lip and gave him an innocent look, the exact look he told me not to give him earlier.
That's when he did something that I was sure to haunt me for the rest of my life.
He ran his tongue from my collarbone up my neck and right underneath my ear and whispered "Sorry it was the bears."
The chills.
I could feel the goosebumps all over my arms at his hot breath against me, I wondered if I had the same effect on him that he does on me.
Probably not.
"You're so gross." I faintly giggled, giggled, I actually giggled.
When did I giggle?
"You know what? I think you're in denial, I think you don't want to admit to yourself that you're deeply in love with me and want to have my many children in Ohio with our sweet little dog 'Yappy.' And our playground swing set with stickers of bananas on it because our youngest as a weird obsession with bananas that we tried taking her to the physiologist for but nothing worked so we ended up embracing it and she wore a banana costume for Halloween. We like her better than our oldest son because all he does is play his die hard punk music and scream teenage angst at us and it's stressing us out because you have to finish your cooking blog and I have to finish my papers or my boss will kill me so I end up getting a motel for the night where I do my work, you end up finding about the motel and immediately think I'm cheating so we get into a big fight. We end up divorcing and you keep the house and the kids and I keep my ties and we split our separate ways, and every time I'm at the bar and someone asks me about you I shit-talk you but it's fine because you shit-talk me to your 50 Shades of Gray bookclub."
I stared at him with my mouth hung open before busting out in hysterical laughter, the kind of laughter that makes your eyes water and your stomach clench. The kind of laughter that makes you go red because you can no longer breath.
"What?" He struggled to keep a straight face and looked at me intently.
"First of all, our dog would not be called 'Yappers' because we're both way to creative to let that slide. Secondly, our youngest might be obsessed with bananas but that's okay and we accept her for it. We wouldn't divorce over a fight about a motel but that doesn't mean I still won't shit-talk you at book club, you know how nosey Margaret can be. And lastly, god forbid I ever live in Ohio."
"Where would you like too live Ms. I'mtofancyforOhio?"
"In the woods, among the bears." Carson started laughing at my response and I couldn't help but join him. I went to reach and grab my hair tie but huffed when I realized that Carson broke it.
"Why'd you rip my hair tie?"
"You look better with your hair down, it's long and wavy. Show it off." He used one of his hands to grab my hands off my hair, leaving my messy hair down to float in the water.
"You're lucky, your black hair always stays the same, even in the water."
"You're right, guys have it better." He said shrugging his shoulders.
"You agree?"
"Guys don't have periods."
"Wow, I think I like you even more now." I said pinching his cheeks, as soon as I said it I wished I could take it back.
I don't like him, I couldn't like him. I couldn't like any guy, at least for the sake of my own well being.
Especially a guy like Carson.
It's purely attraction and not a lot at that.
"Oh really?"
"You know what I mean." I said trying my hardest to hide my blush by looking away.
It has to be unhealthy to blush this much.
"Let's play twenty questions."
"Really?" I said facing him again, he looked somewhat serious which brought my anxiety down a lot. At least he knew how to change conversation fast.
"Yeah, I want to figure out the mystery of Bree Jones." He wiggled his eyebrows and I punched his arm playfully.
"Okay, but on one condition."
Sorry for the late update, I've been really busy on vacation and all<3
What's your favorite part of this chapter?
What do you think the one condition is?
Did you see the progression from Bree this chapter?
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