Warning: Mild Course Language
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It’s gonna burn for me to say this
But it's coming from my heart
It’s been a long time coming
But we done been fell apart
Really wanna work this out
But I don’t think ya gonna change ya
I do but you don’t
Think it’s best we go our separate ways
Tell me why I should stay in this relationship- Burn, Usher
CHELSEA DIDN’T HEAR FROM JAY until noon the next day. He called her and told her to come over, but something wasn’t quite right in his voice.
Maybe something happened at the party? She wondered as she checked to see if the car was in the driveway. It wasn’t. Her brother must have gone to see Poppy, the girl he’d knocked up, again. With a sigh Chelsea shrugged on her cardigan and resigned that she would just have to ride her bike there. Her boyfriend’s house wasn’t very far away anyway.
She also decided to stop at the store and get some food. Belinda was taking her annual holiday this weekend so the Frost household was without their personal maid, therefore there wouldn’t be any food for them to snack on. Jay had been complaining to her about it for the past week.
The ride down the street was a bit wobbly at first and she worried her bottom lip so much that it started bleeding. By the time she got to the main road her confidence went up a little and she started to peddle faster. In her opinion, she made it to the supermarket in record time.
Locking her bike in the rack, Chelsea headed in and went over to the chips section. She had just picked out a packet of salt and vinegar when she spotted May in the aisle across from her.
“May!” she cried and waved her hand. Her friend’s back stiffened before she started to shuffle forwards. Chelsea frowned. “May? I’m over here!”
The redhead picked up her pace until she disappeared around the corner.
“What the…?” Not being able to make any sense out of May’s strange behavior, Chelsea simply turned back to the chips and grabbed a packet of original. She also snagged a bottle of diet Coke (Jay was going to kill her for that) on her way out.
Just as she was paying she got a text.
Where are you?
That was another thing weird about her day. Jay usually signed his texts off with his name or an ‘I love you’, but now they were just straight to the point. Was he angry with her about something?
No, he couldn’t possibly be. She hadn’t done anything wrong.
“Miss?” the cashier prompted. Chelsea snapped out of her daze and handed him the twenty-dollar note, muttering to keep the change. His text just made her want to get there as fast as she could. That way if she had done something wrong he wouldn’t dwell on it for too long before she explained herself.
She skidded to a stop in front of the Frost mansion and leant her bike against the garage. Leaping up the steps, she pressed her finger into the doorbell and set the bag for food between her feet. It was really heavy.
“Hello Chelsea,” Jay greeted her coldly. Yep, I’ve definitely done something wrong that I’m not aware of.
“What’s wrong Jay?” she demanded. His eyes narrowed.
“Come inside.”
Chelsea followed him all the way to his bedroom, where she set down the food next to his desk. He didn’t offer to carry it for her like he usually would, but she shrugged it off.
“So?” she asked and sat down on his bed. “What’s going on?”
An enraged look crossed his face and he scoffed. “Don’t act like you don’t know. You’ve been found out, Chelsea. That’s all.”
“What do you mean?”
“DON’T PLAY DUMB WITH ME!” Jay slammed his hand down next to her but she didn’t flinch, too shocked that he was actually being violet. That shock quickly turned to annoyance.
“I’m not playing dumb with you, Jay. I seriously have no idea what you are talking about,” she said slowly. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“You’re a whore,” he hissed at her. “You’re a selfish whore and I wish I’d never met you! I wish you didn’t turn up that day during kindergarten for a tour, in that stupid white dress!”
Chelsea blinked a few times. They had met before high school?
“I wish you didn’t smile at me during your freshman year, I wish you never became a part of my study group,” he continued to rant. “And I wish I never ever asked you out! I wish I asked Dani out instead!”
“You don’t really mean that,” she whispered, her face as pale as a sheet.
“Of course I do. You’re a cheating whore just like your mother.”
She sucked in a breath between her teeth, more confused than ever before. Cheater? He was calling her a cheater?
“I didn’t cheat on you, Jay. I have no idea what you’re talking about! I freaking love you, for God’s sake! Why the hell would I cheat?” by the end of it she was shouting.
“You said you loved me but you don’t! Someone who loves someone else doesn’t cheat!”
“I didn’t cheat!”
“Stop lying to me you horrible bitch! Just admit it! You cheated on me like your mother cheated on your father! Like Brad Pitt cheated on Jennifer Aniston! Like-”
“Jay, I have no idea who has been feeding you these lies but I wouldn’t cheat on you. Where’s your trust for me? Is it gone just because someone told you I was with someone else?” Chelsea felt like there was no part of her body that didn’t hurt. “Or did you just never trust me in the first place?”
“YOU HAD SEX WITH ANDY! EVERYONE SAW IT COMING EXCEPT ME!”
“AND ME BECAUSE I DIDN’T FUCKING DO IT!”
To her dismay and embarrassment the tears had started to come, pouring down her cheeks as she looked up at him. He had to believe her or she didn’t know what she would do. This was what she had been wary of since the start- that he would break her and that would be it. She would slip in her studies like all of those other girls and her dreams would be over.
Why didn’t he believe her, though? She was his girlfriend! Who’s word was now above hers?
“Oh, you knew. No wonder he was always at our frates and hanging around your house. Were you having him on the side this whole time? Were you playing him too?” Jay asked, a disgusted look on his face.
She couldn’t hold back the startled sob and slapped her hand across her mouth. “No! I-I- nothing happened between Andy and me! He’s one of my brother’s best friends!”
“Yeah, that was the lie you told me to make sure I knew nothing about your escapades. People like you make me sick.”
“I didn’t cheat on you, Jay! Why the hell won’t you believe me?” Another sob escaped her as she stood up. “Jay-”
Chelsea reached out to touch him, but he slapped her hand away. Hard. She cradled it to her chest before shrinking back; hating the fact that he had this power over her. In her mind she felt like she should be strong right now, she should be arguing back but… her heart felt like it was falling to pieces.
“Don’t touch me,” he sneered. “I can’t believe that you would do this to me. To us.”
“You can’t believe it because it isn’t true!” She fought the urge to add a ‘duh’ on the end, and then wondered if she was getting hysterical.
“There’s too much evidence against you, Chelsea. You wanted to stay home last night and he slept over with your brother, all the time you’ve been spending with him when we aren’t together…”
“I didn’t even know that Andy was staying over last night!”
“Bullshit!”
“You know what?” Chelsea sobbed. “I’ve had enough of this. I’m leaving and you better get yourself together Jay Leonard Frost or I swear to God I’ll kick your ass for doing this to me.”
A flash of insecurity crossed his face.
“Chelly-”
“No! You don’t get to call me that anymore!” she shouted. “Just- just-”
Her words because unintelligible because she was crying too much. In truth, she was kicking herself. How many times had she said that she wasn’t going to get into a high school relationship? Why didn’t she follow her own advice? She felt like poor Alice in Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece.
“It’s over, Jay,” Chelsea managed to whisper weakly. “You don’t trust me and you probably never really loved me. I’m going to go now.”
“No, wait Chelsea! We, we don’t have to break up! We can, I don’t know, do couples therapy or something! We could-” He cut himself off and tried to grab her arm.
“Don’t touch me! Even after all this you still believe that I cheated on you?”
The desperate emotion left Jay’s eyes, “That’s because you did cheat on me.”
She sighed loudly and gave up on him. Marching out of the room with as much dignity she could muster while crying uncontrollably, she slammed the front door behind herself and stared blankly at her bike. The memory of Jay teaching her how to ride it was still fresh in her mind.
“Don’t think about it,” she whispered to herself. “You knew that this was going to happen one day. Teen romances hardly ever last.” But this one seemed so real…
In the end Chelsea ended up like every other sixteen-year-old girl who had been dumped and wrongly accused. She ended up the one thing in the world she promised herself that she would never be: heartbroken.
Just get out of here, she thought desperately. Get out and find somewhere that doesn’t remind you of him.
Holding onto that plan like a lifeline, she climbed onto her bike and shakily began to peddle down the lane. The tears were almost blinding her and she had to constantly wipe at her face, which made her even more off balance. After she turned the corner she pulled herself to a stop and collapsed onto the sidewalk, burying her head in her hands.
Her chest felt like it was on fire and she just couldn’t stop crying. She wondered if this was how Dani felt when she found out about Jay liking her best friend, and then wished that she’d turned him down from the start. Even he regretted asking Chelsea out instead of Dani. Maybe everything would have been better if it went that way.
Then again, she couldn’t remember what it was like to not love Jay. It felt like a part of her would have been missing if she didn’t love him. Something wouldn’t be right with her if he didn’t become a part of her life. She assumed that you never really stopped loving a person and they just faded away over time, which was how so many people dealt with heartbreak.
Their love would always haunt her but eventually she would get over it. In fact, she had to get over it or she might end up like one of those crazy cat ladies.
“Come on Chels, get up,” she said, ignoring the fact that she sounded insane. “You won’t let this beat you. You’re going to do something amazing one day so you can’t let this beat you.”
Foolishly believing her own words, Chelsea stood and picked up her bike. It was still the glossy red that Jay had chosen when they went out to buy it, though there was a chip near the back wheel where she’d crashed it. Despite how much she resented Jay right now, she couldn’t help but smile at the memory of him trying to be Superman. At least he would always be something that she could smile about when she wasn’t reliving how they ended.
Finally, her tears stopped.
Chelsea took hold of the handles of her bike and jumped on, feeling a little bit better after her cry-fest. As she flew down the street she almost felt like she was flying.
Until she crossed an intersection where someone ignored a red light. The last thing she saw were the headlights of the truck before everything went black.
***
I hate writing chapters like this :(
I'm sorry, but everything couldn't stay fine and dandy the whole time. Great song though >>
And that's Chelsea, by the way >>>