Take a Chance on Me

Twenty-one

BEEP BEEP BEEP

I jolt awake to a sharp sound blaring in my ear. I guess I forgot to put my phone on the charger and left it under my pillow. I pick it up and immediately let it go straight to voicemail once I see the name.

Alex

I walk across my room to put it on the charger on my desk, away from my sight so I can try to have a few more hours of rest without thinking of him. It's only 7 AM and Sunday is my day to sleep in. Without him even knowing it, he's making his situation with me ten times worse.

As soon as my head hits the pillow, that familiar, and insanely irritating, sound causes my eyes to open again. I walk over to my desk to check my phone, just in case it's someone I actually feel like talking to. 

Alex

"LEAVE ME ALONE!" I yell, throwing my phone back onto my desk and diving back into bed, pulling the covers over my head. 

"Is everything okay Leah?" I hear Gabby call through the wall that we share. 

"I'm fine. It's nothing. Go back to sleep."

BEEP BEEP BEEP

I don't care, I'm not getting up no matter who it is. This is MY relaxation day and no one is going to ruin it, not even you, Alex. 

BEEP BEEP BEEP

I let it ring until something else, something much scarier wakes me up. It appears in the form of my best friend in my doorway. 

"TURN YOUR DAMN PHONE OFF LEAH. I NEED SLEEP TOO!"

I stare back at her with horror in my eyes as she picks up my phone and clenches it so tight in her hand that I believe she might actually crush it like an empty can of soda. 

"Sorry Gabby." I get out of bed and grab it from her hand. "Won't happen again."

She goes back to bed and I walk back to mine, thinking about how I never want to be on her bad side. Ever. 

I also realize that the only way to stop these calls from Alex is to answer them. When my phone inevitably rings again, I answer it quickly, not only to get this conversation over with, but to avoid pissing off Gabby more than I already have. 

"Hello?"

"Leah? I've been trying to call you all morning. Why won't you answer?"

Is he serious? He must have completely blacked out last night. But him being a jealous boyfriend and assuming that Chase and I were up to something isn't at the top of my list for reasons that I'm mad at him. He consciously, well before any drinking took place, chose to lie to me and let me believe he was sick when in reality he just didn't want me to meet any of his college friends.

"Hmm. What do you think?"

"Come on Leah. Just cut to the chase. What did I do wrong?"

"I guess you need to figure that out."

I hang up. I don't need this right now. If he can't figure out what he did wrong I don't want to waste my time explaining it to him. Maybe his good friend Chase that he tried to kill last night will be nice enough to fill him in. 

-

I've spent my free Sunday afternoon doing my favorite activity - curling up on the couch and binge-watching reality dating shows. Luckily for me, Hulu has many options for this type of television, so I'm going on hour six of laughing and wincing at the complete and utter failure that some of these men call "game". 

"Who wants to take a body shot off of these abs? I won't charge... this time," he calls out to the girls across the pool with a wink. Somehow, he didn't completely embarrass himself because a girl takes him up on his offer. 

"This can't be real!" I call out as if Gabby is sitting on the couch, watching right beside me. Unfortunately for me, our usual Sunday TV days have been put to the side so that she can spend time with Emily. I'm don't blame Emily and I don't feel any sort of disdain towards her, but I really miss my best friend. 

As I'm about to start the next episode, I hear a knock at the door. "Who is it?" I yell as I groan and lazily get up from the couch. 

"It's me, Alex."

Great. 

When I partially open the door, he's standing there with flowers. The look on his face says it all. He's sorry. He's full of regret. He knows he is in the wrong. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to make him explain himself to me. I deserve the truth. 

"Can I come in?" he asks. No, he pleads. 

"Sure." I open the door completely and let him inside. 

"Do you have a vase? I'll put these in some water."

"There's one in the cupboard to the right of the fridge."

I'm trying to hold onto the anger I felt last night. Of course I love that he bought me flowers. I love red roses and he knows that. He knows I love the romance behind them, but I can't let them make me forget everything that happened. After we get though this conversation I'll let him know how much I love them, but until then he will have to wait. 

He grabs my hand and leads us to the couch. While he holds my hands in his and looks longingly into my eyes, he begins. 

"Leah I am so sorry. I'm sorry for being a drunk idiot and assuming that there was something going on between you and Chase. I was so incredibly stupid for thinking you would ever do that to me." He kisses my hands and looks into my eyes, waiting for my response.

"Alex, I wish you trusted me enough to know that I would never do anything to hurt you and I'm happy that you see that now, but that's not even the big issue here."

He inches closer to me. "I know. Believe me I know. I just wanted to start with the small problem before addressing the main issue."

I unleash a visible sigh of relief and he continues. "I never should have lied to you. I thought I had a good reason for doing so but there's never a good reason for lying, especially to you."

I want to believe him, but I need to know his reasoning for not wanting his friends to know about me. "So why did you want to hide me from your friends?" I feel my anger rising inside of me and I pull my hands away from him.

"I want to explain." He shifts closer to me, rubbing my arms. "The reason I didn't invite you is because I didn't want you to think of me in a different light."

What? Why would I think of him differently? 

"When I was in college, I didn't have girlfriends. I had girls, but not girlfriends. And I didn't want one. None of my friends did. You're going to hate me when I say this, but I was the typical college scumbag. I only did one night stands and never gave girls a second of my time unless I was using them."

I knew from the first time I met him on that plane, and the second time that I meant him on that plane, that he had game. He was a smooth talker and I fell for it 100%. I never knew about this side of him, but deep down there was a small part of me that knew he was capable of this type of behavior. 

Suddenly his thumb touches my cheek. He's wiping away a tear that I didn't know had fallen. "That part of me is in the past, Leah. You're my first and only love, and you have changed me for the better. I didn't want you to hear the memories that they were bound to bring up, but I was wrong from hiding you from them. I want you to know that they know about you though. And I do want you to meet them."

I pull him close to me, because I love him too, and because I believe every word that comes out of his mouth. He never should have lied to me and now he knows that. And he knows that I won't put up with it again. 

"I'm just warning you in advance, you're going to hear some crazy shit come out of their mouths when you meet them, but just know that that was the old Alex. The new Alex is crazy about you, and only you."

I put my hands on his face and pull him towards me, planting a soft kiss on his lips. "I love the roses by the way." I place another small kiss on his lips. "Thank you." When I see his beautiful, playful smile finally come out of hiding, I kiss him hard, and he meticulously glides his tongue between my lips, making it dance with mine.

Everyone has a past, but what matters is how they make up for it in the future.