Could Tell a Love 2

I opened my eyes and saw little tear stains on my pants. I picked my head up and wiped my cheeks with my sweatshirt sleeve. I sat there for a few extra minutes, calming down so I looked okay. I opened my car door and walked up to the front door. I sighed and opened the door.

"Hey Beau! It’s about time you showed up!" Eric said, getting up to hug me.

"Hey. Sorry I took so long, I lost track of time." I said, letting go of Eric and sitting by Jared, who was on the floor. I gave him a kiss and noticed the three of them had a game of Monopoly going, and it looked like Miranda was winning.

"Hey, since there’s four people now, we could do teams. Me and Miranda, Beau and Jared. What do you say?" Eric asked.

"Lets do it." I said. "Which piece are we?"

"We’re the iron, ‘cause Eric had to steal the money bag from me." Jared said, glaring at him.

"You just weren’t fast enough." Eric said, taking Miranda’s piece off the board and throwing it in the box.

"Now it would only be fair if we started over, since Beau doesn’t have any property to contribute to me." Jared said.

"I guess we could start over, but I was doing so good!" Miranda reluctantly agreed.

"Don’t worry, you’ll get back up there. We’re gonna kick their asses." Eric said, kissing her on the cheek. She giggled and blushed, handing out the money.

"Since we have two people, does that mean we get double the money?" I asked sneakily, smirking.

"Nice try, Beau." Miranda said, laughing, organizing the property cards. "Alright, who’s ready to play some Monopoly?"

"I think we need a planning session, to see how we’re gonna plan out spending our money and whatnot. Give us a few minutes?" Jared asked, putting his arm around my shoulders.

"Alright, five minutes." Eric said, him and Miranda turning away from us, whispering their plans.

Jared and I did the same. "Alright, I say we save as much as we can for Boardwalk and Park Place..." I said.

Jared’s lips met mine in the middle of my plan. I soon figured out that the whole planning thing was just an excuse to kiss me. I smiled and parted from him, blushing. "Did you really need an excuse to do that?"

"I do like a little privacy every once in a while." He said, kissing me again, putting his hand on the back of my neck.

I heard Eric clear his throat. "How’s that planning coming along?"

We parted and smiled. "Wonderfully." We answered in unison.

"Lets do this." Miranda said, rolling the dice to see who would go first.

A little over three hours and two bags of chips later, the game finally ended, Miranda and Eric going bankrupt.

"Damn those hotels and houses." Eric said, scooting all the pieces into a little baggy.

"We just know how to play this game well. It was close though." I said, collecting all the money. "Got any other games?"

"I got loads of ‘em, but I’m kinda hungry. Wanna pick up Matt and Mike and get something to eat?" Eric asked.

"I’ll call ‘em and ask if they’re interested." Jared said, pulling out his phone.

I smiled a little bit, but then it faded. Now that my mind wasn’t on what properties to buy, it was back on how horrible I’ve been feeling about the whole Daniel thing.

Jared picked up on this right away. He rubbed my shoulder while he was waiting for Matt or Mike to pick up the phone. He gave me a concerned look and I returned a small smile, resting my chin in my hand.

"Hey Matt, you and Mike wanna go grab something to eat with us?" Jared asked. "Awesome, see you guys later...huh? Oh, hold on." Jared looked at Eric. "Where are we going to eat?"

"Where else do we go?" Eric said like it was obvious.

"How about we hit up Dairy Queen? It’s a change of scenery." Jared said into the phone. "Sweet. See you soon."

"Dairy queen? Come on, Taco Bell is superior to Dairy Queen." Miranda protested.

"You can live without Taco Bell for once." Jared said, getting up, helping me up. "Matt and Mike are driving themselves, so we can just go straight there."

"Alright, lets go." I grabbed Jared’s hand and went out the door. We got in the car and before I even had time to put on my seatbelt, Jared asked, "What’s wrong?"

I shook my head. "It’s nothing. I just feel really bad for spending so much time with Daniel and not with you." That was true. I did feel horrible for ditching Jared for Daniel lately.

"Well, I do understand that you have other people to hang out with than me, you shouldn’t feel bad." Jared said, looking through my iPod.

"Well, aren’t you worried about anything...happening...between Daniel and I?" I asked carefully.

"Of course, but I trust you enough to know that you wouldn’t do anything." He said, smiling at me.

I smiled back and concentrated on the road instead of the unbearable regret that was building in my stomach. I should’ve never gotten involved with Daniel again. It was stupid to do, I knew this would happen again. I had the urge to beat up my steering wheel, but I restrained myself. I didn’t need Jared thinking anything else was wrong. I just need to tell Daniel that we can’t be as close as we are, that we need to be just friends, nothing more. My head started hurting as we turned into the parking lot, Miranda and Eric following behind us. Matt and Mike were outside their car, waiting. We got out and all headed into the restaurant.

"I’ll pay for it all." Matt offered.

"Are you sure? ‘Cause I could pay for some of it too." Jared asked, pulling out his wallet. "Here. At least take a ten." He handed Matt the ten.

Matt took it reluctantly and we all found seats. The booths weren’t big enough for all of us to fit in one, so Jared, Matt and I were in one while Eric, Miranda and Mike were in the other.

"I WANT THE UNI SEAT!" Matt yelled as he ran over to it and slid into it, as well as the wall.

"Do you think Matt wanted the one seater?" Jared asked as we sat in the double seat.

"No, I don’t think so." I said.

Matt stuck his tongue out at us as he leaned up against the wall, making himself comfortable, grabbing a chair from one of the other tables and using it as a footrest.

When the guy that took our order came back with our trays, he looked a little annoyed at Matt’s obnoxiousness. He went around so he could give us our food.

"Thanks." Matt said, giving him a big smile.

I held in my laughter until the guy walked away. "God Matt, you’re so obnoxious." I said, stuffing a fry in my mouth.

"Thank ya." He said, starting to eat his burger, which looked nasty. Not far into it, he set it down and got up. "I’ll be back. My bladder is in need of relief."

"Go relieve that bladder, Matt." Jared said, shaking his head, picking at his bun.

"So where were you that you showed up late today, Beau?" Eric asked, making me jump. I didn’t know he was sitting behind me with his back towards me.

"I was over at Daniel’s. He’s an art major and he has this awesome room that he’s been painting with random art for the past two years, and I’ve been helping him paint the ceiling." I explained.

"That sounds really cool." Mike said, taking a huge gulp of his soda.

"So he’s decent enough to not get in your pants while you two are hanging out?" Miranda asked bitterly, biting her fry in half.

The mood went down about ten points after she said that.

I sighed. "Yes, Miranda, he’s decent enough to hang out with without getting sexual." I said.

"Surprising." She said, not getting that bitter, sarcastic tone out of her voice.

Conversation kind of dwindled after that. We left all our trash at the tables and left, piling in our cars again.

"Miranda needs to get over it." I said, pulling out of the parking lot.

"Yeah, she really does." Jared said, sighing, looking out the window.

"I need to stop by Daniel’s really quick before we go home. I have to talk to him for a few minutes." I decided. I needed to end this thing once and for all. I couldn’t take it anymore.

"Do you want me to come with you?" Jared asked.

"No, I just need to stop in. It’ll only be a few minutes." I said, turning into his apartment driveway. I turned the car off and leaned over to kiss Jared. "I’ll be right back."

I got out of the car and went into his house. I found him in his bedroom, folding his clothes. I took a deep breath in and rolled my eyes, going in. "Hey Daniel, we need to talk."

He jumped and squeaked a little bit. "Oh, god, Beau, don’t do that. You scared me."

"Yeah, I noticed." I said, resisting the urge to laugh. I couldn’t break my stern composure. "Daniel, we can’t be seeing each other anymore, not like we have been. I’ve been getting more and more stressed about it lately and keeping it from Jared is making me feel horrible. I just can’t do it. Not anymore."

Daniel didn’t say anything and looked at the floor, dropping the shirt he was holding. I recognized it as the shirt I always wore whenever we painted. "Beau, I don’t understand you." He said in a quiet monotonous voice.

"It’s not that hard to get–"

"No, I get that, but you. You confuse the hell out of me. One day you’re all over me and the idea that not telling Jared isn’t so bad, and the next you want nothing to do with me. I swear you’re fuckin bi-polar..." Daniel said, getting angry.

"It’s not that I don’t want anything to do with you, we can still be friends..." I started.

"No! No. That’s not gonna happen. Get out of my house. I don’t want to see you anymore. Don’t bother finishing your painting, it was a piece of shit anyways." He yelled.

I left, absolutely shocked. I held in my tears and slammed the door. Running out to the car.

"Beau, what’s the matter? What did he do?" Jared asked frantically.

I shook my head and shoved the key in the ignition, speeding off.

"Beau! Pull over! We need to talk about this!" Jared yelled.

I ignored him, continuing to drive. "I’m fine."

"Beau. You are NOT fine. Pull this car the fuck over. Now. Before I do it for you."

It was getting harder to keep the tears in. I slowly pulled off to the side of the road and turned the car off, staring straight ahead, trying so hard to keep my strong composure.

"Beau. What did he do to you, or say to you? I’m not letting you go again until I know what’s wrong." Jared took my keys out of the ignition. "Please, tell me." He whispered, an extreme difference from his voice just minutes ago.

"Daniel doesn’t want anything to do with me anymore. He thought that we were together, but I kept telling him that we weren’t, that we couldn’t be. I finally told him today that I couldn’t hang out with him unless he stopped it with the touching and all that shit, then he just went off on me. He called my painting shitty. He said that I was bi-polar and a bunch of other shit.." I rambled.

We stayed silent for a minute. Jared reached over and started massaging my shoulder. "Are you okay?"

I nodded. "I’ll be okay. He wasn’t a loss."

Jared smiled a little bit and handed me my keys. I turned and smiled at him, too, kissing him before starting the car again and heading towards home.

"Beau, I need to ask you something." Jared said quietly.

"Anything."

"When you said that Daniel thought that you two were together, was that because of stuff that you guys did, and I’m not talking about painting." Jared asked.

"Jared, we never did anything, I swear on my life. You can trust me on that." I said, slightly shocked.

"Are you telling me the absolute truth?" He asked.

I turned into my driveway and turned the car off. "Of course I am. Why would I lie to you? If we would’ve done anything, I would’ve told you about it, you know that. Do you not trust me or something?" I asked.

He didn’t say anything for a few seconds, not making eye contact with me. "I want to trust you, I really do, but I don’t know if I can. You keep saying that nothing will happen between you two after you tell me about what he did. You never tell me about what you do. I don’t know if you’re the one that starts it or not, because I’m sure Daniel doesn’t start all of it. I’d like to believe that that’s how it happened, but that’s just not how it works."

"But that is how it happened! I know that’s usually not how it works, but in this situation that is how it worked. And besides, I would never start anything with him while I was with you, I’m not that stupid. I’ve already lost you once by doing that, I’m not gonna do it again."

"It’s just...I’m worried about you, and us. I don’t want you to do what you did before, because I don’t wanna lose you again. I saw what it did to you when I left for those couple weeks, and I wouldn’t want to do that to you again." Jared said, sounding like he was about to start crying.

"Well, you shouldn’t have to worry about that anymore, since Daniel said that he wanted nothing to do with me anymore, so you can stop stressing about that. I don’t like it when you’re stressed, ‘cause it makes me stressed, and I don’t like being stressed either." I said, grabbing his cheek lightly, making a tear fall from his eye. He looked up at me and smiled a little. I leaned over to touch my lips to his. Jared’s hand slipped onto the back of my neck.

We parted, both of us smiling.

"Can you please trust me? I don’t think I could handle you not trusting me." I asked quietly.

Our lips met again, this time with more passion than before.

"I trust you, Beau. Lets go inside, it’s kinda crammed in here." He said, a mischievous smile on his face.

I smiled wider, kissing him again quickly before getting out of the car and going into the house.