Chapter Twenty Seven

Background color
Font
Font size
Line height

Wes ~

I settled Gracie on a barstool in front of me, letting her lean back against me as we laughed at the table with our friends.

Mandy had ordered two rounds of shots for the table and to my surprise put one of my beers on her tab. I think it was some sort of a peace offering and one that I gladly accepted and acknowledged by paying for one of her girly cocktails.

It wasn't much but it was ten times better than her staring daggers in my direction and talking shit when I wasn't looking.

"I think I need some water." Gracie said with a laugh as she leaned against me a little harder.

With so many people buying drinks for the table I hadn't really kept track of how many drinks Gracie had.

"How many drinks have you had?" I asked with a grin.

"Five...no six. Wait big drinks or mini drinks?"

"Those are called shots," Maggie laughed.

"They're mini drinks if you take them in multiple sips the way Gracie does," Mandy joked.

Gracie playfully narrowed her eyes at her friend.

"I can take a shot, I just hate tequila." Gracie said with her competitive side starting to come through.

"Prove it then." Maggie said with a grin.

Oh here we go.

"Are they really about to go shot for shot?" Chad leaned over and muttered under his breath to Blake and I.

"Our girls are about to get real sloppy." Blake joked.

No shit.

"Our girls huh?" Chad asked, wiggling his eyebrows at Blakes admission.

"Fuck right off, I meant the girls we are with." Blake corrected, clearly still in denial.

Maggie slid off her barstool and stumbled toward the bar with Chad rolling his eyes behind her as he followed her to fetch the shots.

They returned shortly after that with three shots and placed them on the table.

"What is this?" Gracie asked, sniffing the liquor.

"Vodka." Maggie said with a smirk.

"Cheap ass vodka." Chad corrected, making a disgusted face.

Great. That's exactly what they all need.

The girls grabbed their shots and raised them.

"Prove us wrong Gracie girl." Mandy teased.

"And if I finish my shot before you?" Gracie sassed.

"Then I'll take the trash out for the next month." Mandy declared confidently.

"You're on."

Gracie raised her glass, tapping it against Maggie and Mandy's glasses.

"To Mandy and Blake, may their love continue to flourish." Gracie said loudly, before tossing her head back and downing her shot.

Mandys jaw slacked open and Blake choked on his beer at Gracie's words, giving Gracie enough of a head start to finish her shot first, slamming her glass back down onto the table, beaming with pride before her body reacted to the bitter burn of the shot.

Gracie's face pinched into a disgusted expression as she fought against the burning in her throat. I grabbed my beer and placed it in her palm as a chaser that she happily accepted and chugged the contents.

"Cheater." Mandy muttered with a sly grin.

"I think you meant to say winner." Gracie corrected with a proud smile.

Thirty minutes later all three girls were absolutely hammered and my sides hurt from laughing at them. Blake, Chad and I had stopped drinking because we had to drive, but the girls were trashed and hilarious.

Standing from her barstool, Gracie stumbled and grabbed onto my arms that were already around her waist.

"I think I'm a little drunk." Gracie slurred.

"You think?" I chuckled.

"Are we leaving?" She asked as everyone started paying their tabs.

"Yeah we're leaving." I said to her, but looked over her head to Blake and Chad who had their hands just as full as mine.

"Whatcha say boys? We going to stay the night at their place?" I asked.

"Yeah." Chad said with a laugh. "Can you imagine the three of them trying to take care of each other?"

That's not happening, they can barely stand.

I watched Gracie take a few unsteady steps and quickly decided to scoop her little drunk ass up into my arms.

"Up we go," I said, lifting her into my arms and using one hand to make sure her dress covered her.

She clung to my neck with her uncoordinated arms and I put her in the passenger seat of my truck, reaching across her to buckle the seatbelt.

"Safety first." She slurred with a giggle.

Closing her eyes, Gracie let her head rest against the seat as I drove us back to her apartment with my hand on her leg.

"Why do you like to punch people's faces?" She asked in a drunken voice that forced a laugh from my chest. .

I turned the question around on her, trying to keep her conscious until we got to her place.

"I don't know, why do you like to study peoples brains?" I asked in return.

"I wanna help people." She hummed with her eyes still closed.

Even when you're drunk, you're still selfless, Gracie.

"Well so do I. I wanna help people learn how to punch faces properly."

Gracie snort laughed at my response.

"Will you teach me how to punch faces?" She asked.

I couldn't help but laugh at the thought of Gracie fighting.

"Whose face do you need to punch, baby?" I chuckled.

"I can think of a few."

Come to think of it, so could I. A little self defense might not be a bad idea.

"Alright, I'll teach you how to punch faces." I said with a smile.

"Thank you...people will be scared of me if I can punch faces like you." She added with a mischievous grin.

"Why do you want people to be scared of you?" I chuckled, mostly because Gracie was one of the least scary people I'd ever met.

"So they won't hurt me." She said shrugging casually, as if it were normal to be threatened with abuse.

Her response made my jaw clenched and my heart crack right down the middle.

"Nobody's gonna hurt you Gracie. But I'll teach you how to fuck them up if they try." I said trying to instill some confidence in her.

"Yeah." She said, scrunching her face into the toughest expression she could produce.

I carried my little wanna-be fighter into her apartment and helped her find a change of clothes.

She stumbled into her bathroom and stayed in there for quite a while. I was just about to get up and check on her when I heard her call out my name.

"Wes?" She called out.

"Right here." I said against the closed door.

"I can't get up." She slurred.

I opened the door only to find Gracie folded into a neat little pile on the floor in front of the toilet. She'd managed to get her dress off and a large t-shirt on, but it looked like she had gone down before she could put the shorts on.

"What happened? Why can't you get up?" I said with a laugh.

Her small hands were trying to gain traction against the tile as if she was clinging to it for fear life.

"If I let go, I'll fall off the earth." She said before closing her eyes tightly.

I grinned and lowered myself down onto the floor with her, settling behind her so she could cling to my chest instead of the bathroom floor.

"Got the spins?" I chuckled.

"Mmhmm." She responded, taking in fistfuls of the front of my shirt.

"I promise I won't let you fall off the earth." I joked as I wrapped my arms around her.

I positioned my arms in a way that left a clear pathway to the toilet in case she got sick which was highly likely if her world was spinning.

Usually this would be the part where I fetched a roommate to take over while I high tailed it home, but not with Gracie. There was nowhere else I'd rather be.

You are reading the story above: TeenFic.Net