I never was the type to quickly get angry. I mostly was in control of my emotions and tried to get along with people as nicely as possible. Jaxon used to tease me then of how he had never seen me get angry, no matter what anyone did to me. The truth was I do get angry, but I had never taken action in anger so that I wouldn’t regret it later. It was something my grandma had taught me.

Friday night was the first time I had actually acted while angry, and to someone I actually liked. It made me feel...uncomfortable.

How could someone evoke so many emotions in me? One moment I liked him and want to always see his handsome face, the next, I want to harm with anything I've got, then there are times I wanted to cry because of him.

Standing by the sidewalk and staring into Ryan's captivating eyes, I could feel that surge of anger coming through as I remembered what he'd said to me, and he didn't even look one bit remorseful now. He was sitting in the driver's seat of his car, one hand on the steering wheel with a scowl on his face and his eyes challenging me to defy him. I knew that if I got into that car, I might do something stupid like I did before.

“No.” I stared right into his eyes and tried to maintain my stand as I was done with him. I didn’t want anything to do with a guy as selfish, arrogant, self-centered, and a jerk like him. He thought he could just ignore me, then talk bullshit to me, and I would act as if nothing happened? Well, he was very wrong.

“Just get in the damn car, Samantha.” He said my full name. He never said my full name when we were kids unless he was really pissed off. Like the time I promised we would have a sleepover when I was twelve and forgot. Yeah, he was pissed. He wouldn’t talk to me for two days and would only call me by my full name when he needed to.

Why was he here, anyway? Didn’t he have football practice or somewhere else to be?

I tried to calm myself down, exhaling, and unclenching my fists, wanting to hear what he had to say.

I went for the passenger’s door and got in, not glancing at him but out the window with my arms folded across my chest as he drove off.

The car was filled with silence as none of us made a move to say anything. I kept my gaze out the window until I noticed that we weren’t headed in the direction of my house.

“Where are we going?” I asked but still didn’t stare at him.

“You’ll see.” He replied. Okay, he was not a kidnapper, so there was no need to panic. I just needed to relax.

He kept driving for about forty-five minutes before we arrived at a park. I knew this park. We used to come here when we were kids, just the two of us with Jaxon, sometimes Kira tagged along if she wasn’t with her friends.

The park wasn’t filled like how it would be on Saturdays, but you could see some old couples cuddling on the benches, toddlers crawling on the grass, and some kids running around playing hide and seek, and on the slides also. Seeing all of this made me remember how we used to come here almost every day after school. We would first hurry home to change before Ryan’s driver would then drive us here, of course, after letting our parents know. I missed that. A lot had changed. I guess you could say we had grown up.

“Why are we here?” I swallowed past the lump forming in my throat still reminiscing about the past as I stared longingly outside.

“Come on.” He said and opened his door to get out. I got out too and found him leaning on the hood of the car, just looking at the view with his hands in pocket. For a moment, I waited to just admire the way the breeze blew through his hair, and how he ran his hand through it like he was nervous, his Adam apple bob anytime he swallowed. Just then, he turned to stare at me with his warm brown eyes making my breath hitch.

I breathed out and went to stand beside him, looking straight at the park and watching the leaves of the trees dance in the air with the wind.

“Why did you bring me here, Ryan?” I asked once again, still waiting for an answer. I shouldn’t forget I was still pissed at him, so I faced him with a blank stare, not showing that the park affected me and brought back old memories.

“Do you remember the first time we came here together, and you wanted me to try the slide? But then I was so scared, I nearly peed my pants.” I couldn’t help it but burst into laughter with him. I recalled that day vividly, he had climbed only three steps up the metal climbers before his eyes started to tear up due to his fear of heights, and before I knew it, he had started to cry real hard, attracting kids of our age attention making them laugh at him.

God, I had felt so embarrassed and guilty that day. Embarrassed of the attention we were attracting and guilty for making him climb up there, and even though he was nine then, he had looked like a five-year-old with his short stature.

“I cried so hard, my face turned red, and it was only when a kind man came to help me down did I stop crying. Of course, everyone then thought I was a weirdo and made fun of me a lot.” He continued to say with a big smile on his face and a faraway look in his face.

“That was the first time I had tried getting on a slide. It was also the first time I had even gone out with anyone around my age. Usually, my parents would try to get me out of the house to play with the other kids, but I was just so shy, nervous, and insecure around others. Until you.” He glanced at me while saying the last part, and we stood there staring at each other with little smiles playing on our lips.

What he said reminded me about what Lauren, his mother, had said. Of how he usually just kept to himself and that I was the first person he had been so close to.

“Samantha Kendall, you were the first girl...the first person I could be myself around and have nothing to worry about. You were the only person who wasn’t my family and still wanted anything to do with me. You didn’t care about my tiny stature or that I was a freak and different from others.”

“Ryan...” I wanted to refute his statement. He wasn’t a freak then, he was just unique.

“Wait, just let me finish.” He shushed me, then paused for some seconds before he continued.

“When you left, I thought that maybe you didn’t want to be around someone like me. I felt so depressed that I didn’t even recognize myself. How’s that even possible? That someone could make you feel like that?” Oh, if only he knew that it was the same with me. The nights I cried at how much I missed him and thinking he hated me, I had thought I had a problem or something.

“The truth was that you leaving had affected me, a lot and I didn’t know why but I knew that calling you wouldn’t have been enough. I realized then that I had been dependent on you that I couldn’t even live my life on my own. So I tried getting you out of my system by cutting all ties with you.” His penetrating eyes moved to me then while I stood rooted in one spot, not able to break eye contact with him.

Some seconds passed before he broke the contact and glanced forward. “I joined the football team and worked so hard that I got selected to be the quarterback. I tried getting new friends, I even got myself a girlfriend and thought it was all working out. I thought I finally didn’t have to depend on you and was my own self.” I could see a faint smile on his lip until it disappeared again.

“But then you came back, and everything seemed like I had just been kidding myself. Suddenly football didn’t matter, my friends didn’t, nothing compared to you. And it made me so angry that you could just come and turn my world upside down, just like that.” I kept quiet all the while listening attentively to him.

“Maybe that was why I had tried to hurt you on Friday night so that you would distance yourself from me. But the thought of you not wanting anything to do with me just...it frightens me. Why is that? Am I really that much of a freak.” There was a hint of panic in his voice, and I knew that was my cue to step in.

“If that makes you a freak, then I’m a freak too.” I quickly said, making him look at me with furrowed eyebrows.

“The truth is everything you just said defines what I’ve also been feeling this past four years. I don’t know why Ryan, but the thought of you actually hating me frightens me too.” I could feel my eyes getting blurry from tears that I tried to hold in, my throat felt really dry as I try to get those words out.

We stood there staring at each other, his eyes roaming around my face like he was trying to memorize it. While me, I was just drowning in those perfect brown eyes. I felt like I could look at those eyes all day and not once get tired.

“I miss you so much.” He whispered as he took a step closer to me, almost eating up all the space between us.

“I miss you too,” I whispered back, and he swooped in then and hugged me tight while I buried my head in his chest and wrapped my arms around his waist, breathing in his masculine scent. I felt a tear roll down my cheek and wet his shirt, and I couldn’t stop the rest from flowing through too.

I didn’t know if they were tears of sadness or joy, but all I knew was that I couldn’t wipe off the big smile on my face because I have my best friend back.

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