February, 2007, NYU

Liam and Zach were sitting by the bar when they saw Chanty and Cameron walk in.

“Look who is out on a date!” Zach said, beaming at Chanty.

Cameron’s face turned grim. His hand wound around Chanty’s waist to pull her closer.

“Don’t mind them, Cam. You should get used to their unwanted presence,” Chanty uttered, looking at Zach and Liam dryly.

“I didn’t know you guys are still together,” Liam said before he could stop himself. There was just something about Cameron that pissed him off. And to see him with Chanty was not helping at all.

“You know what? I think one of you,” Cameron uttered, looking at the two of them with ire, “has something toward Chanty. Is it you?” he asked Zach who exaggeratedly leaned away with his mouth agape. Cameron turned Liam next. “Or you?”

For a moment, Liam’s eyes met Chanty’s and his world stopped. The loud buzz of people and the clatters of glasses inside the bar suddenly faded away. Then slowly, a grin crept up his face and he said, “Come on, Cameron. Why do you ask? Are you, in any way, threatened by one of us?” he said, pointing his thumb at Zach.

“Or both?” his friend added.

“Come on, Cameron, let’s not let them spoil this night,” Chanty murmured, pulling Cameron away.

Zach and Liam forced out a laugh as they watched the couple walk away.

“Jerk,” Liam muttered before swallowing a glass of tequila. “Let’s go get lost. This place stinks.”

2013

It was a good five or ten seconds before Chanty finally gathered everything that happened. And when she did, she forced her feet to start moving. One small step and she began to walk to the door.

And then she ran.

Her heart was racing and she could feel her hands shaking as she tried to open the door.

“Shit!” she shouted when it wouldn’t turn.

She tried once again. It did open and she swung the door wide and shouted, “Liam! Wait!”

But he was already pulling out of the driveway, his head turned over his shoulder as he guided his car to the road.

“Liam!” she cried out once again. She didn’t care if she was running along the pathway in her bare feet. The only thing she could feel right now was a great deal of alarm and fear woven into one.

“Liam!”

But he didn’t glance back at her as he revved his car away.

Chanty felt the tears running down her face.

He was gone.

He drove off.

Away from her.

As the sound of his car drifted away, Liam’s deadpan voice rang inside her head loudly.

Maybe I am just still that guy whom you could never consider being with you. I could never be that guy, right?

Something inside her was starting to creep up to her chest. And then it began to squeeze right at her heart.

I have always been just Liam, the guy who could understand. And I have been foolish enough to think that I could at least have a shot at you.

Flashes of Liam from years ago appeared before her eyes as they filled with tears. He had always been a constant shadow. A shadow she had ignored and considered a nuisance. A shadow she never missed when it went on a hiatus for four years. A shadow she never appreciated until now.

Until it was too late.

Well, then, I guess it is time for me to finally give up. It had been too long and too tiring for me.

Chanty’s knees buckled and she dropped down on the side of the street, one hand clutching her chest, as she cried soundlessly.

*****

Liam suddenly stepped on the break. A car passed by with an angry honk at its wake.

He didn’t mind.

He closed his eyes and tried to center all his attention on what had just happened.

He walked out on Chanty, the woman of his dreams.

For years, at the back of his mind, Chanty had always been the one.

And he didn’t know why.

She was never the most beautiful. She was not the best in class. She never even did anything good to him in the years he had known her.

What did he see in her?

This had always been the biggest question he never had the answer to.

And he never really cared to find out the answer because as long as he felt the same, old feelings for her; as long as she still managed to make his heart pause and skip a beat whenever she appeared before him; as long as he could still do anything for her, he was willing to wait with that question unanswered.

But this time, it was different. She had lied to him.

He felt used. Just like that night four years ago.

Just like that night when she didn’t have anyone else to turn to and he was there to give comfort.

Right now, all he could think of the past few weeks Chanty spent with him was that it had all been one, big lie.

He turned the gear of his car and started to drive again.

Maybe it was finally time for him to give up.

He scoffed when he thought of how Zach would react.

His friend would laugh at his face for being so stupid over a woman who never and would never see him as a man she could be with.

*****

“What the hell happened to you?” Angelica’s voice said above her.

“He’s gone, Ange. He left,” Chanty said, her face buried in her arms. She was still beside the street, her arms hugging her knees. Her eyes were dry, but she couldn’t even make herself get up and move back inside the house. There was nothing there. Willie was not there to give her a hug. And the other person who could give her the comfort she so needed just drove off and probably cursing her to damnation at the moment.

“What do you mean he’s gone? Who?”

“He found out! Ange, what do I do?” She lifted her face and saw Angelica’s worried face above her. Her friend was still literally in her sleeping attire, wearing nothing but her fluffy bedroom slippers.

If Angelica would go out of her house looking like that for you, you should be thanking all the saints, because it meant you were one hell of a friend she would suffer a great deal of humiliation for being a fashion wreck just to get to you.

And the thought of that brought another batch of tear strike. Chanty whimpered and reached out for Ange. “He’s gone. He left! What do I do?”

“The first thing you have to do is go after him because you certainly have feelings for the man,” her friend said without doubt, her voice a strong pillar for her to hang on to.

“I did! Barefooted!” she cried out.

“Then why the hell are you still here? You do have a car, stupid!”

“I can’t face him right now. He was so angry, Ange. And I had never seen him that angry! I can’t look at that face again!”

“You are such a coward, Chanty. Come on, get up and get inside that house. Let’s have some talk before we go hunt down that guy.” Angelica pulled her up and almost dragged her back to the house.

“I’ll call in reinforcement,” Angelica said when Chanty fell into the couch and cried harder. “You can cry really hard, but please, keep your voice down. I need to call Cass and if she hears you like that, she might get here in just her underwear and that’s even worse than what I am wearing now,” Angelica added as she worked with her phone. “You have to get here NOW,” Chanty heard her say. “And drop by Julianne. We might need her help. I am at Chanty’s. No, everything is a wreck, including her. You are wearing appropriate clothing, are you? Okay, good. Then get your ass down here! Don’t utter a word to Philip.”

“I don’t know what to do, Ange. Cameron, Willie, Liam…everything!” Chanty continued, her voice muffled by the couch.

“Cry. I know what you are going through,” Angelica’s gentle voice told her. Her friend sat down on the couch beside her and rubbed her back as she lay there in a fetal position. “It will hurt more later--”

Chanty cried louder at the thought. How could it hurt more? She didn’t think she could bear more!

“But you have to be strong. Liam is not just the only problem here. There’s Cameron and Willie. But you are not doing this fight alone. I am here. And Cass, too; and hopefully, Jules as well. Just cry for now because later, we are going hunting. And you can’t hunt with your eyes flooded with tears. It will get in the way of your vision and your target. Cry, because you will need your eyes dry for later. Liam will be quite a hard target. You’ve given him more reasons to run away than stay.”

“I didn’t mean to--”

“You don’t have to deny it, my dear,” Angelica cut in. “The guy’s been struck a lot of times than mended. Accept the fact that you are one of the major contributors of his wounds. You’ve hurt him more than anyone, Chanty. Just accept that so you could chase him down and beg for his mercy.”

“Oh, God, I hate you right now,” Chanty cried at her friend.

“Well, you don’t hate me as much as Liam hates you at the moment.” This time, Chanty kicked Angelica off the couch. “You don’t need sympathy from me, Chanty. You need to hear the truth. So just stop fake-hating me and cry your heart out. Cass and Jules will be here any minute.”

“I hate your mouth right now. I hate it!”

“Okay, fine, you’ll take it back later anyway. For now, cry while I make some coffee. And I need to borrow some clothes. And shoes.”

Chanty didn’t hear her friend. Angelica’s words echoed in her head. She had thought of those things earlier outside as she cried beside the street. But hearing them from someone other than herself and Liam, Chanty felt she was finally pulled out of the pool of denial she had been floating in for a long time.

She really was one big of a bitch. Liam had always been her victim. She had hurt him in many ways. He might never forgive her. No, scratch that. He would never forgive her.

*****

“You don’t really hate her, do you?” Zach asked.

Liam shot him a look, but before he could say a word, he saw Julianne briskly walk out of the hotel room’s closet.

“Where are you going?” Zach asked her.

“Out. Cass is picking me up.”

“You’ve been going out more than I have lately, Jules, and I wonder what--”

But Julianne was not hearing him. Instead, she was looking at Liam in a weird way as she walked to Zach to give him a goodbye kiss. “I’ll be back before you know it.” And she gave Liam another awkward look before she said, “’Bye, Liam.”

“Jules! Be careful--”

The door closed behind her before Zach could finish his sentence. “I wonder what’s up now,” he said aloud.

“I think I have an idea where she’s going,” Liam said with bitterness. He took another gulp of brandy.

Zach looked at him for a moment and then realization struck him. “You think Jules also knows about it? She wouldn’t keep a secret from me--”

“That’s the thing, Zach. We always think they are perfect. But they are not. Women, after all, are just like us. They know how to keep a secret and they know how to lie.”

“Well, that’s true,” Zach said, avoiding his gaze. “But that doesn’t mean we cannot give them the chance to explain. They give us more than just one second chance. You should go back to Chanty and demand for an explanation.”

Liam shook his head. “I am beat, man. I don’t think I can face her again.”

“Look, I know you feel betrayed or used or whatever. But I remember you told me a few weeks ago that Chanty told you that you are not Willie’s father. Well? Do you remember that?”

Liam almost cursed. Yes, now he remembered. Chanty was almost begging him to believe her.

And then he shook his head. “She should have tried harder. But what did she do? Instead of insisting, she continued on with the lie because it was an advantage for her. I was willing to embrace it without question. And I was a fool to fall for that.”

“You know, almost a year ago, we were talking and I was at your side of the table. I didn’t believe in all this love shit and you were so insistent on how wonderful it is. Where is your ‘the one’ speech, bro?”

Liam scoffed. “Stuck somewhere. I am starting to believe I don’t have one in this lifetime. But congratulations to you, you found yours.”

“What the hell,” Zach uttered, standing up. “You are talking nonsense. In fact, you’re talking more nonsense than I did that night I decided to be the Bachelor.” Liam watched him fish for his phone.

“What are you doing?”

“I am calling the guys. We need to talk about this, just like what our women must be doing right now. You obviously need more than just me on this one, dude. You’ll need all the help you can get.”

*****

“Liam’s at the hotel, drinking with Zach,” Julianne uttered softly. “I think he is in a mess right now, Chanty. And I feel guilty as hell because I am part of this lie.”

Chanty groaned. She was now sitting on the carpet, her arms on the center table, a great achievement compared to the previous fetal position she was in on the couch earlier. Julianne was seated at the winged chair adjacent the couch behind her.

Cassandra was pacing the living room, deep in thought.

Angelica, to her surprise, didn’t say anything from where she was sitting behind her in the couch.

“I need to explain everything,” she said desperately.

“Yes,” her friends answered in unison.

“Should we call Zach?” Julianne asked. “We can go back to the hotel so you could talk to Liam.”

No one answered. Chanty guessed everyone was worried what might become of the hotel room if they as much as show up. She knew Liam didn’t have any violent streak in his body. But still, she feared the worse. Her mind was wondering to all possible scenarios.

“I know I suggested we hunt him down so you could explain,” Angelica uttered behind her, “and I still believe we should do that. Nothing is more advantageous than a surprise attack.”

“This is not like a simple, chasing game, Ange. We know Chanty blew it big. And we are part of her problem because we kind of pushed her to do it,” Cassandra explained.

“I think Zach knows I know,” Julianne said with worry.

“Philip will kill me,” Cassandra added.

“Henry might throw me in prison along with the bad guys who wanted to kill me,” Angelica said with sureness.

“Can we talk about me and Liam for a second here?” Chanty asked the group. “And that stupid asshole, Cameron?”

Julianne straightened in her chair. “I know I am just a new friend and all, but I want to say something.”

The three women looked at her, their faces full of desperation.

“Come clean, Chanty. Talk with the guy. And if he doesn’t want to listen, go to battle the right way. The clean way.”

“God, that sounds so easy,” Cassandra said, walking around. “What about the dirty little secrets you have on Cameron?”

“We can threaten him like he did threaten you,” Angelica agreed.

Julianne looked at the two women with awe. “You are suggesting Chanty continue on with the lie?”

“No, of course not,” Cassandra and Angelica answered.

“Liam already knows. And Zach probably knows already as well. The lie is over,” Chanty said.

“But Cameron doesn’t,” Angelica uttered. “We can still make him--”

“No,” Chanty cut in strongly. “I am done with this lie. I am done with it. Julianne is right. I should come clean. I will talk to Cameron.”

“Okay,” Cassandra and Angelica answered in an instant.

“What about Liam?”

Chanty looked over her shoulder at Angelica and transferred her gaze to Cassandra. Both of them were wearing the same expression: Hunt him down.

She remembered how Cassandra tried to fight for Philip when she thought he was giving up on her. She heard about how Angelica came up with her brilliant plan to get Henry to his senses.

Making up her mind, she stood up and looked at her friends. “I am going to hunt him down if that is what I have to do. I might not have this much courage tomorrow if I sleep on it.”

She watched Angelica jump from the couch, Cassandra run for her purse, and Julianne standing up to walk to the door.

When she didn’t move, the three women turned to look at her. “Well?”

Chanty nodded. “Yes, now or never.”

*****

When they reached the hotel, no one was there. Julianne tried to call Zach but the man was evasive.

“Jules, I think it is best if you girls leave Liam alone for now. And we will need to talk once I get back,” he had said before he hung up.

“Where could they be?” Cassandra asked.

“They are drinking, I know it,” Angelica uttered.

“Where?” Chanty asked.

Angelica smiled wickedly. “I know a lot of people. And I am sure a lot of people know Zach. They are just a few phone calls away.” She took out her phone and started tapping. “Let the expert handle this.”

*****

After two hours of waiting for Angelica to finally hit something, Chanty’s strong will started to wane. Fear began to creep into her nerves. Her friend had been calling people she knew and asking questions about Zach, the former Bachelor and if it was possible they saw him somewhere.

“Stop that,” Angelica shot at her when she started pacing.

“It is getting late. I need to get to Willie.”

“Let’s settle this matter with Liam first,” Cassandra told her. “Willie is safe with mom. You just checked on him a while ago.”

“Oh my God, I am so stupid,” Julianne suddenly cried out from the couch.

“What?” Cassandra, Angelica and Chanty looked at her with alarm.

“GPS. Shit, how could I forget?” Julianne took out her phone. “I can track Zach through his phone.”

“Then what the hell! Go find him!” Angelica cried out.

They waited anxiously as Julianne worked on her phone. “I found him! They are here,” she showed the girls the map.

“Let’s go,” Angelica ordered. “Chanty, let’s go!” she shouted when Chanty didn’t move.

Cassandra pushed her to the door. “Get over with your nerves. Let’s face this.”

*****

When they reached the bar, there was a big commotion.

There was a crowd gathered outside the door.

“Why do I get a feeling that this is not going to be good?” Cassandra asked.

“Let’s go,” Angelica ordered as they stepped out of the taxi. None of them were too eager to drive given the situation.

“I don’t think it is safe for the both of you,” Chanty addressed Julianne and Cassandra.

“The hell it is,” her sister-in-law answered, walking past her, pushing people out of the way saying, “Pregnant women passing through!”

They walked past the crowed with ease, but the problem presented itself when they reached the entrance of the bar. There were guards blocking the way to the door.

“There’s been a commotion inside, ladies. You can’t come in,” said the bigger man.

“My husband is inside that bar!” Julianne lied. “He is still inside,” she said to the ladies, showing them her phone.

“Who is your husband?”

“Zachary Astor. Step aside and let us pass.”

“We really can’t do that--”

“Hey, do you know me?” Angelica asked the man. “I know a LOT of people, buddy and I--”

Angelica’s words were cut short when they saw a group walking toward them from inside the bar.

Chanty immediately saw Liam, his hand on his head. And then she saw the blood. “Oh my God!”

Cassandra exclaimed the same thing when Philip appeared with bloody shirt.

“Zach!” Julianne cried out when she spotted the man with an icepack on his left eye.

“Oh God, we are so dead,” Angelica murmured when Henry walked ahead, his eyes seriously deadly despite his torn shirt.

“Oh no, Ange, THEY are so dead!” Cassandra added with her hands on her hips.

“What are you four doing here?” Henry asked them as they neared.

“We should be asking that question,” Angelica retorted, her eyebrow arched. And then she frowned. “Why are these cops holding you guys?”

“We’re being arrested,” Philip said calmly.