BEFORE

I have mastered the art of not checking out Brooks Andrews.

Especially when it's game day.

It takes all my willpower in order to not drool over Brooks as he's running up and down the field, like he owns it.

Cause when he's on the field, he does own it.

And that is so sexy.

But I promised Lina. So I've had to master pretending to be uninterested. It's the hardest thing I've had to do, but I'll do it for Lina.

I scroll through my shopping app, trying to see if there's anything I should order. Not that I needed anything new, but I do enjoy indulging myself when I get money from my sponsors.

I saw a sexy white lace top, shoelace design going down the front of it. It was hot, but I knew I couldn't pull it off. But Lina...

"Nana," I poke her side. "Would you wear this?"

She looks at my screen, then looks at me. "I don't think my boobs would fit in that, Av." She snorts.

"Oh, it can," I smirk. "I think you'd look hot in it."

And she would. Lina is so damn pretty, it's unfair. It's natural with her, too. She doesn't wear a shit ton of makeup like I do. She owns her natural self and it's beautiful. I wish I had natural beauty like her.

"You just don't understand the struggle of these," she motions to her chest. "Any 'sexy' shirt would still make me look like a house. It's a no-win situation. These are like mountains on my chest, it's a curse."

I laugh, which makes Lina laugh. Lina thinks her boobs are a curse? I've had boys straight up reject me because of my flat chest.

"I wish I had that problem, okay? I usually have to find the best push-up bra I can in order to make it seem like there's something going on here." I sigh. "That is the true curse."

"Oh, really?"

She doesn't even know the half of it.

"Hell yeah! I wish I had mountains on my chest. Guys usually dig that. It's much harder for them to be entertained with pancakes."

Lina shakes her head, laughing. She thinks I'm joking, but I'm not. My microscopic boobs were such a huge insecurity for me. Guys want something to hold onto. And I hardly have anything to offer them.

Cheering erupted around us. Lina looked to the field, as did I, watching Brooks hold the ball up at the end of the other teams side.

If there's one thing I know about Brooks, it's that he loves this shit. He loves seeing the crowd go crazy for him. It's what makes him so dedicated to perform so well. I can literally see his eyes scanning the crowd, taking it all in.

I see Lina smiling proudly at her brother. It makes me inhale, wishing I could allow myself to be that excited for him.

I loved watching Brooks in his element. But I couldn't show that. Then Lina would be suspicious.

"He's so arrogant sometimes." Lina shakes her head.

So I shrug, smirking. "Arrogance can be hot."

Sometimes, just sometimes, I loved messing with Lina like this. Making snarky little remarks like that just to see how she'd react, selfishly hoping one day the reaction won't be as bad as I think it will be.

"Ew, stop forever."

And I'm always wrong. So I laugh it off and look back down at my phone, distracting myself from the pang of disappointment I felt.

"Want something?"

What I want is something you'll never be okay with, Lina.

"Hm," I hum. "Bag of pretzels?"

She grins. "Of course."

I may or may not be a tad bit obsessed with pretzels. Something Lina has always known. She takes her bag and walks down the bleachers. Once she's out of sight, I allow my eyes to wander to Brooks.

I sigh, resting my chin on my palm. I love to see him like this: super focused and ready to go. He may love the praise he always gets from everyone because he's so damn good. But he loves this; he loves playing football and outsmarting the opposite guy.

I can practically see it in his face.

"Hey," I hear from beside me. I look up, an instant smile forming on my face when I saw Ryan Taft standing beside me. "This seat taken?"

I suck in a breath. "Kind of. Why?"

Ryan Taft is gorgeous. I've flirted with him around school, but he's more shy than I am. He blushes and nods and acknowledges me, but he's never really reciprocated any interest back. So it's curious why he's here right now.

"I, well," he grabs the back of his neck with his hand, making me grin. "I-I'm not good at this."

"At what?"

His cheek deepen in color as he pulls his lip between his teeth. "Asking girls on a date."

That flatters me. I can't stop the smile from spreading across my face as I cross my arms. "You ask a lot of girls out on dates, Ryan?"

"No," he quickly shakes his head. "No, actually. T-the only time I asked out a girl, she actually told me no. So I haven't really w-wanted to ask someone out again...until now."

Aw. That's so sweet.

"And why now?" I question.

"Because," he shrugs. "I wanna get to know you better."

"How so?"

"I thought m-maybe we'd go get something to eat? You know, if you wanted."

I look back to Brooks, completely oblivious to anything happening up here. To me. So I look back to Ryan. "Alright, let's go."

"Now?"

"Gotta live in the moment, right?" I stand up. "No regrets or something like that?"

He smiles. "Yeah. Yeah, of course."

Ryan leads the way down the bleachers, but then I lead the way to my car. I open the door and climb inside, quickly sending a text to Lina. When Ryan climbs in and puts his seatbelt on, we take off.

"Where to?"

"Uh," he chuckles. "Anywhere you'd like?"

I smirk. I'm not a picky girl, but I do want to just talk and see if this would go anywhere. So I drive for a bit, pulling into the ice cream parlor parking lot. As we pulled in, the light drizzle started to grow heavier; the hard rain was thudding against the windshield as I turned to face Ryan.

"You've ignored my flirting for months," I lift a shoulder. "So why did you randomly decide now was the right time to ask me out?"

Ryan flushed, wiping his hands on his jeans. "I-I-I just...I was always interested. I mean, look at you." Ryan's cheeks turned deeper red as I smile. "And I kind of just wanted to—" Wind picked up outside, starting to howl faintly. It caused Ryan to stop and look around outside. "Does that sound normal to you?"

I opened my mouth to answer, but sirens start blaring through the sky. I've never heard these sirens before. My heart starts to race as I look around. "What does this mean?"

Ryan's eyes were wide as he met mine. "A warning of something destructive. My best guess? With the winds, it's a tornado."

"Tornado?" I narrow my eyes. "How? We hardly ever get that kind of bad weather here!"

"I don't know, Avrey!" Ryan shouts, pushing his hand through his hair. "I don't even know what to do right now. But I am not risking my life in a fucking car."

At that, he flings the door open and jets, not even bothering to shut the door behind him. My jaw drops as I watch him dart into the ice cream shop, leaving me to fend for my own.

"Fucking boys," I grumble as I lean over and shut his door. I contemplate taking off, but what if I drive directly into the storm?

These sirens aren't helping, I can barely hear myself think. I don't know what to do. The wind is howling, rain hammering down. Am I safe in my car? Or not? Should I make a run for it like Ryan? I don't fucking know.

I turn my head, seeing one of those built-in sewer tunnel things. Deciding it's probably safer than here, I rush out of my car. The wind is strong. Walking against it was almost impossible with it whipping my hair in my face and making it harder to see.

I finally made it, nose wrinkling at the smell. I crawl in, getting as back as I possibly could. The wind was howling, making my heart feel like it was gonna rip out of my chest. I put my head between my knees and cover the top of it with my hands.

I never thought the ridiculous tornado drills would ever actually come in handy one day.

Oh, God. Am I gonna die?

My breathing is shaky as I shut my eyes, trying to picture I was anywhere else but here. Trying to envision one of my best memories.

I play it back like a movie in my head. My mom, dad and I at the beach. It was my first beach I was ever taken to, which made me fall in love with the feel of sand under my feet and the smell of the sea and the sound of the waves washing in. I loved it. I was seven and I already knew it was going to be my favorite place in the entire world.

My mom bought me ice cream because I had stepped on a broken piece of glass hidden in the sand. It didn't need stitches, but it hurt like hell. And I asked her if I could stay there forever. She laughed, telling me that I was going to accomplish whatever I wanted in this life, and because of that, I could end up living on the beach one day. It's just all up to me and the choices I make.

That made me so happy.

My dad carried me on his shoulder, walking together as a family throughout the beach, living that one day like we had absolutely no worries in the world.

I wish I was there right now.

I blink, waiting to hear anything. But it was quiet. I lift my head, looking up out of the tunnel. I didn't see any more rain falling, didn't hear the wind.

My phone ringing scared me. I jumped, quickly taking it out of my pocket. My mom.

"Hello?"

"Av—can y—me?"

"Mom?" I ask again. "I can't hear you."

"Where—"

"Hang on, mom." I say as I start crawling to the exit.

I stop, looking around. The people in the ice cream shop were slowly coming out, looking around. I didn't see any damage. The shop was still there. My car was, too. Just a lot of debris all around.

I climb out and stand to my feet. "What happened?"

The older woman shook her head. "I heard it. Sounded like it was coming straight for us. Thought it was, too. But it just curved and went the other direction."

"Really?"

"Think it's headed towards the school. But those damn tornadoes are so unpredictable, you never really know."

Oh, no. Lina was there. Hayden. Brooks.

My breath shudders as I think about that ripping through where I left them. I should've never left Lina. What horrible friend am I?

My phone started ringing again, my mom calling back. "Mom, I'm—"

"Avrey! Are you okay, where are you? I saw the warning and have been trying to get ahold of you since."

"I'm fine, mom. It didn't hit where I am."

"Thank God," she breathes. "Come home right now."

"Alright. Okay, I'm on my way."

I hung up, but immediately started calling Lina. But it wasn't going through. I kick the wheel of my car, trying Brooks. But still not going through. I sigh in frustration, climbing into my car.

I drive home, carefully, completely worried sick about Lina and Brooks. What if it does hit the school? What if they're hurt—or worse? I couldn't live with myself if that happened.

When I got home, my parents kept me in a deadly tight hug forever. They kept asking me if I was okay, what happened. I kept the details to a minimum, just wanting to get to bed.

They finally let me go take a shower. When I did, and I still couldn't get ahold of Lina, I started to cry in the shower. That was scary as hell for me, I can't imagine if they were impacted by it.

When I'm dressed in my pjs, I say goodnight to my parents. I go up to my room, crawl under the covers. I close my eyes to try and relax, but I can't. I'm too freakin' worried about Lina and Brooks.

I hear knocks on my window. I raise a brow, looking at it in the dark. What kind of psycho is gonna try knocking on my window?

"Avrey," I hear. "It's Brooks."

Brooks?

I jump up, almost tripping over myself as I run to the window. I fling it open, seeing Brooks kneeling on the roof, waiting for me to let him in.

I step aside, allowing him to climb in. He shakes off his clothes as I lock the window behind him. Then he looks at me.

"Thank God you're okay," I breathe as I, absentmindedly, wrap my arms around him.

He slowly wraps his arms around my waist, resting his chin on my head. I shoved that 'it feels so right' feeling down back from wherever it came from and looked up at him.

"Lina?"

"She's okay. She apparently was right fucking there, shaking her up really good. But she's alive. How are you?"

I shrug. "I thought I was gonna die for a second there. But nothing happened, not like Lina. I've been trying to call her like crazy but she hasn't answered."

"Yeah, I saw a cell tower line on the floor on my way home."

"Damn," I mutter. "That's insane."

"Tell me about it."

I look down to Brooks' hands that were still on my hips, his thumb ever so lightly stroking up and down my side. I look back up.

"And you?" I didn't even realize how breathless I was until I spoke. "Are you okay?"

He shrugs. "I was in the locker room. Heard the sirens, took cover in the showers. It was loud as hell, but that was really it. I think it just hit the back end of the school where Lina was waiting for me at."

"I hope she's alright."

"I was there with her. But I couldn't get ahold of you and, well..." he stops.

He wanted to check up on me?

Stop it. He's just being a good friend, it means nothing. It can't mean anything. Lina is your best friend.

"Thanks," I barely whispered.

He just holds my gaze, which felt like forever. As my eyes lower to his lips, I wonder just how soft they were. And how they'd feel against mine.

"You should get back to Lina." I clench my jaw and step away from his intoxicating touch. "She needs you."

He nods. "You're right."

I offer a small smile as he opens my window and climbs back out. I can't help but chuckle.

"You know I have a front door?"

"I saw your parents on the couch through the glass. Didn't wanna bother them, or make them think I was here just for a hookup or anything."

Why'd he have to say that? I bite my lip, blushing. "Thanks."

"No problem," he smiles before he turns around and disappears from wherever he came from.

I shut the window, letting go of a loud sigh. Then I throw myself on my bed, still blushing at the fact Brooks didn't want my parents to think we would be up here having sex.

The thoughts instantly creep into my mind, making me groan. I slam my pillow over my head and try to silence the thoughts.

Sleep. Sleep is all I need right now.

But even in sleep, I couldn't escape the sexy thoughts of what could be between Brooks and me.

God, I'm in so much trouble.

A/N

If you read what's mine, then you definitely remember this chapter. If not, that's okay 🧡 what's forbidden can technically be read as a stand-alone.

Thanks for reading, lovelies! Don't forget to vote, comment, etc!! <33