Hope's Chance(36)

“It is still early baby. Don’t get all worried. I figured we could get you up and over to the main house and hang out there until they arrive home. We will hear the car and I can run into the kitchen or something.”

I smiled and wrapped my arms around him. “So this isn’t just a dream?”

“What do you mean?”

“You still want to be with me even though we have to sneak around?”

He moved a piece of hair away from my face. “Hope, I would do anything to be with you. It would kill me inside if I didn’t at least try to make this work.”

I couldn’t help but let out a faint laugh. I was more than excited to hear him say those words to me. It was all that I had wanted for so long now.

“Why don’t u grab some clothes and get dressed. When you are done we can walk over.” He suggested.

I jumped up and started running around the room for my clothes. Chance pulled a clean shirt out of a basket and tossed it my way. It was just a plain white t-shirt so nobody would even know the difference where I had gotten it. Now if I would have walked in the house wearing a Penn State shirt, well that would have been harder to explain.

My dad wasn’t back yet anyway. With the time it took them to drive back from the secluded cabin, it would at least be around eleven before they walked in the door.

Chance was waiting out by the pool when I walked outside. He glanced over and gave me one of his famous smiles before I reached his side. We entered into the back of the house and just as we had thought, there wasn’t anyone home. While Chance made his way toward the living room, I ran my bag of stuff upstairs and changed my clothes. When I came back downstairs Chance had a serious look on his face.

I froze in place and started to panic. The color had left his cheeks and his smile had disappeared. “Sit down Hope. Before we can move any further with whatever this is, you need to know the truth about my past. After I explain everything, I will let you decide if we have a future.” He paused for a second before grabbing my hand and pulling me down to sit beside him. “I just need you to promise me that you will listen to everything before judging me.”

I shook my head up and down and let out a big fat “yes”.

Chance looked down to his hands. He was rubbing them on his knees like he was having trouble talking to me. I leaned in to him. “Whatever it is, you can tell me Chance.”

He looked over in my direction and began.

“I don’t know if you were aware of it, but I actually went to Penn State on a Scholarship. I got in with both academics and baseball. I had always attended public school and couldn’t believe when the recruiters contacted me.”

I grabbed his hand and played with it as he continued.

“I had never been away from home before and the first semester was really an adjustment for me. For the first few weeks I threw myself into my classes and stayed in my room, but as the weeks went on I started making friends. My first friend I made was a girl named Christian. She was quiet like me and our professor thought we would make good study partners.”

He looked up at me.

“We started spending a lot of extra time together, even when we weren’t studying. I promise you that it was completely plutonic. We were just friends that enjoyed hanging out. That is all it was, especially for me.”

He grabbed a bottle of water off the table and took a drink. “When I met my now ex, Veronica, our friendship started to taper off. My ex was jealous of me being friends with another girl and I was tired of having to make excuses to Christian, instead of telling her it wasn’t my idea to stop hanging out.”

“Sophomore year started and my relationship became more serious, but the whole time Christian reached out and tried to remain friends. Every time I would say no, she would come back with another invite.”

Chance sat back against the couch and stared at the television as he kept explaining.

“My ex was a selfish bitch. Looking back I realize that we were never in a real relationship. She just wanted someone to dress, order around and be at her beck and call. So winter break was fast approaching and I buckled down to study for my exams, while the girlfriend went to her families place in the Hamptons to drink and party it up with her richy friends.”

He put his hands through his hair and then rubbed his knees again. “We got into this huge fight because I wouldn’t go with her, and she actually told me that if I didn’t go with her we were over, but I knew I couldn’t go. I had to obtain a certain grade point average to keep my scholarship. I had to stay there and study. So, in a group of text messages she brutally dumped me.”

“I took the news hard and ended up leaving the library and going to party. Christian spotted me immediately and we began heavily drinking. This creep kept following her around, so she begged me to pretend we were a couple. I was comfortable around her and the alcohol made us seem like we were more than friends. Soon, the room started to spin and we headed outside for some air.”

“Christian proceeded to throw herself at me on the porch of the frat house. I wasn’t expecting it and she caught my arm with her nose, causing it to start bleeding everywhere. I felt so horrible about the whole thing that I insisted she come up to my room and get cleaned up. I swear to you Hope, I meant nothing else by it, but I had had a lot to drink and my body and my mind weren’t in the same place. We walked up to my room holding hands and laughing. She was pinching her nose as the blood continued to pour out.”