How We Lived (Entangled Embrace) by Erin Butler Read Free Book Online

beside him and drew the blankets around us, cocooning me against his chest. “I know, Kels. I know.”
    He wrapped his arms around my shoulders, and I let him. God, this was so messed up. Why had I come over here? What was wrong with me? This needing him thing? If my parents found out, they’d kill me. “I should go.”
    I didn’t want to, though. Something about Chase made me think of the past, not the present. If I had a memory and could hold it, it would feel like this.
    He shifted so his arms were around my waist. “You’re not going anywhere.”
    He was right, I wasn’t. I lay there and stared in his eyes for a while until he reached out and moved the hair from around my face. I took the layers in my hand and moved them over my other shoulder. “You don’t like my long hair, do you?”
    “I do. I just want to see you.” His fingertips grazed my shoulder and down to my elbow before he grasped my hip. “I need to know this isn’t a dream.”
    I swallowed hard. “So sentimental. No wonder girls throw themselves at you.” I stared at the ceiling and willed myself to calm down. This was Chase. No need to freak out. “Not me, though. We’re friends.”
    “Are we?” His voice filled with hope and a mixture of something else. Hesitation?
    I shrugged but didn’t answer. I didn’t know anymore. I wanted to be, I just didn’t know if we could. His eyes closed and his hold on me tightened. We stayed that way for a while until our body heat built underneath the covers.
    Moving the comforter down, I twisted to face him. I needed to remind myself we’d always be like this, that it had always been like this. “Remember the big fight you and Kyle had in fifth grade? You guys were supposed to sleep outside in your tent that weekend, but you ended up inviting me instead of him?”
    Chase nodded. “He was pissed.”
    “Not just pissed. He threw a hissy fit. Like a real, true-to-life toddler tantrum when Mom said I could go and he had to stay because he wasn’t invited.”
    Chase laughed. “I can picture that.”
    Curiosity pricked at me. When it happened, I hadn’t cared what their fight was about because I got to camp with Chase. Now, I wanted to know everything about Kyle that Chase knew and I didn’t. “What did you guys fight over anyway?”
    “Hmm…fifth grade? It was either about which superhero—Spider-Man or Superman—would win in a fight if they couldn’t use superpowers…or the student teacher we had. Miss…oh man, you remember. Miss…Bustier.”
    I slapped him on the shoulder and buried my head in the pillow. “That wasn’t her name.”
    He looked shocked. “What was it then?”
    “It was Bouché, Miss Bouché.”
    Chase shrugged. “Well, we called her Miss Bustier. It fit her better.”
    “Only you and Kyle would come up with something so stupid.”
    “We were eleven,” he said, and brushed my hair away from my shoulder.
    I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”
    His eyes crinkled at the corners. “You’re still you.”
    I was, wasn’t I? Something horrible had happened, but it didn’t need to change me for good. The longer I spent with Chase, the more I felt like me. “Even though I look like hell?”
    “Yup. Even though you look like hell, you’re still my Kels.”
    I smiled at the memory. When we were real young, that’s what Chase called me. His Kels. That ended when he and Kyle started junior high and girls his age suddenly had breasts. Still a couple years away from developing, my belonging to him went out the window.
    He took my shirt in his hands and tugged a couple times. “Talk to me about this morning.”
    He was pushing. Why did he always push things? “What?”
    “Oh, I don’t know…about how your father wouldn’t let you come to your own brother’s funeral because of what you were wearing.”
    “Jesus. I came out of my room wearing this, okay? Dad got pissed, said I couldn’t go if I was going to disrespect my brother. They left without me. End of