I Love You More Than I'm Afraid (Our Forevers #2) by Rebel Hart (the first e reader .txt) 📕

“I’m trying to get this application done for this internship, the last couple of finals at school are killing me, and Aria’s been really busy lately. All work and no play.”

She groaned. “That’s not good. Relaxing is important too, otherwise you’ll burn out and you’ll never get anything done.”

“You’re not wrong,” I said. The parts and pieces that I’d gathered for the most complex of my designs to complete for the application were scattered around my home desk and I’d been staring at them for the past hour trying to gear myself up to actually start building. “I’m in a massive rut.”

“Well… It’s Friday. You don’t have school tomorrow, and if you’re already not getting anything done tonight anyway, come out to The Undersound. I’m working a double since we’re down a man, and I’ll need someone to keep me company anyway. I’ve started practicing this new drink, The Gentleman, and I need someone to trial run it for me. I’d love to start a sale with it next week.”

“What’s in it?” I asked.

“I’ve been bouncing back and forth between Triple sec and Disaronno; I can’t decide which one tastes better. Then it’s got some bitters, soda, and a salted rim. Kind of a sour, but classier.”

“Thus The Gentleman?” I said.

She laughed. “You get me, Arden.” I laughed along. “Well? Come out? Meet The Gentleman? Maybe a few gentlemen?”

“You know good and damn well I don’t wanna party with any gentlemen.”

Suli let out a barking laugh then. “Come on! You know what I mean. You owe me anyway, remember?”

“Yeah, and I told you like June, remember?”

“I remember, but you’re not doing anything tonight anyway right?”

My promise to Aria not to go back to The Undersound came into my mind. We’d reached a place of understanding on me actually spending time with Suli, but so long as I was underage, me being at The Undersound was going to be an issue, namely for my best friend. I knew that Hannah still had my location saved on her phone. The issue was, no matter how much easier it would make my life, I couldn’t disable my location. I knew Hannah had it, and though it was petty and stupid, it felt like having a small connection with her. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me the tiniest bit happy to know that Hannah was checking up on me, but as happy as it made me, it made me ten times angrier.

Why go through all that when I wasn’t important enough to stick by before?

“Hellooo?” Suli said. “Are you going to ditch me again?”

“I can’t ditch you when we never made plans,” I spat back.

“Is that your way of turning me down?” Suli asked, then scoffed. “Honestly. When did you become so uncool? Maybe Aria’s a bookworm, but you’re not. I can hear it in your voice, you’re stressed.”

“I am.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “But I made a promise.”

“Is it the drinking and drugs and stuff?”

I swayed my head side-to-side. “Kinda. I mean, I think it’s the fact that I’m underage in general, but if I was sneaking in underage to a fucking library, I don’t think people would have as many issues with it.”

She huffed some things under her breath and then said, “Fine, then what if you just came. I won’t give you booze or drugs or anything. Just hang out and drink cola like a dork.”

“Don’t hold back your disdain,” I replied.

“Well, I’ve never been that buttoned up so I don’t get it, but if it’s that important to you to keep this promise to your friend, then I won’t give you any of the bad stuff. I just…” She sighed. “I just wanna see you. I miss you.”

I leaned back in my chair and stretched. “Jeez, when you say it like that, how can I say no?”

Suli let out a little screech. “Yes! Okay! I’m not opening, so I can’t get you in the side, but just come the front way with your ID. I’ll be at the bar, so find me when you get there.”

“You got it.”

“Okay. See you soon!”

The excitement in her voice brought a smile to my face. “See you soon. Bye.”

We ended the call, then I went to change my clothes into something better suited to the night life, and then headed downstairs to leave. My parents saw me headed out and tried to say something to me, but I ignored them entirely. They’d had nothing pleasant to say to me as of late, so I just stopped listening. I wasn’t getting myself all worked up over nothing, and if I went to The Undersound angry from a fight with them, I’d be more inclined to drink or do drugs, and I really wanted to keep at least some of my promise to Aria.

Once again, I weighed the risk of leaving my car at home against taking it with me and battling Friday night traffic downtown, and regretting deciding that the latter was the better option. It took me damn near an hour just to make the twenty minute trip from my home to The Undersound, and because Suli didn’t open, I couldn’t get the V.I.P. parking treatment and had to park close to two blocks away. It was a brisk but not totally unwelcome walk to the front door where I got in line and fished out my fake ID for rapid entry.

“ID?” the security guard said.

I handed it over, keeping my hand outstretched for him to hand it back, but instead he started inspecting the ID closer. My fake wasn’t easily identifiable as one because it was an actual ID card that had my image transposed onto it. Suli knew a guy who would buy real ones from real people in order to make believable fakes, and the original owners would just report their IDs lost and get a new one. It seemed like risky stuff to me, but I never used mine for anything other than