CHASE HOME
Alex's hand thuds twice on the half-open
bedroom door. Courtney's reaction is immediate.
"Come in," she calls out, barely
even looking up from the magazine she is reading -- not enough to see who
it is.
"Hey," Alex says. His voice catches
in his throat and the word comes out weakly.
"Hi," she answers as she does something
of a double-take. Something sounds off about the way she greets him --
surprise, perhaps -- but she doesn't sound outright angry. Alex makes a
mental wish that that is really the case.
"Merry Christmas." He hands her a
box, covered in maroon and gold wrapping paper. "I, uh, I wanted to bring
over your gift. And I was hoping we could talk."
She takes the present and places
it on the bed. "Thanks. And yeah, good idea. We should talk."
For a moment, he is frozen, but then
it all comes tumbling out at once. "Listen, Court -- I want you to know
how sorry I am. It's not that I wanted to hide something so big from you,
but ... I was trying to keep myself from really acknowledging it."
"I can understand that. It doesn't
excuse what you did to Lauren--"
"I know. I know that. I need to sort
that out with her, but ... I don't want to lose our friendship because
of all this."
She appears ready to go on the offensive,
but then she says quietly, "Neither do I." She breathes a heavy sigh. "Alex,
I can understand you being confused. I can understand you not wanting everyone
to know right away. But as much as I want everything to be back to normal,
it's like ... I have this feeling that there's a lot we all need to work
on. Trust, especially."
"I agree." He swallows hard. "Court,
it's Christmas. You -- you and Lauren and Jason -- you mean so much to
me. I know a lot has happened, but I want to at least know that there is
still something to work on, and that we can try to get back to where we
were."
"Absolutely." She hesitates but then
opens her arms for a hug. "C'mere."
Alex is all too happy to join her
in the embrace, despite the feeling that he is going to wake up in a second
and find out that this was all a dream and he has to attempt the confrontation
all over again. But Courtney feels very real in his arms, and for that
he is infinitely thankful.
Now hopefully the rest will fall
into place, he thinks.
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