I had almost managed to convince myself when she caught my eye. Still dancing, her lips dropped the smile that had been on her face, her expression turning to one of pure hatred.
She’d spotted me and it was clear how she loathed me.
But what was worse than knowing that she hated me was that she was focused on me. More than that, she was looking for me. I couldn’t say how I knew it, other than the knowledge that Miranda wasn’t satisfied with how things had gone. Her life had been torn apart by the loss of her sister. And as I sat there with Derek babbling on, me not hearing a word of what he was saying, I realized that Miranda had a plan.
She was going to ruin my life, too.
After that, the date died down pretty quickly. It had been a good time, but as soon as I saw Miranda, it had been a kill joy. I didn’t want to be out anymore. All I wanted to do was go home, crawl into bed, and pretend like none of this was happening.
Derek insisted on walking me home when we finally called it a night, even though I told him that I was fine getting there on my own and he didn’t have to. He told me that he would feel better if I didn’t walk so far (it was only a few blocks) this late (it was only around ten) alone (and there were more than a few college kids out). The gesture was sweet, if unnecessary, and had me smiling, while the company itself was nice, too.
We were mostly silent as we walked, passing several other college students with varying schedules. Some were headed home like me, and some were just now headed out for a night on the town. I didn’t recognize any of them in any depth, so we were undisturbed as we made our way.
The night was chilly, though not wet at least, and my hands were so cold they had become mostly numb. So when his hand slipped into mine, I didn’t protest and didn’t mind. The heat from his body caused a slight rush of heat that tingled its way up my arm.
When we got to my house, he walked me up the porch to my door. We paused there, that awkward moment of ‘what now?’ spreading between us.
I could tell he wanted to kiss me. I just wasn’t sure if I wanted him to kiss me.
He thought it over carefully in his head. I could see the contemplation on his face as he ran through the pros and cons of risking it. I could have solved all of that worry and thinking by simply deciding for him, but that was the trouble: I couldn’t.
I didn’t know if I wanted him to or not, which was part of the problem. Uncertainty was okay—when you didn’t just have sex for the first time with a guy that you couldn’t seem to keep your hands off no matter how hard you tried and who had a way of worming into your thoughts even when you were dating someone else.
But when this was the case, I was pretty sure uncertainty was a problem. If I didn’t want to lock lips with him, then was it really a good date? If I wasn’t dying to have his arms wrapped around me—and not just because it was cold outside—then was there any point in taking this any farther?
The answers to those questions were actually pretty clear to me and under normal circumstances I would accept them. Clearly, Derek was not the guy on my mind and definitely not the one I really wanted. But he was the one I should want. He was the sweet guy who was going places, a future in sight and a plan backed by determination in his head. He was the practical choice, while Logan was a wild card that was destined to drag me right back to where I couldn’t afford to be anymore.
Which was why when Derek finally decided and leaned towards me, I let him fit his lips over mine. I even closed my eyes and enjoyed it, his soft lips warm and just a little moist as his mouth opened ever so slightly. His hands cupped my cheeks and that felt good, too. I focused on how he felt, his body near to mine, the way he smelled, the heat spreading through my skin at the points of contact between our two bodies.
It felt good and if I focused on that, I easily lost myself.
He pulled away after a moment, leaving the kiss warm and most definitely interested, but not full of raging, unquenchable passion. Which was probably a good thing, because I wasn’t ready for that again.
“I had a really good time,” he said in a low, soft voice. He brushed away a piece of hair from my face. “And I’d like to do it again sometime. Soon. Like maybe tomorrow night?”
I hesitated. I’d had a good time, but did I really want another date so soon?
“The day after tomorrow?” he revised, clearly eager for another date.
I smiled, but didn’t give him an answer immediately. I still felt a little weird about dating Derek. Not because he wasn’t a great guy or because I wasn’t attracted to him. He was both of those things and I found myself liking him more and more with each thing he said to me. But there was something bugging me about all of this.
I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
“The day after that,” he tried once more. His expression was so earnest, his face full of hope.
Letting out a sigh, still smiling, I nodded. “I have some studying to do this week, but I think we can work something out for Wednesday night, if that works for you?”
He nodded after only half a second, eager to have a second date. “Absolutely. How about five? I know this great pizza place…”
Pushing up on my tip toes, I placed a kiss on his cheek and smiled at him once more. “Sounds great. I’ll see you then.” Then I headed inside, closing the door behind me. He watched me until the door was completely shut, that goofy, excited look on his face staying there as though frozen the entire time.
Still smiling a little, I locked the door and headed up the stairs towards my room. Kass wasn’t around—which was good for me, because it really was a little awkward to be discussing how my date with her brother went—so I headed straight to my room.
Closing and locking the door behind me, I went to the bathroom to wash off my make-up. I scrubbed at my face until it was shiny, pink, and clean. I didn’t want any of the residue coming off when I slipped out of my dress—this one happened to be easier to take off by pulling it over my head and the last thing I wanted to do was get foundation all over it.
When I was all cleaned up, I went back into my room and stripped out of my dress, pulling it up over my head and throwing it over the back of the chair. I turned to find some sweats to put on when I caught sight of myself in the mirror.
I was standing in just my underwear and bra, my hair straightened until it was flat as a board. My full, curvy body was dolled up, I realized. I had shaved and chosen my sexy panties and the matching bra. I’d taken extra time on my make-up, although it was all washed off now, and even spritzed on some of that body spray I got from Kass for Christmas last year.
It was almost as though I’d been planning on… well, on getting a little more action than a kiss on the porch tonight. Frowning, I reached for my drawer and yanked it open. I found my favorite UMass sweats and threw them on. Then I got rid of the bra and pulled on a large t-shirt. Throwing my hair up into a messy ponytail, I grabbed my book bag and took a seat at my desk.
I hadn’t been planning on doing any studying after my date with Derek, but after seeing my reflection, I had to do something to take my mind off of what I’d just realized.
Though I’d been on a date with Derek, I’d prepared for my date to get back at Logan.
Chapter 5
I was sitting at the kitchen counter, sipping at orange juice and playing with a bowl of cereal that I had no intention of eating. It was soggy and gross, making slopping sounds as I scooped up a spoonful and then let it fall back into the milk.
Cereal and orange juice had been a stupid idea to begin with anyway, but I felt like food was the best choice to help calm my roiling stomach.
As it turned out, I was wrong.
After a while, Kass padded down the stairs and into the kitchen. She was still dressed in her pajamas, wearing a pair of booty shorts and a tank top despite how chilly outside it was. The heater was on in the house and that meant the cold outside wasn’t going to bother us.
She went to the fridge and pulled out the milk jug. She didn’t
have breakfast most days, unless she was hung over, but she always had a glass of milk. After pouring herself a glass, she turned back to face me, leaning against the counter.
For a moment, neither of us said anything. “How’d last night go?” she asked me. She sounded chipper, but it was forced, I thought.
It took me a moment to realize she was talking about Derek. I kept thinking about Logan and Miranda and how last night was probably a mistake on so many levels. When I thought back on the date, all I could see was Logan walking with that girl outside my window and Miranda rubbing up against that guy on the dance floor.
Shrugging, I answered, “Fine. It was fine.”
Kass frowned at my answer. “Fine?” she asked. “Like, ‘fine and I hate his guts’ or ‘fine but I didn’t feel anything’?”
Forcing myself to look up at her, I let out a sigh. “It was fine, like ‘fine, but I’m not sure I’ve gone on enough dates with him to know if I want to have his children yet’,” I answered, snapping more than I had intended to.
Kass narrowed her eyes at me. Putting her glass down on the counter, she folded her arms across her chest and said, “What is wrong with you lately?”
I was about to snap at her again that it was none of her business and what the hell did she know anyway, when I noticed that beneath her irritation, she was actually worried. She had never seen me like this after all.
Sighing, I rubbed my face with my hands. “I’m sorry. I’ve just been really stressed. I’ve got a lot going on right now.”
Her stern expression eased slightly. Kass knew how important academics were to me and she assumed that they were finally causing me to lose it. Running her hands through her hair, she asked, “Got midterms coming up?”
I debated saying yes. If there was any believable, understandable excuse available, it was that academics were bogging me down and I was just really stressed about my grade. But as I looked at my roommate and friend, I realized that she wasn’t going to buy that for long—and that I needed someone else to know about this. Someone I could talk to about it.
Biting my lip, I said, “Do you remember that girl from the other night?”
Kass rolled her eyes. “You mean the slut Miranda?”
I nodded. “Well, I know her.”
“I know that,” Kass told me. “You said so the other night, remember?”
“Yeah, and you knew there was more to the story.”
Falling silent, Kass nodded her head. She had known. Probably everyone had, but Kass especially sensed that there was more to the story than anyone was letting on. She hadn’t pushed it that night, or even since then, but I could sense that she had been dying to since the moment Miranda called me Ri.
“She was the sister of a friend of mine back in high school.” My best friend, I thought. “I wasn’t close with her, but she used to follow us around… She’s a couple of years younger and she always looked up to her sister.”
Kass moved to take a sit on the opposite side of the counter, listening carefully. “What happened?” she prompted.
I wasn’t sure if I could do this. The story that was bubbling in my chest wasn’t one I’d ever dreamed I would share—or ever thought I’d want to, but I needed to get it now. Not just to explain what was happening with me to my roommate and good friend, but because I was going to drive myself crazy if I didn’t figure out something soon.
“It was years ago,” I started, trying to speak past the lump in my throat. “I was in high school. I was… a lot different than I am now.”
“Different how?” Kass asked, staring at me curiously. I could tell she had started putting things together. She didn’t have the whole story, how could she? But she’d figured out enough that it was clear she was reconsidering what she knew about me.
I wished she didn’t have to, but I couldn’t blame her for it. Everything I’d told her about myself was a lie. Leaning forward in my seat, I took a deep breath. “Wild,” I finally admitted, shutting my eyes against her expression. “A total party girl. If there was something that would get you in trouble, I had done it. The more frowned upon, the more dangerous, the more I was determined to do it.”
I shuddered against the memory of the girl I had been. How had I let myself become so terrible, so crazy? It was a question easy enough to answer: I liked it. And I still did. That was why it was so hard to walk away from Logan, even though I knew he was trouble.
“That’s your big secret?” Kass demanded, her tone more amused and annoyed than anything else.
I forced my eyes open and straightened up in my seat to look at her, despite my fear of what I would find. To my surprise and relief, her expression was as amused as her voice.
“Please. Everyone who goes to college becomes the exact opposite of who they were in high school. That’s the point. It’s the perfect opportunity to change your whole image and no one questions it because they don’t know you. Who are they to say?”
The relief within me grew. I felt better almost instantly. She wasn’t judging me, she wasn’t telling me how horrible of a person I was. Yet even through my relief I couldn’t shake the feeling of dread still in my system.
She let out a laugh. “I mean, seriously, this is what you’ve been all emo about?”
And that’s when it hit me. Yes, I’d confessed who I used to be—but I hadn’t told the whole story. Frowning, I shook my head. “No, Kass,” I told her in a small voice. “You don’t understand. I wasn’t just a bad girl… I was awful.”
She shrugged. “Yeah, whatever. Everyone thinks they were the worst person in the world—or the greatest, but those people are assholes. Your own opinion of yourself doesn’t really matter.” She waved off my fears like I was being a little kid. “You’re not awful really. You’re just hard on yourself.”
I balled up my fists and pounded them down on my knees. “You don’t get it!” My voice had risen in volume without my realizing it as I felt myself reach the edge of hysteria. “I was awful! I… I am awful. I can’t ever come back from who I was, and it was stupid of me to think I could.”
Kass gave me a sympathetic look and opened her mouth to say something comforting. Probably, she was going to call me ridiculous for even thinking something so stupid, but I continued before she could say it.
The sooner she knew, the sooner she would understand.
“I killed someone Kass!” I shouted at her, jerking up out of my seat. My breathing became quick and a little panicky. I didn’t want to think about this, much less talk about this, but I had to. Too many things were going on for me to just try to push it aside anymore. I couldn’t keep pretending that this wasn’t happening. Not with Miranda right here. “I killed my best friend. I killed Beck…”
Kass sat there, stunned. Her mouth was hanging open a little bit and she stared at me with wide, disbelieving eyes. I could tell that she didn’t know what to say to that, what to think.
Taking a deep breath, I began the story that had been eating away at me for years…
Beck and I were inseparable. Some people are just like that, you know? Soulmates. Not in the lover kind of way, but just two people so in tune with each other that they might as well be the same person. That’s how we were. It didn’t matter that she liked to read and I liked to watch trashy TV shows. It didn’t matter that she was honors and headed to some big name school on the other side of the country and I would be lucky if I made it out of high school with one class that hadn’t written F on my report card.
We were just the right mix of opposites to be the perfect kind of friends.
She was studying in her room that night. Reading Shakespeare, I thought, but not Romeo and Juliet. One of the other ones, the ones that no one in our class had even heard of before, because she was just that smart.
But I had other plans for the night instead of staying in being good little girls.
There was a tree outside her window. A tall oak with branches that were thick enough to shimmy out on, one of them so close to her window th
at all I had to do was climb up the trunk, jump over to the landing (which was really the porch overhang) and walk the rest of the way to her window.
That’s what I did that night.
I wore black that night. My make-up was heavy, my shorts were so short that they were riding up my thighs, and my converse were muddy from making my way to Beck’s house. The lights were all dim there, except for her window. Her parents and little sister had gone to bed hours ago, but Beck was known to stay up late studying or working on projects. She was just that dedicated of a student.
And if she was up late, then I was likely to distract her from her studies.
Using one of the branches as leverage, I hoisted myself up the tree, scrambling up along the bark trying to get access. Then I shimmied the rest of the way along the branch towards the landing. A breeze picked up my hair, tossing my thick, dark curls wildly about the place, into my face and eyes. Grinning, I pushed my hair back and hopped off the branch, reaching the landing.
From there, I had to be careful. It was an overhang that I was standing on, not a porch or balcony, and it wasn’t exactly designed to hold a lot of weight. But I’d been on it a thousand times since I was a little kid and I knew where to step to avoid falling through the weak spots.
I reached the window and peered inside. Beck was sitting there, leaning over a book that was propped open on her desk. She looked engrossed in the story, lost in the words on the page. I’d always wondered about that. It didn’t make sense to me, not really. Books were a waste of time—and the more my mother tried to push them on me, the more I wanted to just slammed them closed and throw them across the room.
What was I going to find in a book that was more useful than what I could find in life?
When Beck only continued to read, I finally got impatient and knocked on the window. She jerked at the noise, her head whipping towards the window so fast I was worried she’d snapped her own neck. But she hadn’t. When she saw it was me on the other side, she grinned broadly and headed over to the window. She opened it and let me in.
Wrecked Book 3 Page 5
