by Bright, Sera
It drove me crazy that he rarely showed me any of his artwork, but I tried not to make a big production out of it. It was his thing, his secret. Everyone deserves their secrets, if only to have something to call their own. It didn’t mean I couldn’t tease him about it, though.
He just smiled, his lips tilting slightly at the corners. The Mona Lisa had nothing on him, which was a shame. He had a beautiful smile when he stopped being so serious all the time. This cute dimple would even appear.
“Don’t worry about it.” He rolled the canvas up tighter.
Deepening my voice, I mocked, “Don’t worry about it, little lady. This is manly, important artist work, not the stuff for delicate flowers such as yourself.”
He raised his brows. “When have you ever acted like a delicate flower?”
I fluttered my eyelashes and raised the back of my hand to my forehead, pretending to swoon. The complete picture of helplessness. His smile grew a little. Oh, no, that wasn’t enough. I had to see that damn dimple.
It was the last day before fall break, and everyone was eager to get out of the building. With a whole week of nothing planned, including a double helping of absolutely nothing on Thanksgiving Day, I wasn’t in a hurry to get started.
Ash’s parents were forcing him to spend the holiday in Colorado to go skiing. He deserved to have something to smile about before he left. Still intensely withdrawn, most days he didn’t talk to anyone besides his teachers and me. Another reason I devoted myself to teasing him at every opportunity.
I darted in front of him and tried to playfully snatch the canvas out of his hands. “Come on, give it over!”
He held it over my head by a couple of feet, using his height to shameless advantage. I wasn’t short, he was too tall.
“And let you know all my secrets?” A hint of a shadow appeared on his cheek. He lifted the painting higher and out of my reach.
I bounced up and made another pointless grab. “Is it a treasure map? Did you find the lost gold of the Edmund Fitzgerald?”
Wait, how the hell did I know about the Edmund Fitzgerald? Damn you, Wikipedia. Stop filling my head with useless information.
“You are a total brat.” He bopped me on the head with the painting, punctuating each word. An amused smile spread across his face, complete with one deep dimple.
His smile was perfect. He was perfect, even if he did take the brooding, temperamental artist stereotype too far.
“I know.” I reached up on impulse and patted his face. “But you love me anyway.”
Ash startled and caught my hand against his face. He was okay if he touched me, but was uncomfortable if I touched him. There was an unspoken boundary between us, and I thoughtlessly kept crossing it again and again. Stupid lack of self-control.
His smile died as his hazel eyes went unfocused, the way they did when he concentrated on a difficult problem. It wasn’t fair that he had such long lashes. But then, lots of things weren’t fair.
A pocket of cold air carried with it a whiff of expensive cologne. Over Ash’s shoulder, Trevor McCallum’s smug gaze bored into me. My shoulders hunched against my will. I pulled my hand away from Ash’s face and back down to my side. He shook his head as his usual somber expression returned. The slamming of lockers around us became too loud and irritating.
“I need to go ask Mr. Samson about the upcoming unit in pre-calc,” Ash said abruptly.
He disappeared into the crowd to go talk to the balding math teacher at the end of the hall. I could’ve told him anything he wanted to know—I finished that unit weeks ago out of sheer boredom. I considered following him, but obviously he didn’t want to be around me right now. Besides, I needed to go to my locker and grab some books. Trevor wouldn’t try anything with everyone around.
He’d asked me out when school started. I assumed it was a joke and turned him down flat, which hadn’t been difficult since every word out of his mouth subtracted exponentially from any of his potential appeal. I guess he was cute, in a pseudo-Greek god kind of way.
And then my refusal backfired spectacularly. Since the beginning of the school year, he’d found ways to corner me alone and try to convince me to change my mind. Touching me, grabbing me, never listening to my words, stopping short of physically overpowering me but always getting closer. If I showed a reaction, he’d take it as encouragement I was asking for more. He got off on the struggle. Trevor didn’t take rejection well. I doubted he’d ever been told no in his whole life.
I was standing in front of my locker with a hand on the lock when muscular, tanned arms wrapped around me, holding my arms pinned to my sides. I completely froze like a timid little rabbit. The astringent scent of his cologne singed my nose. Okay, so he would try something with everyone around.
“What do we have here? My favorite little freak,” he said. “Have I told you today how good you look?”
“Fuck off.” The initial shock died, and I squirmed in an effort to get away.
He pulled me closer, and ground his groin into my butt.
Furious heat flushed down my face to my neck. “Stop it.”
“You know you love it,” he whispered in my ear, his moist breath causing me to fight off a cringe of disgust.
I gritted my teeth. I could take the gossip Trevor spread about my supposed sexual skills. I heard I was fantastic, by the way. My mother would be so proud. And luckily, people paid even less attention to me as a rumored slut than they did before. But public humiliation took it too far. I couldn’t do a thing about it, because no one else saw a problem.
Kids walked by, giving him grins and thumbs-up signs. One of his buddies came by and held out a closed fist. Trevor crushed his arm across my chest, and reached out to fist bump with his free arm. The principal had already suggested I might be overreacting when I complained. Maybe it really wasn’t a big deal, and all the rising hysteria I felt wasn’t real, either.
Trevor’s bare forearm rested on my breasts, his fingers clawing into the tender skin of my upper arm. A cold sweat broke out. I didn’t want his arm to be there, I didn’t want him to be touching me. But it wasn’t like anything I said made a difference. He’d quit when he decided he was done playing with me.
Frantic, I tried to twist free, but I couldn’t match his strength. He brought his other arm around my chest and nuzzled my ear with an easy affection he hadn’t earned. His lips were clammy on my earlobe. I couldn’t hold back a shudder this time. I glanced over to where Ash stood talking to Mr. Samson but lost sight of him when a group of kids walked by.
“Where’s lover boy? He should see what you’re really like,” Trevor said in my ear. “If he hasn’t already.”
My stomach dropped. I hadn’t imagined it. He had watched my pathetic attempt at flirting with Ash. And this was my punishment.
“Let her go.” Ash pushed through the kids surrounding us. He clenched his jaw, angrier than I’d ever seen. Taller than Trevor but whipcord thin, Ash’s body was coiled tight.
“Why?” Trevor rubbed his arm all over my chest. “You don’t want her, so why can’t I have a turn?”
“Hey!” I snapped. “I’m not a toy. No one’s getting a turn.”
Ash took a step closer, widening his stance. This wasn’t good. Trevor laughed and released me with a big flourish, like he was performing some grand magic trick. I smoothed the front of my favorite vintage t-shirt, the baggy fabric another useless defense. Ash stared Trevor down, his face still dangerously dark. I walked over to Ash’s side.
“It’s okay,” I said under my breath. “Let’s just get out of here.”
Some of the anger cleared from his face when he glanced at my face. He started to turn away when Trevor’s voice rang out above all the noise in the hallway.
“It’s not my fault she has the body of a stripper under those ratty clothes she wears,” Trevor taunted. “Maybe when she’s finished swinging from your pole, she can swing from mine.”
Ash whipped around and pushed Trevor hard in the chest. Caught o
ff-guard, Trevor tripped over his feet, landing on his ass. Kids screamed with laughter. He shot up to his feet with a fist pulled back. Ash raised his arms, as if to say, come on.
I didn’t stop to think. I never do. I leaped in between them, brave until Trevor’s fist landed on my face. Pain exploded from my temple. I bit back a surprised cry of pain as I collapsed against my locker. Instantly, Ash shielded me with his body so no one could see my reaction. His hands went toward my face.
“Fuck!” Trevor said. The asshole actually sounded upset. “I didn’t mean to—”
“What is going on?” Mr. Samson squeezed through the crowd, his reedy voice scarcely registering over the noise.
Slowly, Ash lowered his hands and moved to my side, facing the math teacher. Mr. Samson wore a slight sneer of disgust as he regarded me. I pushed myself off the locker and stood up as tall as I could. There had been a shift in the way the teachers treated me once the rumors started flying. Some lowered their expectations, others brushed off my questions. Mr. Samson had stopped offering me challenging problems for extra credit months ago. And here I was with two boys fighting over me. Every girl’s dream.
“Nothing, they were just wrestling,” I said.
Trevor added ever so helpfully. “Yeah, we were just playing around, weren’t we?”
“You’re holding your eye, Katie,” Mr. Samson said in that tone people take when they know you’re full of shit. “Something happened.”
“I got in the way and caught a flying elbow.” With a wave of my hand, I gestured into the air nonchalantly. Oh, how clumsy of me. “I’m fine.”
That’s usually what people want to hear. Fine. No big deal. Don’t worry about it. They’ve done their part and can go about their business feeling like they’ve made the effort and it was enough. I raised my chin, challenging him to prove my assumptions about human nature wrong. Mr. Samson’s gaze slid from mine.
He looked over the group of students gathered around us. “Anyone have a different version of events?”
Shoes scuffed on the floor. A guy behind Mr. Samson snickered. No one wanted to be the person to tattle on Trevor. It was social suicide.
Ash moved forward as if he wanted to say something, but I dug my fingers into his wrist in warning. I pleaded to him silently, Please, don’t. He had the most to lose if he said something. He measured me with his gaze, and then subtly shook his arm free from my fingers before turning to face the math teacher.
“It was an accident, sir,” Ash said in that flat, impersonal tone he used with almost everyone he didn’t like. “It won’t happen again.”
Mr. Samson sighed and took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes. “Katie, at least come to the office with me and see the nurse for an ice pack. And you two—” Putting his glass back on his nose, he studied Ash and Trevor, and hesitated as Trevor grinned good-naturedly, while Ash’s face was set in stone. “I don’t want to see you two hanging around when I return.”
Trevor mouthed a thank-you in my direction. I flipped him off with my hand behind my back as I followed Mr. Samson down the hall. The lingering crowd of kids laughed. Mr. Samson didn’t bother to turn around to check it out.
Thirty minutes later, the halls were empty when I finally walked out the doors. I winced as I pressed the ice pack to my eye to wring out the last bit of coolness left. The whole side of my face throbbed with blunted pain. A career in underground cage fighting definitely wasn’t in my future now.
I cut across the dry brown grass to the parking lot. Ash came out from around the side of the school, his face guarded. His eyes searched my face, and his mouth flattened as he zeroed in on the blossoming bruise. It wasn’t hard to guess what he was going to ask next.
“It’s okay.” I tossed the ice pack into a nearby trash can. “And I’m fine.”
He took a deep breath. “Just for once, don’t lie. You can lie to everybody else if you want, but not to me.”
I never meant to lie to him. I only did it because lying was as natural as breathing to me.
“My face hurts like hell.” I attempted a grin to reassure him, but it hurt too much to accomplish more than a rueful smile. “But good news, I think I’ll live.”
“I could kill him for this.” He traced around the edge of the swelling bruise on my cheekbone. “Why didn’t you tell me he was bothering you?”
Most of the pain dissolved under his fingers. It was almost worth the punch to the face if it meant being touched by someone who wasn’t trying to do a drive-by grope.
“I told Mr. White the first time he grabbed me. You know what he said?” I studied my black Chucks. “I was just ‘misinterpreting things.’”
“Fuck,” Ash swore under his breath.
“It gets better.” I smirked without humor. “But he would be happy to arrange a meeting with my dad, if I was that concerned about the issue.”
A little hard to do because of my dad’s new job. He’d left, working out-of-state for months at a time. He had made me swear to keep it a secret, going on and on about how they’d turn me over to the foster system if anyone found out. I knew firsthand that wasn’t true. No one would care enough to send me away. But I wasn’t entirely convinced my dad’s work trips were of the legal variety. He said he worked on an oil rig and couldn’t be contacted for security reasons. Right. Same reasons they paid him in cash.
Ash said, “I wouldn’t have left you alone if I’d known—”
“You can’t protect me every minute of the day. I can handle it.”
He brushed a knuckle along my cheek. “This is your idea of handling it?”
I nibbled on the inside of my lip and looked up at his eyes. They had turned golden in the weak afternoon sunlight. I didn’t know what to tell him. I wasn’t going to apologize for my choices. They were mine to make.
“Why did you do it?” Ash said.
“I didn’t lie for him, if that’s what you’re wondering. I did it for you.” How could he think otherwise? He knew me better than that. “I didn’t want you to get in trouble.”
“Nothing would happen to Trevor even if you did tell the truth.” He twisted his mouth in contempt, and then sighed. “And I wasn’t talking about that.”
“But something would happen to you,” I whispered.
We both knew how his parents would react to a call about him being involved in a fight, especially since Ash’s mother managed Trevor’s dad’s mayoral campaign that year.
“I could deal with it,” he said. “I always do.”
But I can’t, I thought. I couldn’t handle him receiving a beating because of me. I couldn’t handle him sneaking into my house to sleep on my couch afterward, and then pretending I didn’t hear the nightmares he worked so hard to ignore. I couldn’t handle him being dragged to more psychiatrists for more fake diagnoses to explain his stubborn silent nature to the school and everyone else. I couldn’t handle watching them try to tear him down any more than they already did. The words refused to come, though.
I shook my head at him, frustrated with my inability to put my own thoughts and feelings into words at will. Other people could do it, so why couldn’t I?
“Why did you get in between Trevor and me?” he asked again.
“I don’t know, why did you push him?” Deflection, the weapon of choice for the meek.
“Because I couldn’t stand for him to talk about you like that. You’re better than him, and everyone else in this hellhole.” He pressed a soft kiss to my forehead.
As he drew back, my gaze dipped to his mouth. A tiny ribbon of connection unfurled between us. All I would have to do was lift my face up, and I could kiss him. What would it be like to be kissed by someone who wasn’t just trying to see if the rumors were true? Maybe I’d like it this time.
I skittered a couple steps back. Not a good idea. Impulse was one thing, flat-out insanity was another. He didn’t think about me like that, or at least that’s what I kept telling myself. And I absolutely could not lose him yet, which is what would happen. His par
ents’ tolerance of our friendship was tenuous already. He was the only person I trusted, the only person I could be myself around without hiding everything. Almost everything.
His face shuttered, and I prayed he didn’t figure out where my mind had gone for that brief second. But then a sweet, quiet smile returned to his lips.
“How hard was that?” He raised a single brow. “You asked a question, and I, being a gentleman, answered the question.”
I arched an eyebrow of my own. Two could play this game.
He continued. “It’s called communication. We should try it sometime.”
“And you have the audacity to call me a brat?” I joked, relieved by the rebound to the familiar safe ground of our relationship.
“You’re a brat, but you’re my brat,” he said. “Come on, I’ll give you a ride home and protect you from any more rogue flying elbows.”
Chapter Seven
Friday
He clenched his jaw several times before speaking, visibly struggling to control his temper. “You’re not fine. You look like you’re about to pass out.”
I stuck my keys into my pocket of my shorts, and then put my hands behind my back, keeping the dandelion tattoo out of sight. I didn’t blame him for being angry with me. Why did he have to come back here now? He could be pissed off at me from across the country, where it was safer.
But his gaze was trained on Trevor. Ash started to move past me, when sounds echoed down the alley. Over my shoulder, I watched Devon and a group of people pour out from the upstairs door. Damn it. I didn’t want anyone to see me with Ash. I moved farther away from Ash, almost to the wall of the bakery. We were just friends talking at a comfortable distance. Nothing more than that now.
“Dude, what happened to your face?” a guy asked Trevor. “You’re messed up.”
I lifted my chin when Trevor looked my way. Go on, tell them what your favorite little freak just did, I silently urged.
