Happier Without You

by Nicole Thorn

  “I know what you look like too, so I stand by my statement. I enjoy looking at you, as do many other people.”

  I could live a hundred more years and not believe him, but it was nice to hear anyway. Even if Poe only wanted to make me feel better, for a few seconds, I felt a little less than gross looking.

  When I stayed silent too long, Poe poked my shoulder. “You look sad. So back to the point of why I’m here. Let me take you out for some ice cream.”

  I looked at the clock, and he’d been there with me for almost an hour. “It’s really late.”

  “So? Live a little.”

  I didn’t not want to go out, and it wasn’t like my parents would have known. Poe had started moving to my window before I even said anything. What would staying home have done me? I’d have been alone, probably regretting my choice. What did I have to prove by sticking around?

  When I met Poe at the window, he helped me get outside. Once I closed it again, Poe took my hand for the walk back to his car.

  “Your parents don’t mind you going out at night?”

  Poe’s pleasant expression sunk a little. “They don’t know I left the house. I would rather they didn’t. I’m not so sure how much they approve of my choices.”

  It felt like one of those moments where I should have dropped the issue. Poe had a lot more problems than I thought he did, and his family seemed to be a touchy subject. I still wanted to know how his sister got those scars.

  We got into the car, and Poe didn’t bring up his family again. I let it go, and he brought me to a little ice cream shop a few miles away. He walked me in, taking my hand and keeping it when we got to the counter. When I tried to pay for my own ice cream, I got glared at.

  “The fuck you think this is, woman?” Poe asked me, handing over a five to the girl behind the counter.

  I blinked hard. “I don’t…know.”

  “Well, I invited you here, and I’m paying.”

  I didn’t say anything after that, but Poe smirked at me like he’d won something. He escorted me over to a booth, and took the side I picked. We put our feet up, and I went to town on my Oreo shake.

  When I came up for air, I set the cup on the table. Poe stared at me, a smile still on his face. “You got a little something.” He pointed to his nose.

  I checked in the reflection on my phone, and I took a deep breath, letting the mortification set in. I had ice cream all over my nose, and Poe got an excellent look at it. Deciding that I was an utter moron, I grabbed a napkin, and cleaned myself off.

  Poe leaned into my ear. “That was adorable, just so you know.” He bumped my hip, and patted my thigh.

  “That was not adorable. I’m a loser.”

  “You really need to work on that putting yourself down stuff. I like you, and I wish you liked you too.”

  Never gonna happen.

  “While we’re on the subject of not liking me…” I started. “I had a little run in with Tammy today.”

  “Oh?”

  I launched into the story for him, telling Poe as many details as I had told the two useless ladies in the office. I told him that part too, letting him know that if he ever had a problem at school, not to bother going to them with anything.

  The look on Poe’s face was…terrifying, to say the least. Anger didn’t fit in his features, and it worried me. It changed him so completely, taking him from someone sweet and kind looking, to a boy filled with something hateful that I couldn’t fix.

  “They didn’t do anything?” he asked.

  “Nope. They pretty much made me sound crazy, and like I was wasting their time.”

  “Do you want…do you want me to pee on their cars?”

  I closed my eyes, shaking my head as he laughed at me. “Sweetie, you really have to pull back on the pee stuff. It’ll make me think things about you.”

  “Like?”

  “Like you’re a weirdo.”

  “I am. Watch as I demonstrate.”

  I didn’t watch, but I felt his teeth on my jaw and holy hell. I didn’t at all hate that. Didn’t hate the little growl either, and my eyes remained closed while Poe tried to… I couldn’t remember.

  “Clover?” he asked me, and I didn’t feel him on me anymore. It made me open my eyes, disappointed. “Can I ask you something inappropriate?”

  “Sure. Cathy does all the time.”

  Poe’s smile felt off to me while he watched the counter. “That assault kiss you were talking about, is that the only way you’ve been kissed?”

  I bit my lower lip. “My only other kiss happened in second grade. We didn’t really know what we were doing. I had a crush on her for like months. She ended up ditching me for a boy who bought her love with cookies.”

  “Bitch,” Poe laughed.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “It kinda bothers me that you don’t like it because your dumbass boyfriend didn’t know how to do it. If you want…” He trailed off for a minute, and wouldn’t look at me. “I can attempt to sway your opinion.”

  What… the fuck? I played it over in my head, making sure it had been what it sounded like. Yeah, sounded like Poe offered up his services. “You wanna kiss me?”

  Poe glanced over at me. “It sucks that the last person you kissed is a jerk—Tammy aside—, and didn’t care to make sure you liked it. I mean, I would be righting a wrong.”

  “You would.”

  My first instinct wasn’t to say no, or feel repelled that he’d offered. It was a weird one, but I didn’t actually mind. It made my stomach hurt though, and I didn’t think I would finish my ice cream. I wanted to nod, and keep my cool when Poe leaned forward to kiss me. His words replayed in my head. If I let him, then Peter wouldn’t have been the last person I’d kissed. It felt…wrong. That relationship ended, and I didn’t want back in it. Not now. This felt like it would have been marking it as done, and throwing the final handful of dirt into the grave.

  “Okay,” I said.

  Poe looked frozen for a second before he turned his head to me. “Okay?”

  “Yeah. You better bring you’re A game, mister.”

  He let out a breathy laugh, and then his hand went behind my neck. My skin prickled with goosebumps when he started leaning to me. Peter always went fast. No lead up at all. I blinked, and his tongue was in my mouth, poking around like he looked for something. Ugh, I didn’t want to think about that and ruin what Poe and I were about to do. I blocked it out as best I could.

  I felt Poe’s breath on my lips, and my eyes closed in response. I waited for what felt like an hour, eagerly wanting him to close the distance already. His hand covered mine on my lap, and…

  “I need to clean the booths,” a dead eyed teenager said, standing right outside of our seats. “We’re closing.”

  I wanted to murder him, but the kid was only trying to do his job. Poe still glared at him. “Thanks, man.”

  “No problem.”

  Sighing, Poe tugged on my hand as we moved out of the booth. He pulled me to his side as we walked out the door. “We should get you home,” he decided. “Lest your parents happen to check on you.”

  I resisted pouting at the loss, and let him do as he said.

  Chapter Thirteen: Defining Insult to Injury

  “Graham is in a mood today,” Cathy said as she walked up to me at my locker. “He got all snippy because he found out someone asked his girlfriend out on a date. Twice.”

  I knew little about her friends, but I’d heard the name before. The boy was in her band, and if I remembered right, he looked for excuses to get mad at things. I heard he punched a guy for looking at him the wrong way.

  “Skipping practice today?” I asked, pulling my things from my backpack, putting them away.

  “Yup,” she said. “I get to go home and help Jamie wash his dogs. Super.”

  I smiled, and closed my locker again.

  I’d felt guilty all day for not filling Cathy in on my weekend, but I didn’t want to share yet. The day after Poe’s and
my almost kiss, he came back to spend more time with me. He’d snuck in, and we watched some TV while not actually watching. We mostly talked about me, and when I was a little kid. He asked me a lot of questions about how my parents had been, which I didn’t understand. I’d never really said that stuff out loud, because Peter was sensitive about the parent stuff. I tried to keep my complaining to a minimum, so he wouldn’t have felt bad.

  Jamie appeared out of nowhere, glaring at his sister. “Yeah, you get to. You should be damn honored that Mumbo lets you see him naked.”

  Cathy rolled her eyes. “Your dog is nothing compared to Cujo. Does your dog give you high fives? No? That’s right, fucker.”

  Jamie turned to me. “Why do you put up with this? You could do better.”

  “I really can’t,” I said.

  Cathy smirked. “Suck on that, Jamie.” She snapped her fingers in his face, and he batted her away.

  The boy leaned against my locker, settling up between us as he threw a look back, and across the way. There lied Kelly, Peter, and a few of their friends. They smiled, and laughed, and it made me sick.

  “How’s the chump?” Jamie asked me.

  I snorted. “Blind support. I like it.”

  He flashed me a smile. “Cathy filled me in. I felt like I had to inform you that I’m on your side, as well as my girlfriend, who thinks your ex is an ass.”

  “Thank you… And thanks, Cathy, for telling him.”

  She patted her brother’s shoulder. “I had to explain why the boxes were all smushed up. Are you mad?”

  I shrugged. “Nah, it’s fine. Nice to know not everyone thinks I’m the clingy loser who fucked everything up.”

  “No one thinks that,” Cathy said. “Literally everyone who hears what happened, is on your side. We all think Peter is a selfish asshole.”

  My reaction was still to flinch when I heard things like that about Peter. When we had been together, it happened a lot. His personality wasn’t…one that meshed well with others. He got a lot of joy out of correcting people, and that wasn’t any way to make friends.

  “Might be a little harsh,” I said. “It just bugs him when things are wrong.”

  “Like his method of kissing?”

  I gasped, and reached over to smack Cathy in the shoulder. “Dude! Why would you tell him that?” I only told her the night before, when she called to see what I had been up to. I started filling her in on what Poe and I talked about. She asked questions…

  “It was horrible,” she said. “I didn’t want to know it without telling someone I trusted.”

  Jamie patted my head. “It’s okay, kiddo. We all feel really bad for you, but I have much reverence for a girl who could put up with the shit you put up with, and not murder anyone. Good on ya.”

  My face burned up, and I had nothing to add.

  I looked up at the small crowd a few yards away, and accidentally made eye contact with Kelly. My heart raced, and ached as I struggled to get my next breath. I told myself that I was okay, and I could get over it. People got dumped all the time, and that didn’t make me special. It wasn’t like I got cheated on either, so did I have the right to feel this awful?

  Kelly stopped looking at me, instead aiming her eyes up at Peter. She smiled wide, taking his hand and holding it. He didn’t like PDA, so he got a little snippy when I tried that kind of thing with him. When I didn’t see him pull his hand away, I felt that hollow thumping that popped up in my chest from time to time. It made me look away.

  “Where’s Poe?” Jamie asked me, giving a great distraction. “I thought you guys were all…cuddly.”

  We were, but I wanted to know how the hell he knew that. “Cathy tell you that?”

  He laughed at me. “She didn’t need to. You’re seen all over the school with him, and most of the time, you’re touching in some way. People notice, and I have eyes everywhere. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but I am very charming and wonderful.”

  Cathy gagged. “You’re a gross human being, and you have a dumb dog.”

  “You bitch,” he whispered. “My dog is majestic as fuck, and could eat Cujo for breakfast.”

  “Only because he eats everything in the house.”

  “It makes my point no less valid.”

  To answer the question, I said, “He’s got the last of his makeup stuff to do, then he’s free. And we’re not a thing, just so you know.”

  Jamie laughed again, then he winked. “Sure he’s not. Either way, everyone thinks it.”

  It wasn’t my problem, so I refused to stress out about it. There had to have been a fast approaching line, measuring how much I could have taken before my head exploded all over the wall.

  I looked up at the wrong damn time, because I caught sight of Kelly again. Their friends had gone, and I saw her hands reaching up for Peter’s face. She took it, and pulled him down to her. For one brief moment, she saw me before her lips touched Peter’s. Then they kissed, and I felt like the wind got knocked out of my lungs again. I bit down on the inside of my cheek, trying to keep from making an audible sound of my heart shattering again.

  I knew that they were dating, and I had for weeks. So why did it still hurt this badly, when I got a confirmation of them doing something I knew they had already been doing? It made me feel insane, and pathetic that I cared. All the things that Peter and I did, they did now. It was part of the deal, and it shouldn’t have taken me by surprise like that. It still felt like a gunshot.

  “What a prick,” Jamie said, turning to see Kelly and Peter going at it. “Ya know what, I would be more than happy to French you in public if you wanted a little revenge.”

  I scoffed. “I doubt Peter would give a shit if I was kissing someone else.”

  It only took one smile and an eyebrow quirk from Cathy for me to feel afraid. “I don’t think you’re right on that one, babes. He came over to our table to make sure you weren’t with Poe. And I don’t care what you think, that was what he was fucking doing. So I think your ex might be a little jelly.”

  I rolled my eyes. “He dumped me.”

  “So?” Jamie said. “That doesn’t mean he wouldn’t get a little pissy at the thought of you with someone else. That’s the thing about assholes, they’re assholes.”

  I smiled.

  “So he wouldn’t like you doing what he’s doing. If you would like, I will lend my tongue to you. Ana wouldn’t mind.”

  “Hell,” Cathy said. “She would probably volunteer to help.”

  “That’s true,” Jamie said, digging his phone out of his pocket. “I can text her and have her here in three minutes. We can stage a three-way.”

  Cathy shuddered. “Eww, but I like your thinking. Petty revenge can feel real good if you do it right.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said.

  Cathy tilted my head up, making me look at Kelly and Peter again. Kelly knew I stood there, and she did this anyway. I had no way of knowing if Peter had been aware too, and I didn’t think he would have hurt me on purpose. All the times he had before, had been accidental.

  “Damn,” Jamie sighed. “He really does that weird, opened mouth thing.” He made a face. “That’s fucked up.”

  I made a sound of disgust again, and turned to Cathy as she went on. “Think about it. You’re suffering, and it might make you feel a little better.”

  “Isn’t that a bit childish?”

  “Absolutely. You don’t have to be the bigger man all the damn time. I’m not saying we murder Peter—though I am totally open to it—but what he’s doing right now, that’s evil. He knows you can see, and he’s kissing her. He knew it wasn’t his business, but he came to mark his territory with you when he caught wind of you and Poe. Peter isn’t playing fair, and he’s got no right to try and fuck with you. I say, get a little revenge.”

  Because I must have liked the pain, I looked to Kelly and Peter one more time. Their kiss ended, and she smiled at him as she put her arms around his middle. We made eye contact, and that smile didn’t
fade. Her gaze lingered, as did the pain in my chest.

  Then I smiled right back. “Yeah, I think we can work with that.”

  Cathy jumped up and down, clapping. “Fuck yeah. Let me get to work on this. Mama will make it all better. For now, we should get home. Come, my love.”

  She held her hand out for me to take, and I did. On my other side, her brother did the same. When I had both of my hands held, I got escorted down the hall in style. I should have been more embarrassed than I was. Strangely, I kind of liked it. I felt lighter, having people that liked me, playing with me like that.

  As we passed Peter and Kelly, he watched me. Jamie smiled at him and said, “Hey, how’s the archeology going?”

  “Huh?” Peter asked.

  Jamie turned while walking, still able to face him. “Ya know, because you love spelunking.”

  “Jamie!” I hissed, and smacked his arm.

  He griped at me, and turned back around. “Shut up. That was funny.”

  I looked to Cathy for backup, but she only shrugged. “Sorry, he’s right.”

  I supposed he was…

  Cathy gave me a ride home before she had to head off for her dog bathing party. I walked into my house, and nearly got trampled by Orny coming to give me a hug. He made me bend down to him.

  “I saw lots of birds today,” he said. “They flew away when I yelled.”

  Laughing, I said, “I’m sure they did.”

  “Okay! Bye!” And he took off in the other direction. I got left in the dust by a small child who then started screaming about a video game I had never heard of. While he did that, I went into my room.

  Since I got lucky enough to not have any homework, that meant I had a boring afternoon ahead of me. No Cathy, and no Poe to save me from the emptiness of this room or this day.

  I started cleaning again, making sure that all of my clothes had been folded properly, and nothing looked crooked on my bookshelves. It didn’t, but I still messed with them a whole bunch. Though everything had been perfectly arranged, nothing felt right in here. I looked around, and it all seemed so empty.

  Something tapped on my door before it opened up, and my mother peeked her head inside. “Can we talk to you for a minute?”