Against the Rules (Even The Score #4)

57. king

CHAPTER 57

KING

RUIN PHOTOS

Outside the aquarium, Kassie was deep in her sketchbook, drawing all of us like Bob’s Burgers characters while we waited for Willow. I sat on the bench, watching the road. Waiting. Counting down the seconds.

There it was, the dark blue van.

I jerked up from the bench so fast, it tipped behind me.

"Oh, oh! I got it!" Piper hurried over, but couldn’t raise it. "It’s too heavy?—"

Leaning back, I yanked it into place, craning my neck for the van. The moment Willow stepped out, in a two-part outfit with lots of green and pink, I lurched forward to meet her halfway, grinning so hard, my face hurt.

"Where have you been, young lady?!" Adam belted. "Your father and I were worried sick! We’ve been waiting so long, my ass is asleep. You’re grounded!"

Willow rolled her eyes. "I’ve been with your coach. "

"It’s too hot to argue," Kassie groaned. "I want air conditioning."

Tickets stamped, we made our way into the aquarium. I purposefully hung back with Willow while the others checked out the iguanas.

"How was lunch?" I asked, careful to keep my voice low. Her headphones poked out from her purse so I slipped them out, untangling them while we walked. "How are the boys doing? Your dad?"

"Um…good."

"Did your brothers get the tickets for the Star Trek popup?"

"Mm. Yeah."

"I have something to tell you."

Her eyes were fixed on the iguanas a couple of seconds too long before she looked up in surprise at her headphones, tied in a circle. "Oh. Thank you."

Willow kept fidgeting with her jacket and it was pretty obvious she wasn’t mentally at the aquarium.

I stopped her by one of the columns covered in barnacles. "Are you okay?"

"Um…no."

"What’s wrong? What happened?"

"I…" Willow leaned against the column, biting her lip. "I think I created a new reason for my parents to get divorced and they’re already divorced. I slipped about the open mics in high school. My mom freaked out." She sighed. "Plus my dad called and he basically auditioned for his realtor license to get me to come to Boston."

My mouth ran dry. I wanted to present my case for why Willow needed to stay in Houston but I fought the urge. She looked exhausted.

"Is there…what can I do?"

"Nothing," she said quickly. "What’s the news?"

I rested my arm on the column above her. I was so excited to tell her but now my stomach was in knots. "Uh…I talked to June. I told her I don’t want to do the fake relationship anymore. We’re calling it off."

"What? You didn’t have to?—"

"I wanted to."

"But—King, we can’t tell anyone?—"

"I know you still want to help Elijah out, and that’s cool, but you’re right, I’m unhappy in mine. June’s one of my best friends but I’d rather spend the time with you—" I stopped myself. "Not that you need to make the same—I know Elijah’s a good friend of yours. I don’t want you to be pressured. That’s not what I’m doing. Shit." I raked my hand through my hair. "Mine’s overdue. That’s what I’m trying to say."

"Oh." She paused. "Where is June?"

"One of the hockey players came and picked her up. She went back to Houston."

"You didn’t have to do that, King."

"I know. I wanted to."

Last year, it was easy holding June’s hand and kissing for the cameras. It didn’t mean anything. But now when June wanted an arm around her for photos, it was an uncomfortable feeling, like trying on a jacket five sizes too small.

Willow and I wandered to the sea lion exhibit, away from the rest of the group. This was a completely different feeling. Sleeping together was one thing but getting to hang out with Willow in public, getting to be that close to her, was exactly what I wanted.

"I have a personal question to ask," she whispered by the starfish. "You don’t have to answer it."

"Anything."

"Have you…ever…done drugs?"

The words didn’t sink in at first, but when they did, I burst into laughter. Until I realized she wasn’t kidding. The laughter petered out when I really thought about it—this was something we hadn’t talked about and it wasn’t funny.

"Oh—uh—yeah."

Willow nodded slowly. "Like…marijuana?"

Ah. Shit.

Gazing down at her, I was struck by the very real observation that we were two incredibly different people. The deeper we walked into the aquarium, the more I knew it. It wasn’t like I didn’t recognize it before but now the differences were stark.

"Yeah. I used to smoke in middle school but football cracked down with testing, so I gave it up."

" Middle school?"

Oh, man. This is going to be a conversation .

I shifted uncomfortably. "I don’t know everything I took—but addy to stay awake—" I stopped myself. Shit, calling it addy to her? "I mean Adderall. And they had coke on the track, which was way too expensive for me, but with some of the guys, it was an expectation to drive for them."

"You’ve done coke?"

"Yeah. I had some bad coke for a race. I finished up my rounds before it hit and I started vomiting blood all over the—" Too much information, King . "—uh, I got really sick and one of the guys called an ambulance. I got cuffed instead. Spent about thirty-six hours in lockup while they waited for me to sober up."

Her eyes were too wide. She stared at me without blinking.

I thought I kept it pretty PG, but this was Willow I was talking to. She wasn’t just soft to touch, she was soft with everything. A soft, fluffy, painted cloud on a pastel background and there I was, some guy in a hoodie and shorts, who couldn’t believe she gave me a chance and kept giving me chances after I fucked up.

"That’s my Scared Straight story. Went clean after that."

"They didn’t take you to a hospital?"

I shook my head and stayed just as still as she was, waiting for what would happen next. Because I never had a conversation like this before. I didn’t know how I was supposed to salvage it, I didn’t know how to fix this, I didn’t know?—

Willow reached up to wrap her arms around my neck, hugging me tight.

I didn’t move for a couple of seconds, surprised. "I…uh?—"

"I’m so sorry," she whispered.

"Oh." I hesitated and wrapped my arms around her too, heart thumping from the close contact. "Did I…mention something or…? Did your mom say something?"

"Um…my dad."

A big strike from the poetry professor. Great. I grimaced at the little windows of fish floating nearby, I had to figure out some way to get on her dad’s good side. While he was in Massachusetts.

Damn.

"What are you two doing?" Adam interrupted—of course.

Willow pulled away from me. "We’re—um?—"

"She found out my tragic backstory and she’s comforting me," I joked, nodding along for us to catch up with the others. I could joke about it. Willow was upset, but those thirty-six hours put me in this aquarium, with a super-hot and kind girlfriend, and great friends. I wasn’t fazed.

"Tragic backstory?" Adam grinned. "Willow, are you collecting those?"

"I hope not."

"Well, if you’re not busy in October, I’m suing my parents, and it’d be awesome if you could RSVP for the court date."

Willow’s eyes shot to mine. "Is he serious?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "We’re all going."

Adam walked backwards, still talking to us. "Don’t you know that’s the next stage of friendship here? First, football practice. Second, court together."

"We’re dressing up for it," Kassie broke away from the next exhibit. "It’ll be like alumni night."

"Can you believe the lawyers told me no v-necks or speedos?"

"I can’t tell if he’s being serious," Willow whispered to me.

"Completely serious." Adam frowned. "They said no mesh tops."

Piper looped her arm around him, squeezing tight, while Ryan walked up. "We’re all going to be there for Adam, first day of court. We’re a team. And as a team, it’s important to show up and show out for things like?—"

"Wait, no." Adam snapped his fingers. "My tragic backstory is Ryan sending me a nude meant for Kassie."

Ryan blanched. "You motherfucker ."

My mouth fell open and Kassie wheezed with laughter. "You did what? "

"Listen to this. I get a text message at eleven, right? It’s from Ryan. It says he misses me. And I’m like—aw—that’s my brother, that’s one of my best friends, what a nice message. We never send stuff like that to each other. Open it— bam . Dick and balls."

"It always has favorite contacts on the side, not most recent!" Ryan shouted. "They changed it with this shit update—I hate these fucking phones!"

Kassie laughed so hard, she sank to the floor, and I had to help her back up while Willow and Piper weren’t much better. Fuck, I couldn’t stop laughing either. Adam kept going, complaining about how he never got a sentimental message like that from Ryan, who reached out to grab him, but I pulled Adam away from the line of fire.

"You never even respond to the regular texts I send!" Ryan snapped.

"Goes to show, if you want someone’s attention, show them your super hairy balls?—"

"Motherfucker—"

Ryan dove for Adam and I yanked him away by the back of his shirt, still laughing.

We made it to the end of the hall where they had a station for photos, and everyone quickly gathered around, even if most of us were still laughing, Ryan still fuming. Willow stopped giggling long enough to ask an old man to take our picture.

"I got it," I assured her and grabbed her phone.

"No, you don’t. You have to be in it."

I shook my head. "I don’t do that."

"They take photos of you all the time for football."

"That’s for football."

"Willow, some people don’t like hot sauce," Adam called out. "Some people don’t like anal. King doesn’t like pictures. Not really anything you can do about it."

Which was true but Willow pressed her lips in a hard line and motioned the others to start taking pictures without us. When we were in the clear, she dropped her voice. "King, are we doing another weird breakup thing again?"

"What?" I frowned. "No."

"So we’re going to be dating for a while?"

Until I pop out with a ring.

I nodded.

"If we’re dating for a while, we’re making memories," she continued, pointing to our friends, being morons with the boat props. "When I think about Austin, I don’t want to think about how shitty my day was before I got here or family drama. I want to remember this. I want to remember these memories."

Slowly, I nodded again. That made sense.

"So I need photos."

"I can take photos."

"I need photos with you. I want to make memories with you."

It wasn’t that simple. I wanted photos of Willow, sure, anyone would, but every photo with me in it was a photo I chucked in the garbage. How could I explain? It was wasted effort.

"Willow, I ruin photos."

"No. You don’t."

I shoved my hands in the pocket of my hoodie. "You have to understand we’re on different levels here?—"

"We’ve had this conversation before. No. I don’t. "

"Willow—"

"You know how attracted I?—"

"I’m not fishing for compliments."

"King."

"It’s fine. I can take photos."

Willow gave me a tired look. "King. For me? Please?"

Silent, I gave the photo area another look. It wasn’t only the scars that bothered me. I looked like the one person in the world who I never wanted to see again. Which meant I ignored all of the banners with my face on them, the notebooks, the t-shirts, all of it. I took photos if someone else needed them but avoided the rest. The only time I was fine with it was when Kassie drew me but that was because she sketched cartoons. If she ever went realistic, I’d decline them.

My eyes slid back to Willow. She had a shit day already.

I didn’t want to make it worse.

Slowly, I nodded, letting her tug me back to everyone else. The guys stared, shocked.

"Did Willow threaten you?" Adam demanded. "If she has a knife in her purse, blink twice."

I rolled my eyes.

"If King’s taking photos, we need one of Lawson’s boys." Piper motioned the girls away. Which was not why I volunteered to do the photos, but Ryan took his place between us and the camera flashed.

"You look like a kidnapping victim, King. You better smile with the next one or I’m kicking your ass," Adam threatened.

"Yeah and I’ll show Piper your freshman year peace sign phase."

Ryan groaned. "That was painful."

"Tongue out and everything," I added.

"Like you didn’t look like an emo nerd when you got here," Adam laughed.

I flipped him off before Piper took more photos. Everyone piled in together for a group picture, and I thought it was done, until Willow pulled me back.

"Jasmine’s favorites need a photo together," she announced.

"Why don’t you rub it in?" Kassie grumbled.

"There’s no way King is Jasmine’s favorite," Adam said. "That’s coming from someone who used to be in the favorites section and got thrown out for the shiny new edition."

Willow brushed away the comments and leaned into me.

I didn’t know how to touch her. What’s the appropriate way to take photos with your girlfriend so nobody suspects you’re in love with her? I debated for a few seconds before wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her close. Fuck it. We could take one photo together.

My heart skipped a beat when Willow curved next to me.

Okay.

I could take photos with her.