That Infuriating Feeling: An Academic Rivals to Lovers Novel (Chasing Feelings Book 2)

Chapter 13

June, Saturday, 8 Weeks Before the Semester is out

It was Saturday morning, and the day stretched long with emptiness until my 4 o’clock session with Oliver, meaning I was stuck in my room staring at the walls as I often did. I picked up a book I was supposed to be reading for class, but found myself spacing out at the blurred words as my mind wandered to other places. I sighed. It was no use. I tossed the book on my bed and forced myself to get dressed. Surely a walk and a heart-to-heart with the wind would help.

On my way out, I caught eyes with myself in the mirror hanging on the wall. Gross. I quickly turned away from the girl I saw in my reflection and trudged on. I walked through campus until I found a cafe, at which I stopped to buy myself a coffee. Holding something made roaming alone less awkward. Plus, the sweet treat made me less sad.

Sort of.

As if milky bean water could actually fix me.

A soft breeze blew around me as I placed one foot in front of the other, trying to balance myself on the brick lining of the asphalt path through the quad. It was then that I noticed how destroyed my black Converse were, the early signs of a hole wearing thin on the inside of the right one. I shrugged.

Staring down at my feet still, I veered off the path, feeling the way my shoes sank into the squishy grass, wondering where the sprinklers were and about what time they tended to pop up. Hopefully not on Saturday mornings. I kept strolling until I found a picnic table, where I sat myself down. It seemed as good a place as any to drink my coffee and stare at nothing.

About ten minutes into my sipping and staring, I could’ve sworn I heard the faintest of salutations, but I ignored it. I was probably just imagining Alana again. Looking down at my cup, I wiped a bead of coffee off the lip before taking another sip.

“Hello.”

Okay, that was definitely a real hello, but it wasn’t Alana’s voice. My head snapped up quickly. In front of me stood Mr… Uhm… What was it again? The guy who Mr. Brown threw an eraser at two months ago.

“Hi.” Why the fuck was he talking to me?

“You’re Daya’s sister,” he said kindly, looking down at me with a smile as he clutched a beige book to his chest. How did he know that? Was he her friend too?

I nodded, trying not to catch his eye. Small talk was the last thing I needed right now.

“I’m Mr. Hatzakis. Mr. Brown speaks highly of you.”

“Thank you.” I took another sip simply so I wouldn’t have to say anything else.

“I’m sorry,” he said, straightening himself out. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your quiet time. I’ll find another place to read.” He uncurled his arms from around his book and shook it in the air with one hand, politely turning away.

“Oh.” Fuck. The poor guy just wanted to sit down. I thought he was going to grill me or something. “Please, sit. I’m sorry. I’m just a little out of it.”

He considered it before thanking me and taking his seat at the opposite end of the table, explaining that we were under his favorite tree. It was honestly pretty cute the way he talked about it. He gushed over the way the branches arched, the canopy leaving just enough space for the sun to shine through. I looked up and, for a moment, I was mesmerized by the old plant. Gosh, Mother Nature was cool.

Finally, he said, “I certainly don’t mean to pry, but I am the school counselor if you’d like to talk about why you’re feeling out of it.”

“No.” I shook my head and took another sip of my coffee.

He nodded in quiet understanding.

I wondered why he was so chill with my semi-rude answer. If I’d told my parents I didn’t want to talk about it, they’d tell me I had to. They’d tell me that if I kept bottling it up, I’d explode. The fact that he didn’t push made me feel weird, and it also kind of made me want to talk about it.

“I’ve been told I tend to shut down,” I blurted, for some fucking reason.

He nodded again, pushing his book across the wooden table a few inches to make space for his arms, which he folded in front of himself. “Do you know why you shut down?”

“What’s the alternative?”

I was honestly a little curious to know, but he tilted his head as if in slight agreement. “Shutting down can be a very protective thing to do.”

“That’s silly,” I muttered. If there was one thing I’d learned during the last three years, one thing that had been railed into my head over and over again, it’s that shutting down was destructive, and I was supposed to talk about my feelings to process them, or whatever.

“Forcibly subjecting yourself to emotions that are too big, making yourself process your feelings a certain way, even if it’s not a match for you, is silly.” My eyes gaped a little. I’d genuinely never heard anything like that before. “Forgive me if it sounds harsh, but perhaps you’d like to sit with that for a moment. We are in a beautiful place for it, after all.” He gestured with one hand toward the tree, smiling softly.

I settled into my seat, clasped my hands in front of me, and made a full, intentional effort to sit with it. Don’t ask me why, but facing these feelings seemed a lot more doable with this stranger who didn’t seem to think I was totally whacked, as opposed to with my family.

Since the day Alana passed, I’d been sent from counselor to counselor, from forum to support group. I’d been asked the same question so many times that the words started to sound like gibberish. And how does that make you feel? And feel does that make you how? Does and how feel make you that? Hwo nad ekam oeds uoy that leef?

It made me feel like I was going to drop to the ground and melt into the earth. It made me feel like the air was poison and water was bleach. It made me feel like the very world I lived in was no longer safe. Not only because I’d lost her, but because I could lose anyone else at any given moment. Because every walk down the street was a risk. Because every trip to the store could end terribly.

It made me feel like I no longer wanted to feel anything at all.

As silly as it sounds, I honestly hadn’t known just how permanent death was until she passed. Now, it was almost all I could think about. Everything was fickle, and I was so useless, I couldn’t even grieve correctly.

But what was I supposed to do? Go home from that hospital and spill my feelings while I helped my father with house chores? Or maybe I should’ve processed my emotions while taking my school exams that year. Yeah, that would’ve brought her back.

Give me a fucking break.

I blinked at him. “At what point does shutting down go from protective to destructive?”

He shrugged as if to say there wasn’t really an answer to my question. “When you start to lose things that are important to you. When you decide it’s enough.”

I tucked that thought away for later.

“I have these meltdowns sometimes.” I stuck up two air quotes. I wasn’t a fan of the term, but it got my point across. “I don’t like having them. I prefer to just exit a situation when I feel one coming on, or avoid it entirely. I think that’s why I shut down, to answer your original question.”

“What does it feel like when one is coming on?” He squinted his dark eyes, curls of black hair resting on top of his glasses. He looked like he was truly 100% invested in my answer. It was kind of nice of him.

I shook my head. “Like I’m in a sauna. It’s hot, and I can’t breathe. My muscles go weak and my vision gets hazy. I get very angry, and I always say things I regret when I’m angry.”

He nodded. “It’s a huge step that you know the cues. That’s not an easy thing to decipher.”

“Yeah. I don’t know.” I looked up at the tree’s branches as I picked the paint off my thumbnail. Knowing the cues didn’t exactly fix anything. “My best friend passed away three years ago, and now there’s just a…hole. A human-sized hole.” My shoulders lifted and dropped. “I keep tripping into it. Maybe if I could just fill it, I wouldn’t spend so much time falling.” I scoffed to myself at the absurdity of it, preparing to hear what I’d heard so many times before. You have to face your feelings and work through them before you can move on.

“Probably.”

I looked at him once again, his soft grin present through his sprinkle of dark stubble. “Seriously?” I don’t know if I was shocked or offended, but I figured it all hung on his next sentence.

“What did you like to do with your friend?”

I shrugged. “Anything and everything. She was the only person I could be myself around. Even when I was mean or when I complained, she just got it.”

He tilted his head thoughtfully. “Any activities?”

I looked down at the table, tugging at a splinter of wood that was easing its way up from the surface. “I guess we just liked to cause a raucous.” I puffed a silent laugh to myself. “Silly pranks and running around town.”

“Do you still do those things, or have you shut them down?”

I shook my head. “I have no friends, no hobbies. You found me sitting here because my only alternative is sitting in my room.”

He nodded. “It’s okay to continue living, even if that means filling up the hole with distractions and shutting down certain parts of your feelings for a bit. For some people, that’s the only way to get through it. Your pain may not get any smaller right now, but the good things can get bigger, and that can help. You can give yourself some grace.”

I sighed, and for the first time in three years, I realized something. “I, uhm… I don’t want to feel like this anymore.”

He pressed his lips together. “Maybe you could start by finding someone to cause a raucous with. See what happens. You’ll process the rest when you’re ready.”

I didn’t want to replace her or overwrite her, but the pain was getting just a little too big for me. A hot tear loosened from my eye and rolled down my cheek. I looked down at my hands just in time to watch it land on my skin. I sniffled. “Do you think there will still be room for her memory if I do that?”

“Of course.” He furrowed his eyebrows very seriously and repeated, “Of course.”

◆◆◆

Oli

It didn’t matter how much Juni lightened up to me out in the real world—which was hardly at all—because the second we sat down next to each other in history class, it was fucking game on.

My motivation in other classes simply wasn’t there because there was no one fun to look at, no one fun to listen to. There was no June. How could I possibly pay attention in biology if there wasn’t a single person in that class who spoke up? Or in American Lit if all my classmates actually listened to my interpretations and valued them instead of rebutting them rudely?

I stopped caring about other subjects, and it showed.

My brain was officially consumed with three things: surviving, band practice, and June. I could no longer recall where I left my damn charger each day, even after hours of carrying it around with me, nor could I remember to post to the online board for biology class once a week, nor did I want to, frankly. I wanted to think about her, music, and nothing else.

I sat at my desk in my room and opened my planner to find that I’d accidentally gone three days without crossing anything off.

Not good.

As I pushed an atrocious amount of days-old follow-up to tomorrow’s to-do list, that insatiable feeling started swirling in my gut, begging me to find something to eat. It was Saturday morning, and I’d need to spend the day catching up on tasks I’d let slip while mustering up every single bit of my strength to be able to focus. But I just couldn’t. I couldn’t do it anymore. At least not without her around making me want todo well.

So, for the first time in years, I stopped.

I just stopped.

I placed my hands on the desk in front of me, and I stopped.

I sent my consciousness fishing through my body in search of a fragment of motivation, but I couldn’t find it. There wasn’t a single piece of me, not a solitary atom, that wanted to keep going. I was living someone else’s life. My body was nothing more than a vessel moving through steps laid out by a person who had absolutely nothing to do with me.

I didn’t want to catch up on my tasks, I wanted to listen to music.

I didn’t want to check things off my list, I wanted to prank Jonah and watch how pissed he got.

I didn’t want to finish my homework, I wanted to see Juni.

Fuck.

No.

No, I had to stay on track. I would be able to do those things, I reminded myself, as long as I did the important stuff first. I just had to make it to graduation.

I abandoned the room, gathering my supplies and whipping out the door. Something to eat would help me focus on what I was supposed to be doing, which was making sure we all survived the next few years. I sat down at a campus cafe, pulled out my computer as if that would make eating alone any less embarrassing, and went to work on a meal I felt I desperately needed to have, despite the lack of hunger cues.

Hours later, I sat in the library across the table from June. I felt okay. Kind of. Physically, I was fine. Lunch did a decent job of taking my mind off things, and a walk through campus pushed it down. But mentally? I was lost. So, despite being in a horrible mood, I anchored myself to the library chair, to my session with June.

Her phone vibrated, and I caught myself looking up from my work. She didn’t react, only ignored the device. I put my head back down, but it vibrated a second time and, once again, my eyes shot up.

“Sorry,” she said.

She must’ve believed the sound was annoying me, but it was piquing my interest, I’m ashamed to admit. She turned the phone face up in her hand, read the new message on the screen, chuckled to herself, and typed something in response. After placing the phone back on the table, she returned to her work. I shifted in my seat uncomfortably, my forehead creasing as I wondered what the hell was going on over there in June’s world, becoming entirely frustrated that she wasn’t saying it aloud.

Well, she was mumbling to herself as she often did, but not loud enough for me to hear.

Fuck. I shouldn’t have even been thinking that way. I shook my head, letting my brain rattle around in its cavity before forcing myself back to my work, back to the important things. But her phone vibrated once more and, again, I caught my eyes flicking up as she read the message, giggled to herself, and typed something back. My teeth clenched painfully.

This was bad. Bad, bad, bad.

“How’s the work coming along?” I asked rudely.

Oh, Oli, you dick. You are such a dick.

She rolled her eyes. “About as well as your hairline.”

I sat up in my seat immediately, straightening my shoulders and elongating my neck to look down on her. “I have an excellent hairline. That doesn’t even make any sense.”

She looked at me through her lashes. “I don’t know. I’d have a word with your barber if I were you because that cut is just…” She pulled her cheeks back and sucked in a breath.

My mouth dropped open. How dare she say that? There were two things I definitely had: nice hair and decent size. I was Oli, the big, bearded guy. That was my thing. “You know you really shouldn’t shame people for things like that.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry.” Good. I lowered my attack position back down to neutral. “Let me rephrase. About as well as your last brain cell’s treacherous journey out of your left ear.”

My knuckles turned white as I gripped my pencil. I was suddenly finding it very difficult not to slap it down and walk right up to June. I could do a lot of things that would shut her up real quick.

“Oh, look!” she said, pointing to a random spot on the table and acting as if she were following an invisible critter skittering across the surface. “There it is now. It’s making its way to…” Her finger trailed toward herself. “Ope! It looks like it’s coming this way! What’s that?” She cupped her ear and leaned down to the table to listen to the invisible creature. “Sure. Come on in!” She jerked her head and shook it as if she were letting my final brain cell settle into her brain.

My teeth ground so hard it hurt. She flipped me off casually and picked up her phone once again.

“Miss Juni.”

“Yes, sir?”

A wave of energy flashed through me as I realized I didn’t hatethe way that sounded leaving her mouth. “Your head is going to blow if it gets any bigger.”

“Funny. Is that what happened to you?”

Fucking. Brat. I couldn’t help but imagine myself dragging this girl between the bookshelves. She wouldn’t have so much shit to say if I was eight inches deep in her throat. My heart raced as I truly considered making it a reality.

“No comeback?” she asked.

I snapped back to the present. Yes, as a matter of fact, I did have a comeback. “Sorry. I was just thinking of all the different ways I could shut you up.” Her face slackened in an instant, and she almost dropped her phone on the table. “Now put that phone away before my imagination gets the best of me.”

“Is that a threat?”

“Get to work or find out.”

◆◆◆

June

Me: Got any plans tonight?

I clicked send on the text message and shoved my phone down on the library table nervously. I could do this. I could find someone to cause a raucous with. There was a perfectly nice girl who asked me to hang out constantly right in my own room. The universe literally could not have made it easier for me. All I had to do was open up.

Mary Roommate: Yes. Don’t worry. I’ll be out of your hair :)

Fuck. She might as well have smacked me in the face. Something about the people around me expecting me to hole up made me feel like a complete and utter failure. Alana would’ve been so fucking mad at me.

“I can fix this. I can be better,” I mumbled.

Me: I was actually wondering if you wanted to go out.

I set my phone back down, too nervous to see how she’d respond. The vibrations of her messages sounded throughout our entire corner of the library. Oliver glared at me from across the table. Choosing the quietest and most focused part of our session to text my roommate probably wasn’t an awesome idea.

“Sorry,” I said to him, grabbing the phone as it vibrated once more in my palm.

Mary Roommate: Who are you and what have you done with my roommate?

Mary Roommate: Girl, yes!I’m gonna go through your closet now and choose your outfit.

Mary Roommate: Lies. You’re wearing my clothes. I already found something.

I giggled at that, mostly because I didn’t expect her to be so excited. It was nice. It made me feel wanted.

Me: I’m surrendering myself to the process.

Mary Roommate: You’ll be surrendering to a Natty Ice and a frat dick before the evening is out.

Mary Roommate: Or not. Idk what you’re into. You’re hard to read.

I snorted as I replied, but my amusement was interrupted by a rude question from Oliver. “How’s the work coming along?”

Sigh. He was the worst. Whatever. At least soon I’d be out with Mary instead of dealing with him.