Chapter 2 #2
“You two…you two were fighting because of the underwear?” He sucked in a ragged breath. “Oh, this is too fucking good,” he said and then looked at Ren. “Vicky didn’t cut your underwear. I did.”
The room went silent as our mouths fell open.
“You what?” Ren, Vicky, and Myles all said at once.
“Why the hell were you touching her underwear?” Vicky pushed on Nash’s chest, and at any other time, he would’ve lost his mind. Nash was enjoying this moment way too much.
“Why were you touching my girl’s knickers, and why didn’t you give me a pair?” Ren smacked Myles’s arm and glared.
I couldn’t hold it in any longer and began to laugh, which set Nash off again.
“I thought you’d figure out it was me, but this…oh fuck, I couldn’t even have planned this. You two just made my morning.”
“I’m going to kill you,” Ren said, pushing up her sleeves.
“Careful Princess, with those holes in your underwear, I now have very easy access,” he said, and all the color drained from Vicky’s face.
“Why would you want to touch that thing?” Vicky’s voice turned into a high-pitched screech, making me wince. Still laughing, Nash wandered out of the room, and Vicky followed, yelling at him like a yapping dog.
“I’ll go get you some ice,” Myles said and walked out, leaving me alone with Ren.
She started picking up items—victims of the fight—off the floor.
I grabbed a couple of textbooks, and something fell out.
It was a picture of Ren and a woman who looked like she could’ve been her older sister. The resemblance was remarkable.
“Is this your mom?” I held up the photo, and Ren bit her lip as she walked over and took it from my fingers. Her entire demeanor changed in the blink of an eye. She ran her thumb over the picture, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.
“Yeah, that’s my mum. This was taken about a year into her cancer treatment before things got really bad.”
“Did she pass away?”
Ren nodded and looked up at me. The sadness in her eyes made me want to pull her into a hug, but I kept my hands in my pockets.
“Myles didn’t tell you?”
I lifted a shoulder and let it drop. “Not something we’d really talk about. I’m sorry, though. I love my mom. I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose her.”
“You don’t want to. I miss her every minute of the day.” Clearing her throat, she grabbed the books I’d set on the table and stacked them neatly on her desk.
“Was it the cancer? Sorry, you don’t have to answer that,” I said, running my hand through my hair.
“No, there was a break in and my mum was too weak to get up and tricked me into going into the closet to get her a gun. I should’ve known it was a ruse, my mum hated guns.
I had no idea it was a panic room and she locked me in there.
They…they….” She closed her eyes and my heart broke open for her.
“I watched them kill her on the monitor.” She shook her head.
“That explains the library, you were reliving that moment weren’t you?”
She looked away and nodded as she reorganized her desk even though everything was already perfect. I didn’t think I could feel more of an asshole, but I did. I hated that we did that to her so much.
“I’m sorry,” I said, lost for what else to say. She nodded and smoothed turned to smooth out her made bed.
My eyes bounced around her space as we fell silent.
This was the first time I’d been inside her room.
The desk reminded me of Theo’s. Not a single thing was out of place.
There were a couple of photos and a small strand of twinkly lights with snowflakes on the end.
I would bet anything that Myles had gotten them for her.
Her comforter was a powder blue color with accenting pillowcases and a stuffed animal.
The neat and orderly room screamed Ren. She laid the photo down on her nightstand, but her fingers lingered on the image.
“You look like her,” I said, and Ren smiled, and my stomach did that weird flip thing.
“She was beautiful,” Ren said.
“Yeah, she is,” I said. “I mean was…I mean, you are…no, both of you are.” She stared at me, one eyebrow slowly rising, and I wanted to jump out the window and bury myself in the snow.
I crossed my arms. “You know what I mean.” I needed to say something, anything else.
“My cousin Lisa really liked you and said she’d like to hang out sometime.
” That was not helpful. What the fuck was that?
Instead of making it better, I doubled down on the offer.
“I said that we could all get together one night, or day, whatever.” I’d lost my fucking mind.
“Like…you, me, Lisa, and Myles, or just you, me and Lisa?” She tilted her head as she inspected me, and I really wished I could take a hit.
The baggies were burning a hole through my pocket, reminding me that they were there and how long it had been since I had any.
I couldn’t take it away with us over break.
Getting arrested here at home was bad enough, but customs was a whole other story.
“Um…whatever works, I guess,” I said.
“What works?” Myles walked back into the room, and I jerked at the sound of his voice.
I crossed my arms as a mixture of guilt and jealousy took shape in my gut, but the image it created was nothing pretty.
She was my best friend’s girl, for fucks sake—like I needed to add losing my best friend to my list of worries?
“Blake said that Lisa would like to get together one day,” Ren said.
“Is that so?” Myles lifted his eyes to mine as he got Ren to sit and handed her an ice pack wrapped in a towel.
“I guess we’ll have to make a night of it then.
We just need to figure out how to sneak you off the property,” he said.
“Would ya be up for gettin’ in my trunk,” Myles asked, and it unsurprisingly came off sexual.
Ren must have thought so, too, as she glared at him.
“Don’t you mean get in her trunk?” The words were out before I could stop them. It was the stupid, asshole-like comment I would always make, and my mouth was on autopilot. Luckily, Myles laughed.
“Ha ha, you two are hilarious.” Ren rolled her eyes.
Fuck, I needed to get out of here before I said anything else stupid. “I’m gonna go and check out our room,” I said, and Myles lifted a brow.
“Our room is the same as a few weeks ago.”
I ground my teeth together. “I’m going to give you two some privacy,” I said, but it was Ren who spoke up this time.
“You don’t have to go. Today is Myles’s study day. If you stay, he’s less likely to get distracted,” she said.
“Huh, that’s gonna happen anyway, yer in the same room, and yer always distractin’.”
The two of them were disgustingly cute, and I couldn’t figure out what I envied more. The fact that they had one another, that Myles had Ren, or that I wanted something special, but no one I’d dated had hit the right buttons for me.
“Alright, I’ll stay for a bit,” I said, wondering why I was setting myself up for more punishment.