Chapter Twenty – Wren #2
Logan stands beside me, and he doesn’t so much as look at me when he asks, “And how far did being nice get you? Maybe if you were a little less nice, your ex wouldn’t have cheated.” He throws that sentence at me like a knife, and it digs into my skin like it’s newly-sharpened steel.
If I wasn’t already nervous beyond all belief about my plan for the night, that actually would have hurt.
It was a very mean thing to say. “Or maybe he would have cheated no matter what I was like, because a cheater’s a cheater.
” I bite my bottom lip. “Maybe, even if I would have given everything to him, he would’ve still ran around behind my back with my best friend because they’re both terrible people. ”
The crosswalk light turns green, allowing us a safe path as we cross the four-lane street. “Maybe,” he admits. “Cheating on you with your best friend. That is real shitty. Even I wouldn’t do something like that.”
“Would you cheat?” I don’t know why I ask. It doesn’t matter. We aren’t in a relationship. I don’t want to be in a relationship with this guy.
“Cheating requires being in a relationship.”
Besides the fact that he didn’t answer the question…
this guy has never been in a relationship?
For some reason, that blows my mind. I bet someone like him has had ample opportunity to date.
He’s probably the most attractive guy I’ve ever seen, with a swagger to match.
A lot of girls go crazy for a guy like that.
“So,” I say slowly as we continue toward Main Street, where our destination is, “you’ve never been in a relationship?”
“No. And you’ve only been in one, and with the way it ended, I don’t know if you can even count it.” Lashing out at me. Seems to be his typical response. He really does make it impossible to get to know him, but maybe that’s the point.
“Don’t think I didn’t notice you didn’t answer the original question,” I say, tossing him a glance. “Would you cheat? Be honest. You’re the kind of guy who’s never been in a relationship, so you’re used to hooking up with anyone you want. Could you ever give that up?”
A bitter laugh escapes his chest, and his feet slow to a halt.
I have to stop and turn back to face him, finding he’s staring squarely at me with an unreadable expression on his face.
“You know, it always used to be easy for me. Easy to talk to girls, easy to get exactly what I wanted from them.” His jaw grinds as his expression morphs into irritation… at me?
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
He takes a single step toward me, and even though I can step back and put more space between us, I feel trapped under his emerald gaze. Those eyes… they’re so vibrant. I try to imagine them with black body paint around them, with a mask on his face. I can picture it, but maybe it’s all in my head.
“Because,” he whispers, “believe it or not, I’ve been having a real shitty go at things lately.
I can’t go out and get plastered. Can’t fucking hook up with nameless girls.
I literally can’t do a single goddamned thing without you either appearing out of thin fucking air or you just…
refusing to get out of my head. Ever since we met in that club, you fucked me up, and I don’t understand why. ”
I open my mouth to argue with him out of habit, but I can’t. No words come out of me as everything he said sinks in.
I messed him up. Some girls might feel thrilled at the prospect of messing with a guy like this, but me?
I don’t know how I feel. I don’t know how I should feel.
All in all, I’m thoroughly confused, and if I’m being honest…
it’s kind of a two-way street. I’ve caught myself thinking about this jerk way more often than I should, and that’s before the whole he-might-be-a-famous-rockstar thing.
Logan shakes his head and averts his gaze from me as his lips tug into a handsome frown. “You know, maybe this isn’t a good idea.”
“No,” I quickly say. “There’s something I want to do with you tonight. Please? After we do it, you can go home and hate me all you want.”
The breath he lets out right then is legendary, and I can see his willpower waning. “I never said I hated you,” he mutters, and then he sighs again. “What are we even doing?”
I smile at him, and when I smile at him his frown only grows.
I don’t tell him, but I do resume my pace.
We’re almost there, anyway, and when we get there, he’ll know—there’s only one thing you do at the place we’re going.
Besides drink, I mean, and I will not be partaking in that.
Even if I was twenty-one, I don’t see the point.
We end up in front of a karaoke bar called Singing Notes, and the moment Logan realizes what it is, he refuses to go inside. “No,” he says. “Fuck this. This is what you wanted to do? Fucking karaoke? No.” He turns and takes a single step before I grab his wrist and stop him.
“Wait,” I say, pleading with him, well aware he can yank his wrist out of my hand and I’m not strong enough to stop him. “Please, just wait.”
Logan is prickly, and when he turns back toward me, he sends me the iciest look I’ve ever gotten.
As I release his wrist, I say, “Hearing you sing at the cemetery…” I need to be careful in what I say. I can’t tell him I suspect he might be a disgraced former rockstar; that’s a surefire way to piss him off and get him to leave before ever singing a single note.
I practiced this in my head over a dozen times. I can do this.
“It made me want to sing,” I tell him. “I haven’t since… since before—”
“How is that my problem?”
I take a step forward, standing less than six inches away from his chest. I angle my head back and gaze up into his eyes. “I want to sing with you tonight. Please.”
My heart beats fast in my chest, so fast it feels like it’s going to pop out and run away.
This is scary. This is the very definition of nerve-wracking.
I don’t know how people do stuff like this every single day.
I’m not used to putting myself out there, but…
I need to take it back. My love of singing.
It doesn’t belong to my ex. It’s mine, and it’s time to reclaim it.
And who better to reclaim it with than Logan? Even if he’s not a former rockstar, he’s still the guy who helped me get out of my own head, my first. I might have regretted it in the beginning, but now… now I don’t think there’s anything wrong with what we did.
People have sex. It can be fun. It doesn’t have to mean anything. You don’t need to wait for the perfect time, or hand your heart on a silver platter to the other person. Sometimes sex is just sex. Part of life.
I’m going to be okay, and maybe it is naive, but I want Logan to be okay, too. We both need to overcome some things, stuff we’ve been avoiding.
Sometimes you need to grab life by the horns and ride it until it throws you off… and then you need to get right back on the bull and ride it again. When it comes to singing, we can ride it together.