Betrayal - Chapter 34
Wednesday
I wasn’t sure how Matt and I could get any closer. But as the days turned to weeks, and the weeks to months…we were completely inseparable. I didn’t even feel like myself unless we were touching. Which was why I always practically ran to lunch.
I spotted Matt laughing with Mason at our usual table. It still felt surreal to me that I was dating Matthew Caldwell. I wasn’t sure when that feeling would disappear. Hopefully never.
“Hey,” I said when I reached the table. I leaned down to kiss Matt on the cheek. But he grabbed me around the waist and pulled me onto his lap. Yeah. It was so much easier to breathe when we were close.
Kennedy snapped a picture of us. “I’m going to make you the most amazing pre-wedding album,” she said.
“Pre-wedding album?” Matt asked. “Is that even a thing?”
“It is when I have thousands of pictures of the two of you being ridiculously adorable.” She stole one of the fries off his tray and he didn’t even complain. “I can’t wait for Friday’s Thanksgiving. Are you sure you don’t need us to bring anything?”
“Nah, my mom said to just come hungry,” Matt said.
Kennedy and her mom were both coming to our second Thanksgiving on Friday and I was so excited.
I’d already agreed to go to my dad’s tomorrow to celebrate with his family, so the Caldwells had been so sweet to change their celebration to Friday so that Matt and I could attend both.
And I was thrilled when Mrs. Caldwell had extended the invitation to Kennedy and her mom too.
She’d dubbed it “Friendsgiving,” and she was going all out as usual.
It was going to be a perfect, relaxing long weekend. Just as soon as real Thanksgiving was over. I was excited to spend time with my dad. But I hadn’t stepped foot in his apartment since homecoming. I’d be entering Isabella’s turf, and both she and I knew it.
“Are you nervous about tomorrow?” Kennedy asked. “Entering Wizzy’s lair once again?”
I looked over at Isabella. She’d calmed down over the past month.
She’d only left me one threatening note in my locker a day now.
Sometimes two. But at least there weren’t any dead animals.
I’d never be able to forgive her for that.
Matt and I had buried Sir Wilfred in the Caldwells’ backyard.
And I felt guilty the whole time since I’d originally hated the little guy.
God, just thinking about his body on Matt’s bed made me feel sick to my stomach.
“No, I’ll be fine,” I said. “I’ll have Matt there with me.
” I smiled up at him. “Honestly, I’m mostly nervous about meeting my new extended family.
” And I was a little nervous about the prank James, Rob, and I were planning on pulling on Isabella.
But they promised they had everything covered.
I just had to sit back and laugh. And hopefully get the Caldwells and Hunters to finally make up.
“What if all your new relatives are as terrible as Isabella?” Kennedy asked. “Yikes.”
“What’d I miss?” Felix said and sat down next to Kennedy.
The two of them weren’t dating. Yet. But Kennedy was finally civil with him.
And I’d give it another few weeks before one of them caved and confessed they were madly in love with the other.
Because now that I knew for a fact that Kennedy liked Felix?
It was obvious. I hoped it was obvious to Felix too.
Because I wasn’t going to meddle anymore.
“We were just talking about Thanksgiving,” Kennedy said.
“Oh, I can’t wait till Friday,” Felix said. “Thanksgiving always sucks with my parents out of town. But this year I’m going to eat so much turkey.”
Kennedy laughed.
I was so excited that Matt had calmed down about my friendship with Felix.
It was even Matt’s idea to invite him over on Friday.
I almost felt confident saying that Felix and Matt were friends now.
Maybe they’d make it official soon too…with a handshake or something.
Not the way Felix and Kennedy were going to make it official.
“What time did you say I should come over?” Felix asked.
“You can come over whenever, really,” Matt said. “Brooklyn has an appointment in the morning, but she’ll be back before noon, right?” He looked over at me.
My dad had finally made me that appointment to get birth control.
I was surprised it took him as long as it had.
Especially since he’d basically found out I was sleeping with Matt on Halloween.
“Mhm,” I said, hoping no one would ask me any questions about it.
A gynecological exam hardly seemed as fun to talk about as Thanksgiving.
“And we can always just play video games before dinner’s ready,” Matt added.
“Awesome,” Felix said. “Are we talking Xbox or…”
Mason leaned over. “Of course we’re talking Xbox. And we’re going to kick your ass.”
“Oh, game on,” Felix said.
They all laughed as the bell rang, signaling the end of lunch.
Matt’s fingers intertwined with mine as we all walked out into the hall. But all of us stopped when we saw two cops standing outside the cafeteria.
One of them stepped forward. “Felix Green, you’re under arrest for the possession of drugs on school property.”
Felix laughed. “What?”
“We found drugs in your locker,” the cop said.
“That’s not possible.”
“Mr. Green, you need to leave the school grounds immediately,” the principal said. “You’re hereby expelled. An investigation…”
“An investigation? But I don’t have any drugs in my locker…” Felix’s voice trailed off as the cop held up a bag of white powder.
“You need to come with us right now,” he said.
The sound of laughter made me look behind me. Freaking Cupcake. With his arm around Isabella and a huge grin on his face. I knew without a doubt that he was behind this. They both were. Isabella winked at me and my heart sank.
Her words from several weeks ago came back to me. “ I’m going to break you, Sissy. And I’m going to do it by breaking everyone around you.”
Felix seemed to have come to the same conclusion on who had set him up, because he yelled, “What the hell, Cupcake?”
Cupcake shrugged his shoulders. “I didn’t do anything. You can thank Brooklyn for this. I saw her on the phone earlier. She probably turned you in.”
What? I took a step forward, but Matt grabbed my arm to hold me back.
Felix didn’t even look over at me. “Fuck you, Cupcake. Brooklyn had nothing to do with this and you know it.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Isabella said. “This is all definitely happening because of her. Nothing like this ever happened before she moved to the city. It’s a shame she doesn’t just leave.”
They were doing this because of me. God. She was trying to destroy everyone around me.
“He must have put the drugs in my locker,” Felix said and pointed to Cupcake. “He set me up.”
“Mr. Green, I’m not going to ask you again, you need to leave the school grounds immediately,” the principal said.
“But I didn’t do anything.”
The cop grabbed his arm.
“It was Cupcake!” Felix yelled. “He’s selling drugs on school property. He’s putting them in his gross sugar cakes. He had to be the one that planted drugs in my locker. You should be arresting him.”
Cupcake just laughed. “I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“You haven’t done anything wrong? You fucking raped Kennedy, you disgusting piece of shit.” Felix lunged at him, but the cop caught his arm.
No. No, no, no. Oh, shit!
There was an audible gasp from the students around us. But Kennedy’s gasp was the only one I was focused on. Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes as the cop handcuffed Felix and dragged him away from Cupcake.
“Everyone get to class!” The principal yelled. “Now!”
“How could you?” Kennedy said as students rushed past us. “You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone. I told you I liked Felix. How could you do this to me?”
“Kennedy, I’m so…”
“Sorry? I don’t care if you’re sorry. You promised.”
“I know, it just kind of came out at homecoming…”
“He’s known since homecoming?! Are you freaking kidding me?”
“I was just trying to help. I was so worried about you.”
“Save it, Brooklyn. I always have your back. Always. And the one time I ask you to have mine, you don’t.”
“Kennedy…”
“I was barely holding on as it was. You know that. And I was finally excited about something. But this whole time Felix was just being nice to me because he felt bad for me?”
No. “Of course not.”
“You think he’d actually like the poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks?
” She tried to wipe away the tears that were pouring down her cheeks.
“My life isn’t a fucking fairytale like yours, Brooklyn.
God, Felix probably still likes you. Because everyone always just likes you. No one will ever want me.”
“Kennedy, that’s not true. Someone will want you.”
“Someone? Just not Felix? You sabotaged me. You knew I liked him and you ruined everything. He’ll never look at me the same. And God, I really can’t freaking look at you right now.” She ran off toward the bathroom.
I went to follow her, but Matt grabbed my hand. “I think you should give her a second to cool off.”
Isabella laughed as she walked past us. “Two down,” she said. “That was easier than I thought. Only one to go.” She placed her index finger in the center of Matt’s chest.
Matt grabbed her hand to push it away.
“Funny,” said Isabella. “We’re already holding hands.”
Matt dropped her hand like it had burned him.
“No matter. I still have a month to ruin this relationship. See you on Thanksgiving, Sissy.” She blew me a kiss and walked away, her high heels clicking loudly on the floor.
“I didn’t mean to,” I said through my tears. “I thought Felix would talk to Cupcake and fix it. I thought…”
“Why’d you tell Felix and not me?” Matt asked.
“I didn’t mean to tell anyone. It just kind of slipped out at homecoming…”
“At homecoming, yeah I heard you. Which means you kept it from me for weeks, Brooklyn.”
“I wasn’t keeping it from you. Kennedy asked me not to tell anyone.”
“But you told him .”
God, he sounded so pissed. “I’m sorry.”
Matt took a deep breath. “Maybe next time you need help with something you should ask your fiancé instead. Then maybe none of this would have happened.”
“You weren’t my fiancé then. We weren’t even together. Matt…”
“Because you wouldn’t come talk to me. You just broke up with me without even letting me explain my side. We only ever fight when you don’t talk to me. And when we got back together you looked me in the eye and promised me no more secrets. So what the hell is this?”
“It wasn’t my secret to share.”
“Well apparently it was, because you shared it with Felix.” He shook his head. “I’m not having this argument with you in the middle of school. We can talk about it later. Or not, since you don’t like letting me in.” He left me standing in the middle of the hall as he walked away.
“Matt!” I yelled after him. But he was already pushing out the front doors of Empire High. God, what the hell had I done? I ran after him and down the front steps. “We also said we wouldn’t run away!” I called after him.
He froze at the bottom of the steps and turned around. He looked so sad, and I hated that I’d done that to him.
I ran down the rest of the stairs. “Please, I don’t want to fight with you,” I said.
He didn’t say a word.
“When Kennedy told me what Cupcake did to her…I didn’t know what to do. It felt like I had this secret that I couldn’t keep in. And I would have told you, but I already felt so guilty about letting it slip to Felix. Please, I can’t handle you hating me too.”
Matt reached out and ran his thumbs beneath my eyes, wiping away my tears. “Kennedy doesn’t hate you.”
“It sure seems like she does.”
“She doesn’t. And I could never hate you either.”
“It sure seems like you do.”
He dropped his forehead against mine. “You drive me fucking crazy. But that’s because I love you. Not because I hate you. I could never hate you, baby.”
I breathed in his cinnamon exhales. “I really am sorry.” I wrapped my hands around his torso.
Now the prank tomorrow was looming over my head.
I should have told Matt about it weeks ago.
I shouldn’t have kept it a secret. Hell, he may have even helped me plan it.
I had no idea. But I couldn’t tell him right now when he was already upset with me.
It felt like he was slipping away from me, so I just held on to him tighter.
Tomorrow everything would be better. Isabella would be put in her place.
And hopefully the Hunters would make up with the Caldwells. Matt would understand. He had to.
“Me too.”
“Why are you sorry?” I asked.
“For snapping. With all the wedding planning and playoffs coming up… I’m trying so freaking hard to stay calm for you. I don’t want to stress you out, but it’s just so hard sometimes.”
I knew he was doing that. He was worried about my panic attacks.
He’d been so understanding and patient with me ever since we got back together.
But I didn’t want him to put that weight on his shoulders.
I wanted him to feel free to react however he needed to.
The last thing I wanted was for him to be stressed out instead of me.
“Take a deep breath,” I said and rubbed his back.
He laughed. “I’m not having a panic attack, baby.”
“I know.” I looked up at him. “But it helps with stress too.”
“There’s other things that are better for stress.”
I laughed as his hands slid to my ass. Yeah, I guess that would work too. But a better idea had just crept into my head. I knew exactly what to do to make sure Matt wasn’t stressed out.