Chapter 13 #3
My first thought was all question marks. Go after Maisie Matthews? Me? “We’re—we’re not friends.”
Logan arched an eyebrow. “So?”
In Logan’s world, it was simple. Everything was simple. Even if I weren’t friends with Maisie Matthews, I could still go check on her. That was the kind thing to do. The obvious thing.
In my world, though, everything was complicated. But what could I tell him? That Jade wouldn’t be happy if I checked on her? I could already see his reaction—his eyes would darken in disappointment, he’d shake his head, and say see, you will peak in high school.
Before I even decided, my feet took me forward.
Freshman year, when Maisie ran out of the gym, I hadn’t gone after her. I always told myself I wouldn’t have done anything differently.
But that was a lie.
So, despite the fact that I could practically feel Jade’s glare follow me the entire way, I crossed the bowling alley and pushed open the restroom door.
Maisie stood by the sink, scrubbing at her white shorts. Water and soda dripped down her legs, but she didn’t seem to care. She didn’t seem to notice my presence, either, dabbing almost mechanically. “Are you okay?” I asked hesitantly.
She didn’t look up. “Yeah,” she replied, but her voice was thick.
Shame practically burned me, even though the stain on her pants wasn’t my fault. “Maisie, it’s no big deal,” I began, trying to make light of it as I stepped closer. “I’ve never seen you cry, you know. Not even when you broke your arm in the fifth grade. And you’re crying over your shorts?”
“Of course you wouldn’t understand it,” Maisie snapped, still not looking at me. “You don’t know what it’s like to be humiliated.”
I couldn’t help but scoff a little at that. Did you not hear what my label was? “Sorry, Maisie, but you don’t have the market cornered on humiliation.”
“And you have no right to tell me whether or not something’s embarrassing.
” Maisie finally turned to me now, glaring her puffy eyes at me.
There was pure anger in them, despite the tears.
The sight of both emotions had me freezing.
“If it were just my friends, it’d be one thing, but it’s the fact that it’s you and Jade and freaking even Connor out there that makes it worse. And you know it.”
Don’t cry over them, Maisie, I wanted to say, but those exact words wouldn’t come. “Who cares what they think?”
“Hypocrite.”
I flinched in surprise, the air leaving my lungs in a silent whoosh. “Excuse me?”
“You care what they think. You always have. Don’t be hypocritical and pretend that isn’t the case.
” Maisie lowered her paper towel and tightened her fist around it, and in that moment, the tables turned.
Our popularity status meant nothing in that moment, not with the hateful look in her eye.
Then again, with her, status never truly mattered.
“You were voted Most Likely to Peak in High School, right? I guess they knew what they were talking about.”
Out of everyone at Brentwood, it made sense for Maisie to think that. To look at me and see nothing more than a girl destined to wave pom-poms and rule the top of the social pyramid. She’d been a casualty of my climb to popularity, and she had every right to believe it.
But hearing it from her hit differently—like falling from a cheer stunt and having the air knocked out of me. It wasn’t some Top Tier girl in the same boat, or a random nobody who didn’t know me. It was Maisie Matthews. And if she said it, then maybe it was true.
I guess they knew what they were talking about.
The shame I’d felt a moment ago swamped me again, nearly sucking me under its wave. There wasn’t anything I could say—no defense would hold water against her.
And that’s the truth, an insidious voice whispered in my head, sounding a lot like my own voice—mixed with Jade’s. You can go to arcades and date the enemy, but you’ll never be able to escape what you did. You’ll never escape the truth.
Without another word, I turned and practically ran from the bathroom before the pressure in my throat migrated to my eyes. I ran into someone on their way to the door, bumping them in the shoulder—were they holding sweatpants?—as I stumbled past.
“Did you go check on her?” Jade asked irritably as I sank down at our table.
I immediately picked up my drink, ignoring my trembling hand. The ice water did nothing to quell the fire in my throat.
“Did you even order the pizza?” Jade turned and looked at the counter. “I thought I saw you talking to someone—”
“Some guy was trying to flirt,” I barely got out, swallowing hard. My water slipped in my fingers, and I almost followed Maisie in spilling all over my shorts. But water was better than bile, which rose in my throat. “T-The girl said she’d deliver it.”
I passed Landon his card back, but didn’t look at him. I didn’t look over to try and find lane twenty-two, either. Instead, I focused on our bowling alley screen. “Where’s Reed? It’s his turn.”
The pizza came to our table less than ten minutes later, fully paid for, but it was the worst pizza I’d ever tasted in my life.