Chapter 1 #3
“And here I almost regretted what I said yesterday about not being together.”
I curled my lips up, not knowing if that was a joke or not. It was still a sore spot for me. I wanted to stay close to him. I wanted to understand him, but it seemed too soon to joke.
“Is that mine?”
He looked down at the jersey I’d slept in.
“I don’t know, I found it lying around.” Great, the second lie of the day.
“I didn’t think you’d actually stay, June.”
“I was glad to do it. I wanted to see you this morning,” I whispered on his lips.
“Me too.”
“How are you?”
“Good, you?”
“Good.”
“Despite James?”
I looked at him. I didn’t know what to say.
“I’m sorry you ended up having to share the sofa bed with him.”
“Uh, yeah. Can I ask you something?”
“Shoot,” he said, biting into a piece of bread.
“Why are you guys best friends?”
He pushed a slice toward me. “Because he’s there for me. Always has been. Even when my family pretended not to see it. I think James saved my life, so to speak. Or at least, he saved me.”
“You mean he’s always been there for you during the hardest times?”
“We’ve shared a lot of things. You remember—” A nervous hiccup interrupted his words. He took a sip of orange juice before resuming. “Do you remember that one day when we were talking about Poppy’s pool party, and I told you I can’t stand . . .”
“The smell of chlorine,” I finished for him.
I vividly remembered the strange sensation that I’d felt when I’d heard him.
“Yeah.” His voice broke.
It seemed like one of those stories that you tell only once to archive it forever.
“I’d already stopped swimming for years.”
A cough brought us back to reality. The steely glare that James shot Will was clear. Don’t tell her anything.
“Did you sleep well, Jamie?” Will asked.
“Well, I could’ve slept better.”
James stared right at me, obnoxious as always.
“Look I—” I was ready to answer back, but Will interrupted me.
“Why don’t we get back to talking about us?”
“Yeah, sorry, Will. Do you want to finish what you were telling me?”
“I don’t know.”
“What kind of story is it?”
I’d never heard even a hint of it. Not even from Poppy.
“It’s unfortunately not pretty, June. I already told you enough that wasn’t pretty yesterday. Maybe . . .”
“I’m here when you want.” I rushed to calm him down.
Our lips pecked each other, flavored with coffee and jam.
“You should head to school, June.”
“We should,” I corrected him, as someone snorted behind me.
“This one is a thorn in my side first thing in the morning,” James mumbled as he started to mess with the coffee machine.
“I’ll hit you over the head with a pole, Hunter,” I said.
“Until proven otherwise, you, unlike me, aren’t endowed with any pole. Zero.”
“But I bet there aren’t that many inches separating you from zero.” William burst out laughing, and not even James could hold his back.
“Maybe, but the fact that I might have a small one doesn’t make you less of a pain in the ass.”
“James!” Will said immediately. “Apologize now.” James didn’t even hint at putting his sneering to a stop.
“Hey, June White.”
I glared at him, since I already knew he was screwing with me.
“Sorry,” he added in a really fake tone.
Will turned around to put the mug in the sink and added, “And fuck you, since you’re here.”
“Maybe I’ll go home,” I said.
“James.” Will was firmer this time.
“What the fuck? I already apologized.”
“Everything’s fine, Will. My mom will already be furious. It’s better if I go. Do you have a toothbrush I can borrow?”
“Yeah, there’s a new one under the bathroom sink.”
I cleaned myself up, put my hair in a messy bun, got dressed, brushed my teeth, and went down to grab my backpack. But just as I was putting on my shoes, I heard the two of them whispering at the door.
“I wanna go get it back.” James was the one talking.
“How?”
“They’ll never give it back to me if I don’t take it by force. Taylor’s dad will kill me if he finds out.”
“How would he find out?”
“Because if he’s just as much of a control freak as his daughter is, he’ll find out eventually. Besides, we can’t trust Taylor—Jackson said that sooner or later I’ll do something to really piss her off, and she’ll get back at me.”
What were they talking about? I stuck my head out beyond the wall and saw William run his fingers through his hair, with a glint of excitement in his eyes.
“Okay. Let’s go now,” he suggested.
I took a step and joined them in the kitchen.
“Now?” James seemed perplexed, then he turned around to look at me.
“I wanna come too.”
My words even made William turn around. He scrutinized me carefully. James, on the other hand, laughed so raucously that he almost started crying.
“Listen to you. Shut up. You look better when you’re quiet.”
“I won’t let you drag Will into another mess.”
My protective instinct gushed out so much that even William was stunned.
But something clicked in my head: James must’ve been in these situations because of something Will did, and if he got out of them, Will wouldn’t owe him anything anymore.
“I’m not kidding,” I reiterated.
“For fuck’s sake, you’re such a riot. Go back to Mommy and quit fucking around.”
“I think Ethan Austin has a weakness for June,” interjected William, holding me back just as I was about to react.
“So? What do we have to gain from bringing her with us?” James took a sip of his coffee, skeptically.
“Maybe I could help you easily get whatever you want from Austin. Don’t you get it? I could help you.”
Their laughter ceased instantly. “Don’t even joke about something like that, you’re not gonna be bait,” James said.
“But think about it, James.” Will looked at me more intensely. “It’s the morning. He’s alone. He can’t do anything to us.”
James grabbed one of Will’s shoulders and pulled him aside.
“Are you a dumbass, Will? What if he does something to her?”
“What could he do? We’ll be there.”
“You two are completely out of your minds,” James said.
I now understood that I needed to be careful with those types of jokes around Will, but James’s bluntness didn’t seem to faze him. Maybe he was used to it.
“You don’t have anything else?” Will pointed at the backpack. “Besides the hoodie, I mean.” I opened the biggest compartment.
“I just have this,” I answered, pulling out a low-cut tank top.
James ripped it out of my hands and threw it onto the floor. “Yeah, and then you’ll see what happens to you!”
I shivered because deep down I knew that he was right.
“James, enough,” Will said.
“You don’t understand what kind of maniacs you’re dealing with.” He raised his voice.
“I told you, I don’t think so,” Will replied.
“I want to see what you’ll think if you go see him dressed like that.”
I ignored his comments and looked at William.
“What do you say, Will?”
He picked my shirt up off the floor and passed it to me. “We have to think of a plan to distract him. And if you put this on, you’ll definitely distract someone like him.”
Meaning if we’re gonna fuck things up, we gotta really fuck them up, right?
William went to put the dishes in the sink. James on the other hand stared indifferently at my oversized hoodie.
“You look fine like that. Why do you have to change?”
I didn’t know if it was actually a way to prevent me from getting into serious trouble, but for once I decided to listen to him. I put the tank top back into my backpack, and he breathed a sigh of relief.
“Listen, Bonnie and Clyde, what we’re about to do is fucking crazy. Batshit fucking crazy. That’s exactly why I won’t go inside, but . . .”
James let out a groan of frustration out when he realized that we weren’t paying attention.
Will caressed my cheek and gave me a peck on the lips.
“Are you listening to me?” James said in an unsuccessful attempt to get our attention again.
“June, obviously I told you that just for Austin. It doesn’t make a difference to me how you dress. You’re always so beautiful,” added Will. “I’m gonna go change now, then we’ll leave.”
I stood dazed, and watched him walk away. James mimicked a grossed-out face.
“Suck it. I’m really beautiful.”
I grimaced at him as he shook his head.
“Yeah, right. You’ll be even more beautiful when Austin bends you over on the poker table,” he remarked sarcastically.
“James, come on, can you not talk to her like that?” Will said from the top of the stairs.
James narrowed his dark gaze and glared at me. “He’ll do it. I warned you.”
“That’s insane, James,” I retorted, backing away until I could grab the table behind me with my fingers. For a second I didn’t recognize my own voice flowing from my lips, more meekly than usual.
He came so close to me that I could smell his cologne. “Don’t play with me, princess,” he said.
I stared at him with my head held high. “Or what?”
“My fantasies will turn into reality, sweetheart,” he spat, with a less than reassuring sneer.
“Yeah, in your dreams, Hunter.”
The self-confidence I showed him was fake, a house of cards built just to protect me from his cutting remarks.
“Like you wouldn’t do it, White.”
He moved his tongue quickly over a corner of his mouth. I felt myself flush.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” he whispered in my ear, as I elbowed him.
“Hey!”
I headed to the door, waiting for Will to come back.
James wore his studded leather jacket over his black T-shirt. He put on a pair of Jordans and came close to me, leaning his hand against the doorjamb.
I cleared my throat as he pulled his vape out of his pants pocket. “Is there any time in the day when you’re not under the influence of something?”
“I don’t know, when I’m sleeping?”
Running his fingers through his hair, he fiddled with a lock. I started to feel the distance between us close in.
“Stop it, James.”
“Stop what?”
He played with mouthpiece of the vape pen with his tongue.
“Whatever it is that you’re doing.”
“Are you already frustrated?” His voice became sneaky and quiet. His eyes slid down between my thighs, like he was checking something. “Does my presence bother you that much, Snow White?”
“Why should it? Don’t flatter yourself, it’s not about you,” I said.
Finally, William joined us. “Ready to go?” He flashed me a dazzling smile.
“Readier than ever,” retorted James, shoving my shoulder as I walked out the door.
Maybe it would’ve been better to go to school.