Chapter 39
James
I rubbed my temples nervously. I was too tired to think about the mess with Austin. I had to take a shower and recover, but my stomach was burning from hunger. I smelled something inviting come up from downstairs, so I decided to go down to eat something.
“Will you make one for me too?”
Jasper was using the toaster and heating a slice of bread before spreading Nutella all over it.
“With peanut butter.”
But I didn’t even need to say it. My brother was already grabbing the right jar. His eyes sparkled for a few moments, but they got darker when he saw me walk away.
“I’m just taking a shower, and I’ll be right there,” I reassured him. Damn it, I should spend more time with him.
“James Hunter, go to your room!”
It wasn’t my dad who was giving me that order but Tiffany. She bolted into the house, running like usual.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“Hey, Jas. Jordan.” Jordan?
I turned around and saw my dad sitting at the dining room table. I hadn’t even noticed him.
“Move,” she said without even looking at me, she was in such a rush.
Tiffany rain into my room but before I could join her, my dad called me.
“Out with one, in with the other,” he murmured in a clearly disappointed tone.
“Jordan, eww,” I reprimanded him sarcastically.
“What? What you do, James?” Listen to this hypocritical asshole.
“They’re friends. Perv.”
“Jasper, when you’re older you’re not gonna have these types of friends, okay?” My brother shrugged dejectedly. My heart clenched in my chest.
I was taking time away from him again. But I had my own messes to clean up.
“Your best friend left five minutes ago,” I announced, going into my room, where my scent mixed with Tiffany’s.
“So what?” she asked with a smirk.
I looked at her from head to toe. Her wavy hair fell on her leather jacket over a tight top that wrapped over her solid, perky breasts and showed a large amount of her midriff.
“Why didn’t you come here together?”
“You’re a bastard. But she must’ve reminded you of that a lot already, right?”
“I was just joking. Right?” I parroted her. Tiffany shook her head, hiding a smirk.
“What happened?” I asked. This time I was the one who was impatient.
“I got in a fight with Taylor.”
“You’ll make peace like you always do.” I groaned absentmindedly, rummaging through the desk drawer where I found a half-empty baggie.
“No, this time you really screwed up. You’re not gonna like this.”
Obviously I didn’t give a fuck about their jealous-friend bullshit.
“Don’t you want to know why, James?”
“I can manage without it, thank you,” I retorted.
She didn’t look very convinced.
“Did you really go to Tom Austin’s yesterday?”
I nodded, scraping the bottom of the baggie with my index finger.
“I don’t need you to defend my honor, James. You’ve already got enough issues. Avoid finding excuses to get into fights.”
“Do you think that asshole can come to the same place I’m at, do something like that, and get away with it?”
“Are you sure you did it for me?” Tiffany raised her eyebrows.
“Of course. They roofied your drink.”
She stared at me with her narrowed brown eyes.
“Yeah.”
Tiffany still smiled cockily but got more suspicious than ever seeing me look down.
“Look at you,” she continued in an amused voice.
“What?”
“I don’t recognize you,” she teased.
“Cut it out, Tiff.”
I already knew what she was getting at.
“There’s a party tonight, and you’re here in the dark doing what?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Are you coming?”
“It’s always the same shit,” I retorted surly.
“This morning Connell wouldn’t stop talking about how you defended Blaze yesterday.”
“I didn’t. Besides, why do you listen to that dick?”
“He’s cute.”
“Who?”
“Blaze.” She smiled.
I shrugged it off. “If you say so.”
“He’s a little shy.”
“It’s a weakness.”
I could see it from a mile away. I always recognized them immediately, my counterparts. I was just a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
“You’re such an asshole, James. Sometimes I think you did it to Taylor on purpose. She’s the only one who knows how to stand up to you.”
I crossed my arms. “And you? Who would you do it for?” The question took her breath away. We stared at each other for a few moments.
“Why does it matter to you?”
I’d known Tiff for a lifetime. Her mischievous grin showed we were thinking of the same person.
“Would you even be jealous of June?” she asked, biting her lip after.
“Why should I be?”
I used the remaining powder while she opened up my computer without asking me. “What’s the point of watching this shit and not masturbating to it?” she asked when an obscene video started up on the screen again.
“And who told you I haven’t already?”
“Jamie.” The brunet reprimanded me with a smile.
“Hey.”
“You haven’t. I can see it from here.”
“Don’t fuck with me,” I grumbled, nervously rubbing my neck.
“Ah, you finished all the candy. Is that why you’re so impaired?” She seductively played with a dark curl between her fingers.
“I finished all of it. I gotta go back to Austin, but after being seen with his son yesterday, I don’t think he wants to see me today.”
I drew nearer to her as she sat on the bed. Tiffany never seemed intimidated by me. She always looked at me brazenly, and even though she was uninhibited with what she told me, she knew me well.
“Look, between you and White—”
I would’ve wanted to ask her if she’d seen June naked, if Tiffany had seen signs on her body, but then she’d definitely start to screw with me.
“What do you want to know, James?”
“Is there something going on between you two?”
“No, what do you mean?”
“I don’t know, you seemed close at my house.” Tiffany bit her lip.
“Have you seen her naked?” I pressed.
There was a lascivious jolt in her dark-brown eyes.
“Jamie.”
“Answer me.”
“What do you care?”
“I don’t give a flying fuck about you or her.”
If Tiff didn’t want to talk about it, I’d find another way.
“You’re just afraid to let yourself go.”
“Don’t come to my house to act like my fucking shrink. You hear me?” And then, fear of letting myself go? Was she serious?
“For someone who slept with half the school, that doesn’t seem like the right description. Change jobs, psychology isn’t the right fit for you,” I added.
“This isn’t all you are, James.” She trolled my bare chest with her eyes.
Yeah, everything bored me.
“I just need to get past the limit, Tiff.”
I let out a breath as I squeezed my fists until it hurt.
“You already did that a while ago.”
For a fraction of a second, Tiffany looked sad. She really seemed worried about me.
“So you’re not coming tonight, James?”
“I don’t feel like it.”
I saw her get up and, without turning around, raised her hand to wave goodbye. “Then stay in your own little cage then.”
Tiffany left, and I could finally take a hot shower. I ate alone and lay down on the bed, with my phone in my hand.
Jordan: Jasper and I went to the movies
Thank you so much for the invite, Jordan.
I wanted to see just what kind of party I was missing out on. I went to Connell’s Instagram page.
That dick posted anything and everything on his stories. All that was missing was for him to add the first and last name of every girl who went down on him.
Even though, to be honest, he only shared the videos and photos he took with girls with his close friends.
After wasting half an hour of my life on Instagram, I came back to reality. I needed to sleep. I could do something dumb, or not. I better not, now that I thought about it.
And just like they say that the only way to get rid of temptation was to yield to it, I surrendered and looked through my contacts. I put on the speakerphone then put my phone on my chest. Four rings, then an answer.
“James? Is that you?”
“White.”
My voice echoed more gruffly than usual.
“It’s midnight! What is it? Did something happen?”
She sounded worried judging by how fast she spoke.
No, she hated me.
“Were you sleeping?”
A little puff.
“Of course I was! I—”
“Then why’d you answer?” Silence.
“No,” I heard her hiss faintly.
“No what?” I whispered.
“No, That’s not true.” More silence. Maybe I was wrong.
Maybe she’d turned on the iron but after changing her mind she didn’t use it again. That was why she had straight hair. The words flowed out of my mouth, and I couldn’t say them to her. I could whisper the worst things to her; why was I now was afraid of asking her something so simple?
“Can’t sleep?” I asked, before gulping loudly.
“No.”
“Me neither. But—”
I moistened my lips and tapped on my abs with my fingertips.
“What, James?”
Her tone suddenly got irritated.
“I know a way to make you sleep well, Snow White.” And she didn’t think twice about answering curtly.
“No.”
“But you didn’t even let me talk—”
“No, James.”
I burst out laughing at the umpteenth refusal. She seemed like a kid, but she said it decisively.
Maybe she wasn’t as innocent as she wanted to make me believe. Maybe she knew that there was only one way to make me persist, and that was saying no to me.
“No what?”
“No to any perverse thing you want to suggest.” Perverse? Listen to her.
“What do you know?”
“I know you’re calling me at midnight half wasted just to ask if I can’t sleep. Right? Do you think I’m an idiot?”
“Sort of.” I chuckled. “Yeah, I called you just about that. So what?”
“So I’m too sober to listen to you.”
Of course, deviously remind me that you smoked yesterday. Listen to her, she was already anticipating it.
“Then you act—” she whispered all of a sudden.
“What? Tell me.”
“Like this. Like everything is normal, James.”
She made me smile, maybe because June always said the first thing that came to her head. Everyone I knew just pretended to find the best thing to say. She didn’t. I was jealous of her spontaneity.
“I still don’t understand what it is that I do, princess. Can you be a little more specific?”
“I want you to delete my photo,” she exclaimed, getting right to the point.
“I can delete it, but you know that you can’t see anything, right?” I murmured.
“I don’t care. Delete it.”