Chapter 8 #2
For some reason, him acknowledging the bridge made me feel lighter. It was stupid to feel that way, given his tone, but it felt like we were moving in the right direction. “They didn’t forget, they just…made it about them.”
“Because that’s so much better. Remember what I said about a backbone?”
“I have one. I just know when to use it.” Or, really, it was more like using it caused more problems than it was worth.
Standing up for myself, being defiant—it brought nothing but complications.
Especially at home. It would earn me a week’s worth of cold shoulders and a hefty dose of emotional blackmail. It was better to do what people said.
“Like this morning?” The blue of his eyes did nothing to dampen my pulse, especially not when I looked straight into them. “Was that you thinking it was an appropriate time to use your backbone?”
“It’s like I said yesterday.” I shook his hand off my arm, and it was surprisingly easy to do. His grip had been light. “I want to live a little.”
“Except it terrifies the hell out of you.”
Ha, true. “Maybe I want to do things that scare me.”
The words, initially, were all talk. Who wanted to do things that scared them?
Hanging out with Hudson Bishop in a public place was scary enough.
Except the longer the thought lingered, the more real it felt.
Before yesterday, when was the last time I willingly chose to do something scary?
Something thrilling? When was the last time I’d done anything without my parents’ approval?
The answer was easy: never. Maybe that was why, even though I was terrified, I still stood across from the Grim Reaper anyway.
Hudson didn’t look confused as he studied me. “No,” he said finally. “You don’t. You just don’t want to be tied to the role you’ve been playing.”
“It’s not me. I’m not what everyone thinks I am. The label…that’s not me.”
“Don’t do anything because of what others think. Trust me, it never works the way you want it to. Do something because you want to.”
And with that, Hudson started walking toward Ms. Murphy’s office. I hurried to catch up, wanting to explain that these feelings stemmed from before the list, but in a weird way, I thought he knew. As if he knew from the day at the bridge. Is there a point to fighting it if nothing will change?
Today, Principal Oliphant had a task for us—to help apply barcodes to new books for the library. Mrs. Juniper, the librarian, had dropped off a cart full of books that needed barcodes applied. There were probably one hundred books on the cart, and it was definitely going to take us the full hour.
“I’m surprised they’re trusting us with something like this,” Hudson said as he peeled off a barcode from the sticker sheet, slapping it on the interior of the book cover. “What if we put the barcode on the wrong book?”
That had been my fear when we’d first started, which was why I double—no, triple—checked the title on the book before applying the barcode.
“We could cause anarchy,” he went on, carrying through in his assembly line. Peel sticker off, slap it on the cover, set the book aside, and do it again. It almost seemed too flippant. “The fall of the Brentwood High library would be within reach.”
I paused in applying my next barcode, narrowing my eyes at him. “You are putting them on correctly, right?”
“Of course.”
I didn’t look away from him. He tucked some of his hair behind his ear, though a few of the front pieces fell into his line of vision. He sat in the same seat as yesterday, but today, something was different. My brain fumbled to try and figure out the minuscule change.
With his head bent down, Hudson looked over with only his eyes. “Apparently, I’m going to do all the work, huh?”
I dropped my gaze to my barcodes, resuming my progress as if no time had passed, pretending like I wasn’t embarrassed for getting caught staring.
The curiosity of everything that was him began eating at me. Like why he was on thin ice, why he got his nickname, why he was always alone. Why he felt he was forced into a role—what role that was. Prying into his business was a definite no-no—I learned my lesson yesterday—but it was so tempting.
“So, what’s up with the skirts?” he asked me after a few minutes, not beating around the bush and not bothering to find a more polite way to ask the question. “Is it something with religion?”
“I didn’t realize there was a religion based on wearing long skirts.”
Hudson cleared his throat a little, suspiciously sounding like he was fighting a laugh. “I guess I meant, is it a conservative thing?”
I looked down at my lap. This skirt wasn’t as long as the dress I wore yesterday—it came down to my mid-calf, exposing my pale ankles. “My mom picks them out. Sometimes she gets me material so I can make my own. They’re more comfortable than jeans.”
Even though I confessed to Mom buying them, there was absolutely no way that I was telling him that she was the one who laid out my outfits every morning. I could practically hear all the insulting jokes he’d crack.
I peeled off another label and took my time centering it on the book, smoothing out the air bubbles. “This morning. That was your sister, wasn’t it?”
His teeth grazed his lower lip. “Yeah. Paisley. Seven, and as mean as they come.”
The little blonde girl with the rainbow backpack this morning hadn’t really struck me as mean—at least not when she was giggling with her brother.
However, the glare she turned to me did seem a little vicious.
There wasn’t a trace of spite in Hudson’s expression at all as he spoke about her—in his voice and on his features, there was nothing but affection. “I’ve always wanted a little sister.”
“You can have mine.” Once he finished the book he worked on, he paused, still staring at the spine. He seemed to debate something before ultimately turning his attention to me. “Her bus driver is late a lot. He was late a lot last year.”
I blinked. “O-Oh.”
“That’s why I had so many tardies.” He waited for the realization to dawn on me. “Because I missed the bus waiting for her.”
“Does Principal Oliphant know—”
“I know exactly what she’ll say,” he interrupted, grabbing another barcode. “She’ll say there are only so many free passes she can give with that.”
“What about your parents—”
He cut me off again. “My dad leaves for work before the buses go.” Hudson all but ripped another barcode off the sticker sheet, not lingering on that line. “And I had a lot of absences last year because Paisley was sick a lot. She couldn’t be home by herself.”
“What about your mom?”
“She died when Paisley was three,” he said without hesitation, without flinching. “It’s just us.”
Why he was suddenly confessing all this to me, I didn’t know, but I held still, giving him my full attention.
Much like earlier, how it felt like he was letting a bit of his guard down, it seemed that way now.
It wasn’t fair that he was on thin ice because he had to take care of his sister, though, and it made me newly angered toward the way Principal Oliphant had painted it.
Like he was willingly skipping school, not forced into it.
Then again, had he ever told her the truth?
Hudson leaned his head onto his hand, strands of his hair feathering between his fingers.
Underneath the sharp lighting of Ms. Murphy’s room, the color shimmered more golden than wheat.
“Speaking of siblings, when Principal Oliphant said your brother played football, I didn’t realize it was Landon. ”
It felt like a weird switch of topic, given what we’d been talking about, but I let him change it. “Pieced that together, did you?”
“And your mom is the school board president.”
“Yeah.”
“Makes sense why Principal Oliphant wants this to be a secret from her, then,” Hudson said, corner of his mouth flicking up. “Since she’s the one trying to get me expelled.”
I drew my lower lip between my teeth, an uncomfortable feeling sinking through me. “I’m sorry.”
Hudson raised an eyebrow. “Do you have a habit of apologizing for things that aren’t your fault?”
I dropped my gaze back to the barcode sheet, resuming the labeling without another word. It didn’t cause the feeling in my stomach to disappear, though, weighing me to the chair.
“You know, I didn’t…” Hudson began and then stopped, clamping down on the words before they could escape.
His expression was as complicated as I’d ever seen it, but there wasn’t a trace of the barbed wire I was used to.
“I didn’t thank you for this morning. You probably saved me from Principal Oliphant kicking me out. I was a jerk, but…thanks.”
I could still hear the savagery of his words spoken just twenty-four hours ago, could see his expression in my mind.
You’re suffering this on your own accord; I don’t owe you anything.
That was what was different now—everything about him yesterday had been like a wild animal backed into a corner.
Today, the ferocity was absent, revealing a more subdued person underneath.
“How about this.” I drew in a breath and tried to speak without faltering, though my brain already braced for his reaction.
“This buddy thing. This…good influence thing that Principal Oliphant wants. Let’s try it for the rest of the month.
If you’re still uncomfortable with it all, I’ll tell Principal Oliphant I don’t want to do it anymore. You just…have to trust me.”
It was a strange thing to say—trust me. I wasn’t sure I’d ever said it to anyone before.
It was always me relying on someone else.
Mom, Dad, Landon—that bubble was strong enough without me, and they never viewed me as someone to rely on, and until that moment, I didn’t realize how badly I wanted to be that person for someone.
How badly I wanted to be needed by someone.
How badly I wanted to be someone to someone.
It was a blink-and-you-miss-it sort of thought, because a second later, I was freaking out for thinking that that someone could be Hudson Bishop.
“You should make a list,” he said. “Make a list of things you’ve never done before but secretly want to do. Things that always scared you. It can be like your rebellion list.”
“Rebellion,” I echoed, and at first, the word sounded wrong. Rebel against what? My parents? The more I thought about it, the more I realized that they’d never really forbidden me to do anything. I just never went against what they wanted. “What would I do with a list?”
“We could check them off.” He looked mildly nauseous as he said the next line. “For our…buddy thing. I was the one who told you to fight to be who you want. Makes sense I should help you with it, I guess.”
That was his response to what I’d said. Trust me. This was his reply. Okay.
With my pulse jumping a mile, I stuck my hand out to him, like we were making a business deal in the quiet room, surrounded by books. “Deal.”
Hudson regarded me for a moment before reaching across the table.
Instead of clasping my hand, he wound his pinky around my littlest finger.
It was such an easy, confident move, that I held perfectly still.
When he squeezed it, my heart seemed to clench in response, that rollercoaster feeling resurfacing in my stomach.
With one of his half-smiles, the scar on his cheek bending with the movement, he said, “Deal.”