Chapter 4
FOUR
COLE
“ Y ou’ve been ignoring my emails,” I grunt as I sit down in the chair opposite Lana. Figures I’d find her hiding out in the back of the library, it’s like she hates her own place or something with how much time she spends here.
She sighs, her eyes raking over me. “I was trying to put off having to deal with you.”
“Yeah, well, the assignment is due in two weeks, and I don’t know about you, but I do actually want to pass this class.”
She scoffs. “Oh please ,” she says, drawing the word out. “Why don’t you just get Daddy to buy you a degree and be done with this place?”
I shake my head. She has no goddamn idea what it’s like to be me. She has no idea what my father is like. Yeah, he might not have been physically abusive or anything like that, and I’m sure some people have it a lot worse, but it wasn’t easy growing up with my dad.
“Stop being a dick and let’s just figure this shit out, okay? ”
“Fine,” she mutters. “The assignment is in two parts. You do part one, I do part two. Sound simple enough for you?”
I inhale slowly, attempting to keep my composure and not lose my shit on her right here in the quiet confines of the library. “And putting it together? We can’t just hand them in separately.”
“We won’t. We’ll meet up again sometime before it’s due and put them together,” she says with a roll of her eyes.
Jesus Christ, the attitude on this one is astounding.
“You just like acting like a brat, right? What’s your damage?
Daddy didn’t love you so now you act out for attention?
You hate yourself so much that you have to put that hate on everyone else just to take the burden away from you?
Because from where I’m sitting, you’re just purposefully being a dick because you hate the world. ”
She snickers quietly and folds her hands together, resting them on the table in front of her.
“I don’t hate the world. I don’t hate myself.
Fuck, Cole, I don’t even hate you. You’re nothing, just like everyone and everything in this place is nothing to me.
It’s not that I’m being a dick, it’s just that I’m uninterested in everything around me.
You’re boring, Cole. Why would I want to spend time around someone who makes me want to scoop my eyeballs out with a rusty spoon before forcing them down my own throat and making me gag on them? ”
That was… oddly specific.
“Are you a sociopath? Psychopath? Which is it?”
“Which one do you want me to be?”
“Jesus Christ,” I mutter under my breath.
This is going nowhere, and she’s exhausting to talk to for so long.
The chair creaks as I stand, and I give her one last look before turning my back, ready to get the hell out of here and away from her.
“Hey, Aston?” she says from behind me.
I clench my jaw and squeeze my eyes shut. I am not in the mood for her shit today.
“What?” I grit through clenched teeth, not bothering to turn back to look at her.
“What you said got me thinking…” She trails off, and my damn curiosity gets the better of me, making me turn to look at her.
“Maybe you are the one who hates the world. Maybe you’re the one who has a Daddy who doesn’t love them, and you hate yourself so much because of it that you wear a mask around other people. Am I right?”
I don’t answer. I just stare at her.
“Because you do wear a mask, Cole. I can see right through it, and I’m willing to bet that I’m the only one who can.
That’s why you have a bug up your ass about me.
Because you knew from the moment we locked eyes that I could see right through you.
You knew I could see right through the cracks in your composure, and it’s killing you.
Of course, it doesn’t help that you also want to fuck me. ”