Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
My palm still burns.
It’s been twenty-four hours and I think it still shines scarlet, the heel of my palm. With which I touched him.
For the very first time, no less.
Yeah, the first time I really touched the guy I love, I smacked him. Not once but twice. And he deserved it by the way, for saying those horrible things to me.
I’m not going to pretend that I’m some kind of a saint, a good girl. I have committed the crime of falling in love with my sister’s boyfriend.
I have committed the crime of wanting him and craving him and watching him while he was with her. I’ve always considered myself dangerous, a ticking time bomb.
That’s why I was running away that night. That’s why I will run away when I get my chance again.
But not once, not in my entire life, have I thought despicable things about my sister.
If I’d blown up like a bomb that I am, I would’ve done it for love. I would’ve done it because my heart got so swollen with wrong cravings and secret longings that it burst out of my chest on its own.
Not for revenge. Never for revenge.
And I won’t let him think such despicable thoughts either. I can’t let him be that angry and hurt and miserable. So miserable that he’s thinking of hurting someone else.
So, I’ve come to a decision. It has two parts.
The first part includes getting him to apologize to me.
Yes, I’m forcing him to apologize and be nice. Because I can’t live in a world where Arrow Carlisle is a grade-A asshole.
I cannot accept the fact that the guy I’ve been in love with for eight years is mean and cruel. So I’m going to force him to be decent.
And the second part is ending his pain once and for all.
I know my sister has asked me to not interfere. I know that.
But I’m going to.
Because he’s hurting and she must be hurting too.
Breakups are tough and if I can do something to curb their pain, then I will. Besides, this is the least I can do after betraying my sister in secret for years.
Although I’m not sure how I will accomplish this big feat. But I’m working on it. For now though, I need to make him apologize to me.
I look for him all day at school but I don’t see him anywhere. He’s not in his office either; I went and checked. I even wanted to ask Coach TJ about him but I stopped myself lest I appear overly familiar and step over any more of my boundaries.
When school is done and night falls, we sneak out again.
This time it’s my idea.
Because like a fool, I think I might see him again at the bar like last week. I might find him there, looking for his next distraction.
My chest squeezes when I think that. When I think of him looking for a way to get rid of all his anger.
Will you be my rebound girl, Salem?
I wanted it, didn’t I?
God, how badly did I want it.
I would’ve said yes. I was going to say yes. I was going to say yes to becoming his distraction, an object that he uses, just because I’m so crazy in love with him.
If only he hadn’t said those words. If only he hadn’t been a giant fucking asshole.
Anyway, we’re at the bar now.
Like the last time, I have lipstick on. It’s called Dream Broken Darling, a melancholic and dark shade of coral and brown, which suits my mood perfectly.
Just like the song that’s playing overhead: “Sad Girl” by Lana Del Rey, the queen who makes music for doomed and heartbroken girls like me.
My mind is on the song and my hips are already swaying to it, and probably that’s why I don’t see the obstacle in front of me until I’ve crashed into its back.
It’s Wyn.
Who in turn crashes into Poe, who bumps into Callie.
Coming out of my melancholy, I frown. “What’s up? Why are we stopping?”
Wyn shrugs, rubbing her shoulder. “Because for some reason Callie has turned into a statue and won’t move.”
We’re standing just a few feet inside the door almost in a line and Wyn is right; Callie, in the front, has stopped moving. The rest of us break away from our formation to go stand beside her.
“Callie, what’s up?” I ask, touching her elbow tentatively.
“Nothing,” she says, her eyes focused on something, her lips barely moving.
“Then why aren’t you moving?” Poe asks.
Callie mumbles something indecipherable and I follow her gaze to find myself staring at a guy.
At a gorgeous guy, actually.
For the first time since yesterday, my mind is thinking about something else. And that something else is this guy that Callie is staring at.
He’s got dark hair that’s kind of spiky and messy at the top, as if he has a serious habit of running his fingers through it. And dark-colored eyes.
Gosh, those eyes are so sparkly and uncanny. Like black gems.
He stands directly opposite to us, among a group of people. From what I can see, this guy seems to be at the center of it.
Everyone – mostly guys and a couple of girls – is somehow talking to him at the same time. Everyone is looking up at him at the same time, as well.
Probably because first, he’s taller than everyone in the group, and second, because he looks bored. Or maybe that’s his resting face, looking arrogantly bored by everything around him.
Well, not everything.
Because in a matter of seconds, his dark-colored eyes have fallen onto the one thing that does interest him.
My friend, Callie.
His smooth features change. They buckle and morph to show slight surprise before a frown appears between his brows.
He clenches his smooth jaw too – much smoother as opposed to his messy hair – with what I can only describe as disdain.
Confused, I look away from him and back to Callie, and when I find the same expression on her face, things suddenly click.
“Is he… the guy because of whom you’re at St. Mary’s?” I ask her, remembering the story she told us about how she ended up at St. Mary’s.
So one night, over dinner, they all shared their stories of how they ended up at St. Mary’s.
Wyn, who lives in a rich neighboring town called Wuthering Garden, was sent here by her parents because she had a fight with them about applying to art programs when the time came.
And she got so angry that she drew graffiti on her dad’s car.
Although, I can’t imagine Wyn ever being angry with her silver eyes and soft voice. She’s a pure artist. A girl who dreams.
Poe, who’s from Middlemarch, another neighboring town, was sent here by her guardian because she’d prank him and he got really tired of slipping on banana peels and finding frogs in the middle of his bed.
I can definitely see Poe doing something like that.
She’s a girl who loves trouble, and I say that with all the love in my own troublemaking heart.
Then came Callie’s turn.
“Well, my oldest brother sent me here. Conrad. I’ve got four older brothers by the way and we live in Bardstown. No parents. Anyway, he sent me here because I stole a guy’s car. And drove it into the lake,” she said.
When I asked her why, all she said was, “Because he lied to me.”
Then Wyn jumped in. “Don’t waste your breath. She’ll never tell the whole story. We’ve asked a million times.”
Poe nodded. “Yup. All we’ve ever gotten is a name, a very sexy name: Reed Jackson.”
So now at the bar, Callie stiffens at my question but jerks out a nod.
Poe is next to speak up. “He is Reed Jackson. Wow, I didn’t realize how…”
“How gorgeous he is?” says Wyn, picking up Poe’s trail.
“Exactly,” Poe exclaims. “Gorgeous.”
“That’s the word, yes,” I breathe out.
“Yeah. He’s gorgeous,” Callie says the first words since we all saw him, standing there acting like he owns the place.
Then she breaks the intense stare-down and looks at me. He, however, keeps the connection and friction in his gaze well and alive.
“And a liar and an asshole. So he’s basically a villain. A gorgeous villain,” she says with a tight smile. “Oh, and he’s here. Fantastic. So I’m gonna need a drink before I go over there and drown him in the lake. Fuck Will, the bartender, I’m stealing his whiskey.”
And then she marches away from us and toward the bar.
“What just happened?” Wyn asks.
“I think we might need to keep an eye on this guy,” Poe says.
“Yeah. And on Callie too,” I say and make to follow my friend.
But Poe stops me. “I don’t think you should go after her.”
“What?”
“Yup. You’ve got other things to worry about,” Poe says, raising her eyebrows.
Wyn looks over my shoulder. “Yeah. Something like him.”
Him.
They don’t have to tell me anything more than that. I immediately know who him is.
In fact, I feel him.
I feel the skin on the back of my neck prickle and heat up. My entire spine prickles and heats up.
“You should go talk to him,” Wyn continues. “We can take care of Callie.”
“Yeah, give him hell,” Poe says fiercely.
Again, I didn’t tell them what happened.
But they guessed that something awful had occurred back at the library, when I came out all red and shaky.
And then he came out, a few minutes behind me with his jaw gritted, looking all arrogant and aloof as he left the building without sparing anyone a glance.
My friends asked me if they needed to do something about it. If they needed to prank him or if it was serious enough to go report it to someone. I told them I could handle it. That it was between me and him.
And I was right.
I am going to handle it because it is between me and him.
Still feeling him at my back, I exhale a breath. “Okay.”
They both give me smiles before squeezing my shoulder and taking off after Callie.
At last, I turn around.
My palm stings as soon as I catch sight of him.
He’s in the same corner as before. The one he was bursting out of. The same vintage jacket too that makes him look like a daredevil. A bad, rebellious boy. And the same cap, hiding the top of his face and his dirty blond hair.
Like the last time, he also has a girl by his side. This one is a brunette. She seems pretty interested in him, and why wouldn’t she be? I bet she’s counting her lucky stars that she gets to talk to a superstar athlete, The Blond Arrow.
Besides girls find him irresistible, don’t they?