Chapter 11
ELEVEN
THE GIRL WHO CRIED WTF
AN HOUR EARLIER
“I told you but you didn’t believe me.”
“The way you talk about Zach, everything’s massive, Girl Who Cried Humongous Dick.”
Recognizing both voices, I sincerely regret telling Callan it was fine to leave me on one of the benches outside the Pond.
I’m not sure what it is about Addison Fitzpatrick, but she gets under my skin.
Take this conversation—I’ve heard every imaginable version of it a thousand times over, alongside a different giggle, ever since Zach hit puberty and began making a name for himself on the ice.
When Pecan morphed from part-Shrek into handsome mofo our freshman year, I was screwed.
Ever since, like a colony of Elviras on the hunt for prey, girls have surrounded me on all sides. I’m the wallflower you use to gain access to both of them.
Fun times.
It’s not as if Addison’s the worst. That honor belongs to Xaqueline Gilmore who, thankfully, left our private academy in senior year after her dad went to prison and the family lost their fortune.
Maybe it’s their physical similarities? Is that what has me retreating into myself whenever she’s around? Or is it the fact she’s queen of the Pies?
My earphones buzz, drawing my attention away from my post-game chill playlist to the email notification on my cell.
A rewrite—last week’s philosophy essay. Expected in three days. AND a request for a meet-up during Langton’s office hours on Monday.
Great.
I’ve been doing better with Callan’s help, but Dad was right. Langton totally has it out for me.
To message me this late at night… could he hate me any more?
“You’re friends with Zach Bradley, aren’t you?”
I huff. Inwardly.
Addison spotted me—great.
Honestly, I’m used to being invisible. I’ve grown to appreciate it, but this is just ridiculous.
Enough for me to rant, “Either you’re in a fugue state or you’re pissed because Zach didn’t call you to apologize about that mess at Dopie's.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” is her airy retort.
Ah, fugue state it is.
“Sure you do. You stole some of my cheese fries.” I might be forgettable, but Dopie's cheese fries are a thing of legend.
“That’s right. Of course. You’re the freak who—”
“I’d think twice before you insult me, Addison. If you want to get to Zach through me, babe, you have to pretend to be nice to me.
“You think you’re the first person to have the genius idea that I’m a toll bridge to Zach’s bed? Spoiler: you’re not.” I smirk when she sucks in a breath. Is that fake umbrage? Nah. “Now, if you don’t mind, that seat’s reserved for literally anyone but you.”
“I’ll be sure to tell Zach how much of a bitch you are to his girlfriend.”
I stick up my middle finger at her. “One, he knows that already. Two…” I flick another bird her way.
“You’re not his girlfriend. If anything, you’re barely even his fuck buddy because I haven’t seen you around our apartment for at least six weeks.
” Huh. Six weeks? The thought lodges in my brain, but then I see her mouth has screwed up into a nasty snarl and I brace myself for her to call me a fat ‘something.’
Then, her friend spares me by yelling, “Addison, our ride’s here!”
“Let’s just see who he chooses,” she hisses before flouncing off like the grade-A flouncer she is.
“You can have him if he picks you,” I yell at her retreating form. “He wouldn’t be a friend worth keeping otherwise.”
Mid-tantrum, she stomps off but, damn her, tries to get the last shot: “I was doing you a favor with those cheesy fries. Your ass is already as big as that bench.”
“Now I know Zach’s dick has made you dumb. Spatial awareness—get some. Looks like you do remember Zach giving you shit last night. I knew those fries were that memorable.”
Smirking when she finally has no comeback, I watch her drive off. But my smirk soon fades.
Six weeks.
No way.
The problem with being observant is that you learn your best friends’ habits. Even if you have no desire to know anything about them.
Pecan, for example, likes to fuck in public. The number of times I’ve caught him at a party, in our kitchen, hell, outside our front door—his little exhibitionist self has zero boundaries.
Zach, on the other hand, prefers comfort.
Why fuck against a wall when you can get your rocks off in a lush bed?
He also never goes to a girl’s apartment, as he thinks it gives them the wrong idea. Because I’m an early riser, I’m the one who gets to see the live-action walk of shame.
But now that I think about it, there have been no walks of shame recently.
Is that what’s wrong with his moody ass?
He hasn’t gotten laid?!
Something twists in my stomach.
Something… poisonous.
A friend would tell him to hop onto a bunny just to get over his funk.
A friend wouldn’t be glad that he’d kept his dick in his pants for once…
I bite my lip.
Especially when I think about Callan’s insistence that we’re dating.
We’re not.
We’re just close.
And that’s what makes this dumb crush annoying. I got over it in middle school. There’s no place for it in the here and now.
“That seat’s reserved,” I mutter when someone sits next to me.
“You and whose army is going to stop me from sitting here?”
The audacity of that answer has me gaping at my nails before yanking my head to the side to glower at the stranger.
“You jerk,” I sputter, realizing Zach’s goofing off. Then, I grin. “You won!”
He smiles, not smirks.
I bite my lip again.
God, he’s handsome.
Tousled hair that never sits flat on his head. A golden brown that, in the summer, is a million shades.
His eyes, while kind, are such a pretty hue of blue that it makes you think of swimming in the ocean. That lighter than light water where you can see sand. His nose was broken senior year. Ironically, not on the ice. Pecan elbowed him in the face when Zach tried to wake him up after a party.
All the nicks and nooks that line his features, I know how they got there.
There are memories etched right in front of me. Most of them, we made together.
That nick in his lip? When I headbutted him by accident after I climbed into his treehouse and he went to help me up.
The little slice on his cheek—a defenseman’s blade after both of them ate ice on a pass that went wrong.
He’s the type of tall that makes a girl think about how small she is. And his strength comes with the job…
“Hat-trick alert!” I croak out, punching him in the arm, my wet nails forgotten as I push aside my dumb thoughts.
About his dumb self.
And the resurgence of the dumb crush I have on him.
“Watch it. You already wrecked my other sweater with pink nail polish,” he taunts.
“Screw that. Hat. Trick. Pow, pow, pow.” I whoop because I need him to know how proud I am of him.
My crazy, stupid feelings don’t change anything about our friendship.
He tips his head to the side and I, gulps, take note of his strong jaw and the scar beside his Adam’s apple from when Pecan clocked him there with a tire-iron that accidentally took flight—we soon learned never to let him change tires.
At least, not when we’re around.
“I knew you were going to trounce those jackasses, but you were a cut above,” I blurt out, hating that I sound throaty.
Hating these bizarre thoughts that are plaguing me.
Hating, in all honestly, that I’ll never have the right to lean in and kiss those marks that are our memories together.
“I saw the scout in the crowd.”
“You and your dad.” I roll my eyes. “You're the literal worst at communicating.”
“God forbid he shows up to watch me on his own. He has to send spies instead.”
Huffing, I default to my usual snippy self as I snag his right hand and begin painting the thumbnail, leading up to completing two for the pink and one for the stink. And yes, I’m doing this in the semi-dark, but your girl needs a distraction. Stat.
“He was impressed,” I tell him. “How couldn’t he be? You hit it right out of the park. Everyone was talking about how, with you on board, the team might take it all the way.”
“Wonder what Dad’ll say.”
“You don’t care about his opinion so why does it matter?” Because he does care. He’s just lying to himself. But he can’t lie to meeeee. “Would you play for him?”
“Like you need to ask. Hell, no.”
“What if it was the best offer on the table?”
He pulls a face. “Maybe.”
I snicker at his disgust. “Charleston Hunter tried to ask me questions about you for The Daily Duke. I swear she thinks she’s working for PSN News.
She wanted to talk about your stats and if it was fair that a walk-on got to start in tonight’s game, but mostly, I think she has a crush on you and she was scoping out the lay of the land. ”
“What did you say to her?”
“I asked if she saw you play tonight because if she had, then she wouldn’t be asking idiotic questions.”
“Thank you, knight in shining armor.”
My smile’s smug. “You’re welcome, damsel in distress.”
“Draft’s coming up.”
“Not really. It’s not even this year!”
Tapping his temple with my finger, I pshaw. “The draft is always coming up.” When he stays silent, I turn to look at him. With two boys for best friends, you get used to abrupt shifts in conversations, but that was unusually brisk. “You okay?”
“Sure.”
Liar.
“Saw Addison too.”
“Which one?”
God, he doesn’t even know that’s the perfect answer.
“The woman from Dopie’s.”
“Oh, her.” His mouth flattens. “What did she want?”
“Nothing good.”
His scowl darkens. “Do I need—”
“Nah. I handled it.”
“Found your voice, huh?”
He has no idea why I didn’t push that argument yesterday so I change the subject.
“Where’s Peeks?”
“Heading to a party where he’ll be caught with his ass out on display somewhere.”
I pause with the black lacquer dripping onto his thumbnail. “We should change his nickname to Peeks the Cheeks.”
“You watch it stick.”
We grin at each other.