12. Juliet
JULIET
“ T hey’re watching you, you know.” Mads’ quiet words make my lips twitch when I should be anything but amused. It’s been a few days since we met with Viks on the north side of town and things are back to their normal routine. Well, as normal as the town pariah and the gutter’s golden boys can get.
“They always watch me,” I say, stroking the flat of the paintbrush down the side of the poster board we’ve been working on since twenty minutes into the guys’ football practice. I used to find it annoying. Now, it’s kind of nice.
I never wanted to be that girl that sat and waited around for her boyfriends like some lovesick fool—not that I’m dating the Scorpion Kings. That’d be ridiculous. They’re just… my friends with benefits? Fuck, I don’t know what the hell they are to me.
My hand slows and I lift the brush away, glancing up to follow Mads’ attention to the field below us.
The guys’ coach stands to the side, a whistle hanging precariously from his mouth as he watches the team run back and forth across the green, each time trying to make it faster and faster as they sweat beneath their heavy equipment and the winter sun.
A wind whips across my face and I shiver, burrowing deeper into the stolen hoodie I pilfered from one of their closets—I can’t even remember who the original owner was anymore.
As soon as it’s lost their smell, though, I’ll be trading it out for another.
Returning my attention to the poster boards, I scowl at the lettering I’d been filling in.
“Why are you doing this again?” I ask. “I swear to God it feels like you’re on every damn committee there is. Newspaper. Student council. You’re always doing something. When the hell do you have time to sleep?”
Though I only mean the question as one of frustration and concern, Mads’ shoulders stiffen up and she quickly returns her attention to the half-painted poster board in front of her.
“Extracurricular activities look good to colleges, and I need a full ride if I get accepted somewhere.” She doesn’t look up as she says the words, but I see the truth in the slump of her back.
It’s there in the way she pointedly drags the paintbrush in her hand up and down on the same line over and over again even though it’s already clear enough.
I can’t imagine Mads not getting accepted at any college of her choosing.
She’s practically Miss Perfect. Well, maybe working in a host club and having an underage sex tape scandal won’t look too great, but I’m sure her grades and all the bullshit she’s put up with for this school will help in the long run.
“You can get loans too,” I offer, returning my gaze to my own work.
“I would still need my parents’ tax information,” she replies just as fast. “They won’t give it to me. I’ve already asked. They don’t see the point in college for me.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to inquire if it’s because they expect her to get married to one of the crazies from their stupid church or if it’s simply because she’s a woman. I don’t. Instead, I try a different tactic.
“So don’t ask.” I shrug. “Take it.”
Her head lifts and the burn of her attention sears into the side of my face.
“What?” My lips twitch. “Don’t tell me you’re shocked that I’d encourage someone to steal. That’s what my family is known for now, isn’t it?”
“You’re not your family.”
I stop painting, but I don’t look up. I hadn’t known just how much I wanted to hear those words from someone’s mouth until she spoke them. Now, they linger in my mind, wrapping my anxieties and fears in a cushion of their meaning.
You are not your family.
Swallowing, I carefully reach for the paint and dip my brush once more, sliding the sides of the brush along the edges of the small cup as I wipe off the excess so it doesn’t drip. “Neither are you, Mads. You’re so much more than them.”
Mads doesn’t respond, but she also doesn’t move away or find an excuse to leave the way someone who’s upset or uncomfortable might.
Instead, the two of us continue our work on the posters—advertisements for the upcoming winter formal—until the sharp whistle from the guys’ coach behind us calls an end to their practice.
“Thanks for helping,” Mads says with a sigh, as I lift up my last poster and set it on one of the bleachers. There is already a stack of dried painted posters nearby. More than enough that she’ll hopefully be done with the task.
“I had nothing better to do,” I say honestly, wiping my paint-splattered hands on my jeans before I scratch my nose. “But next time, you should get those lazy asses on the student council to help you. This is their job too.”
Mads laughs and waves me off as she cleans up the mess and puts the lids back on the paint cups before storing them in the plastic bag she brought with her.
It isn’t until she’s walking away —her posters in one hand, the semi-wet ones on the outside and held precariously so she doesn’t smudge them, and the bag of supplies in her other hand—that I realize something.
She didn’t have to do those damn posters here.
She could’ve done them in the classroom relegated for the student council’s after-school use.
But she’d come here. Because she’d known I’d be bored and alone as I waited for the guys.
Avery would never have been so thoughtful.
“Hey yo, Prep Girl!” Gio’s sudden shout drags my head around and I sigh, moving towards the railing that separates the bleachers from the football field.
Sitting on the cold metal for so long has made my ass go numb and bending over to paint has put a crick in my neck.
I stretch onto my toes, trying to shake off the discomfort as he approaches.
“What’s up?” I ask, dropping down and folding my arms over the railing.
“We’re heading to a party tonight, you in?” He grins up at me, his helmet already off and held loosely in his right hand.
“A party?” I frown. “Where at?”
His grin widens. “North side.”
I roll my eyes and groan. “Are you serious?”
Gio bobs his brows up and down and drops his helmet to the ground.
Hooking both hands into the railing, he scales it up until I’m forced to release it and lean back as he towers over me, the breadth of his shoulders blocking out the players on the field.
A gasp leaves my lips as he hooks two fingers into the neckline of my hoodie and pulls me forward.
The heat of his lips hovers in front of mine. A smile threatens to break past my shields. “Really, Playboy?” I blink back at him. “Is this your idea of a tease?”
Gio’s tongue comes out and licks straight across my lower lip. He tastes like mint even if he smells like sweat. My nose wrinkles and I shove him off.
“Fine, I’ll go to your stupid party, but we’re not staying all night. We’ve got school tomorrow.”
I’m released as soon as the agreement leaves my lips and Gio cackles like a psychopath as he jumps back to the ground. “Well, aren’t you a good girl now, Prep Girl?” he says as he bends and retrieves his helmet.
I roll my eyes again and flip him my happy middle finger. “Fuck off.” I step away from the railing. “I’ll wait for y’all out by the cars.”
“You sure you’re okay to be there by yourself?” Gio asks, eyeing me.
I flip him the bird once more. “I can’t let you guys hover around me forever, just…” I lower my hand. “Hurry up and don’t keep me waiting.”
Gio rolls his shoulders and jogs backwards towards the guys. “Nolan will be right there—he needs to shower at the house. Lex and I will be by later to pick y’all up.” His eyes move over my bundled form. “Wear something sexy.”
I stop moving and scowl. “Keep telling me what to do and I’ll be wearing your blood as lipstick,” I tell him.
The laugh that echoes out of him holds no hint of fear. I shake my head and turn away, yanking up the hood of the sweatshirt and shoving my freezing hands into the connected pocket as I make my way to the parking lot to wait for my ride.
Just like Gio said, Nolan is the first one done.
He makes his way across the parking lot with Lex’s SUV keys in hand and a duffle over one shoulder.
There’s a fresh mark on his cheek almost like he cut himself.
I stare at it as he approaches and nods my way where I lean against the front of the SUV’s hood.
“Come on,” he says. “Gio’s giving Lex a ride—I want to shower before they get to the house.”
I don’t comment as he unlocks the vehicle and we climb in.
Nolan cranks on the radio, a softer rock ballad crooning through the halfway decent speakers as he backs up and heads for the road.
All the while, I find myself entranced by him.
It’s easy to stare at him as he drives, watching the play of muscles in his forearms as he grips the wheel and turns it.
After a while, he glances over at me. “What?”
“Why don’t you shower in the locker room with the other guys?” The question is out of my mouth before I can call it back. It’s dumb. I suspect I already know the answer. The only reason I asked is because I want to hear it from him. I want Nolan to be the one to open up to me.
When I expect him to grow tense under my inquiry, he surprises me by facing the windshield as one side of his mouth tips upward. “What? You haven’t figured it out by now?” He lifts one shoulder in a casual shrug. “No homo.”
I roll my eyes. What a fucking liar. “You fucked me while Gio ate my pussy,” I remind him. “You didn’t seem all that concerned about how close another naked guy was to you when there was active sex happening.”
At that, Nolan barks out a sharp laugh. The sound is real and full of amusement. My stomach flips. I like that sound.
“Okay, you got me there,” he says, still chuckling. His red-brown eyes shoot to me and back again. When he speaks next, it’s with a more somber, serious tone. “It’s because of the scars.”
I shift in my seat, turning to face him fully as I rest my back against the car door. “The ones on your back.”
Though it hadn’t really been a question, he nods as if it had been. “Yeah.” He blows out a long breath.
Don’t ask, I tell myself. Don’t ask. Don’t ask. Don’t ? —
“How did they happen?” You dumb fucking bitch — Why? Why can’t I just leave well enough alone?
Nolan slows the SUV to a stop at a red light and props his other arm on the window length.
He turns his chin slightly, gazing at me across the console through the thick fringe of lashes that surround his impossibly dark eyes.
I swallow back the sound of my voice threatening to make its way out and steal back the question.
Moments pass like that, the two of us captured in each other’s gazes. The only sound that drifts through the cab of the SUV is that of the radio on low and the sound of the rumbling engine.
When the light turns green, he doesn’t sit up, but he does turn his eyes back to the front as he takes his foot off the brake and eases the vehicle forward as we start moving again.
I release the breath I hadn’t known I’d been holding.
Somehow, I forget how intense he can be when he sets the sole of his focus on you.
I need to remember, even if I’m with the Scorpion Kings—it’s only for now. At the end of this year, we all graduate. Maybe we’ll go to Eastpoint together, or maybe life will take us all in different directions. There’s no telling.
“You don’t have to tell me,” I say after several more minutes have passed as we’re getting closer to his house. “It was stupid to ask. I’m sorry.”
Nolan doesn’t respond right away. In fact, he doesn’t say a word as he turns into his neighborhood and parks behind the Indian motorcycle in his driveway. I don’t think he will until as I reach for the door handle, his voice rises up over the still playing radio.
“I got my scars from the same place you got yours,” he says.
I frown and twist back to face him. “I don’t have scars.”
Nolan’s smile is sad as he tilts his head and then turns off the car. “We all have scars, Princess. Some are just easier to hide than others.”
With that, he gets out of the SUV, leaving me propped in the passenger seat. Before I asked, I would have assumed Nolan got his scars from his father. I still think that. His words to me, though, have me second-guessing not the question itself, but why I asked it.
It’s taken me losing everything—my home, my family, my friends—to realize one fact of life. It doesn’t matter how much money you have or what kind of luxuries you possess. Everyone has scars. The rich. The powerful. The poor. The powerless.
In that, we’re alike.
The Scorpion Kings and I… we’ve bled to be where we are and it doesn’t matter where we started, the end is always a climb, not a fall.