Grayson
Chapter Fifteen
I had a hard time keeping a smile off my face. Even though I could smell the iron from my blood and my upper lip was warm and tingling with swelling, I felt better than I had in days.
“Are you alright?” Cole asked me quietly after we put our clothes on and packed our stuff in the locker room.
I nodded. The only reason I didn’t grin like a lunatic was because I had to hide the fact I was crazy. Oh, but I was. I was crazy about Avery. Despite the pain each time I looked at him, my heart erupted with all the feelings I had never poured into words.
For the last two days, I stewed in heartache over the fact I would never get to tell him. For two days, I licked my wounds like a cub lost in the wild. But I had to stop feeling sorry for myself.
“He roughed you up real hard,” Cole said. “I was worried.”
“I’m fine,” I said. Nothing was broken. Bruises were part of the deal. That I received them vindictively and in punches rather than getting slammed against the boards mattered little to me. A bruise was a bruise.
Sawyer would pay the price despite my attempts to smooth things over. What that price might be, I didn’t know. I only knew that nobody listened to me when I told them I’d slammed into him first.
Eerily enough, Cole was thinking about the same thing. “Why did you lie?” he whispered, his gaze darting around.
“He was protecting his friend,” I said. “I can hate him all I like for humbling me out there, but he had a good reason.”
Cole folded his lips, blinked slowly, then frowned at me. “You have to stop being so hard on yourself, Gray. It’s not right.”
What Cole didn’t know was that I had stopped. With each punch I received, and the accidental head-bump that had bloodied my nose, I felt better.
Pain was good.
Pain purified.
And pain revealed.
Avery had swept in, falling apart with worry. He cared. He cared about me. Yes, he wanted to rescue his friend from getting expelled or serving a sentence for murder or whatever, but he looked at me with such beautiful fear in his eyes.
In truth, I wanted to kiss Sawyer on both cheeks and thank him. His actions revealed something so wonderful that I couldn’t barely contain my excitement.
“Are you coming to celebrate?” Cole asked after a time of silence. He knew I wasn’t going to talk more about it, so he shifted the topic. “And not at the Thinker,” he said. “We think he might be there.”
“This one’s coming no matter where we go,” I said and gestured vaguely in Spencer’s direction. “So I’ll pass this time. I have some plans to make.”
Cole raised his eyebrows, but I touched the side of my nose to bind him to secrecy. It hurt, so I winced, and it brought a new wave of joy to me.
Ah, but I had deserved it. And it felt like atonement.
It would only have been more appropriate if Avery had done the beating, but the results wouldn’t be this thrilling.
Now, I knew where he stood. I knew he didn’t hate me the way I hated myself; and I wasn’t nothing to him, either.
He’d said it and I had believed it. I had said the same words to Spencer and I had no intention of ever changing my mind.
But Avery…my sweet, beautiful, loving Avery had only said it to protect himself.
I grabbed my things and walked out. My Breakers would celebrate tonight, but I would plan and plan until I had far better reasons for celebration.
As I walked away, I chuckled. It was contained, held down, but it burst from me anyway.
I chuckled again, then once more until I laughed and my chest shook.
The bruising on my side wasn’t that bad.
The nose had been a chance encounter because I ducked instead of swinging my head to the side.
I bloodied it by myself if we were being honest.
I laughed into the night and the thick winter clouds above me.
Nothing could stop me now.
It wasn’t much, but it was a chance. I still had a chance if I played my cards right.
“Oh, Sawyer,” I whispered to myself. “I’m gonna build a monument to your valiant contributions.
” And again, I laughed. Impatience kicked in, but I contained myself.
My instinct was to run to the Thinker and drag Avery out to talk to me.
But that was wrong. Among his friends and worrying about Sawyer, he wouldn’t be in a loving mood. I had to be smart.
But that was okay.
I could arrange things and show him that I would bring down the stars from the sky for him.
Because he still cared. Even if he hadn’t spoken to me, the emotionless mask had slipped for a moment there.
He had revealed just how scared he was. He had allowed his feelings to shine for one brilliant moment and all the physical pain had gone away when I saw it.
My heart had healed, too. Not fully, but it was mending itself.
I wasn’t going to miss my last chance with the guy I loved.