Chapter 7 #2
The bad boy fantasy they all worship, sold on the smirk and the hoodie without ever seeing the person underneath.
My fingers tighten around the straps of my bag. Nails dig into the fabric. I keep my eyes forward and pretend my chest isn’t already burning.
Cassie steps in beside me, shoulder brushing mine. She nudges my ribs, her voice low and teasing. “Jealous?”
I scoff, way too fast.
“He can fuck whoever he wants. I don’t give a shit.”
Cassie snorts. “Please. You care so loud I could hear it from the science block. You’re one eye twitch away from ripping her extensions out.”
I roll my eyes, but she’s not done.
“Honestly, if looks could kill, that girl would be ashes and Zane would already be shirtless in front of your locker.”
A laugh slips out before I can stop it. It catches me off guard.
“That’s not even funny,” I mutter, trying to bite down the smile.
Cassie grins. “It’s hilarious. You’re acting all cool while your soul is trying to crawl out of your body and mount him.”
I smack her arm, but the smile won’t leave my face.
That’s the thing about Cassie. She always knows where to press, always finds the one thread that unravels the tension just enough to make me laugh.
But the second the laughter fades, it’s there again.
The truth.
Ugly. Unavoidable.
I don’t want to laugh or joke. I just want him to want me.
The rest of the day crawls by.
Teachers drone on, and every tick of the clock sounds louder than the last. My notes are a mess and my head is somewhere else entirely.
By the time the final bell rings, I’m exhausted.
There were lectures I didn’t hear, questions I didn’t answer, and eyes I refused to meet.
My pen barely touched the page. I stared out the window while the clock dragged its feet, each second stretching just long enough to remind me I don’t belong here.
On the walk home, Cassie talks the whole way, filling the space with gossip, teacher complaints, some story about a guy who tried to cheat off her math test and called her “hostile” when she told him to fuck off.
I laugh when I’m supposed to. Nod when it fits. But my mind’s somewhere else.
She doesn’t notice.
Or maybe she does, but lets it slide. That’s always been our deal.
When we reach the corner where Cassie and I split, I don’t move. I watch her cross the road, her braid swinging as she throws me a wave.
When she disappears down the street I turn around and go in the opposite direction.
I’m not ready to go home just yet.
I drift past store windows filled with clothes that will never be mine.
Crop tops, ripped jeans, leather jackets standing stiff on faceless mannequins.
The park feels easier.
I drop onto a metal bench, my eyes moving towards the duck skimming across the pond. Kids laugh hard enough to echo, handfuls of bread, parents snapping photos like they can trap joy in a frame.
I stay there, the minutes slipping by with the ripples on the pond and the squeals of kids that eventually fade as their parents drag them home.
The park empties until it’s just me. I stay long enough for the sky to shift, for the world to sink into shadow.
Streetlights buzz to life, throwing pale halos across the pavement as I walk home.
The second I push through the door, it slams into me. Noise everywhere. Someone’s losing their shit over socks. Another kid bawls because they got slammed into the wall. A toddler shrieks like the world’s ending while the TV hammers football commentary loud enough to rattle the windows.
Dolores doesn’t move.
She’s sunk into the couch, two wine coolers down, eyes glued to the game. She yells at the screen, slurring curses like the players might actually hear her through the glass.
It’s the same circus every night.
I dump my bag on the bed and head for the window. Dinner doesn’t even cross my mind.
Dolores would lose her shit if she caught me climbing out, threaten the social workers, call me a runaway again. She pulled that stunt when I was fourteen, when all I’d done was sit in the backyard staring at the stars. I hadn’t even left.
Didn’t matter.
She twisted it, turned me into the problem because that’s what she does best.
The rooftop pulls at me louder than anything else. It’s more mine now than Zane’s, since he can’t be bothered to show up anymore.
I cut through the alley.
The moon spills silver across the pavement, lighting everything up in a way that’s too bright, too exposing. My steps fall into rhythm, quick, carrying me straight to the ladder.
I climb without hesitation.
Except tonight it isn’t empty.
Zane. Hood pulled low, cigarette burning between his fingers, his body slouched against the tin as if the whole roof belongs to him.
He turns his head, and our eyes collide.
The hit is immediate. My chest caves around the slam of my heart, pounding a rhythm I do not recognize. It’s too fast. Too frantic.
I know what it means.
I’m in fucking trouble, because I’m falling for the boy carved from fists and fury. The boy made of bricks and bruises. And I can’t stop.
I wonder what he’s doing here. If he still comes to this rooftop and waits me out, hiding in the dark until I leave.
The notion burns. Because if that is true, then he has been haunting this place the whole time, letting me cling to the lie it was mine.
The roof creaks under my steps, each sound carrying in the quiet. My skirt moves against my legs in the breeze.
Zane takes a drag from his cigarette, chest rising slowly before he tips his head back toward the sky. Smoke spills past his lips, drawn out, controlled, the kind of move meant to hold my attention.
He stays quiet.
The burn of his silence wrapping tighter around me than anything he could say.
His eyes lock on mine. Heavy. Unreadable.
Heat coils low in my stomach. Whatever it is burning there, it’s dangerous. And it has me.
I lower myself onto the roof beside him. Not close enough to brush against him, but near enough that the warmth radiating from his body slips under my skin.
It teases, taunts, makes me restless.
His gaze cuts sideways, one brow lifting with that careless edge, as if the last four weeks of silence never touched him.
“Thought you wouldn’t want to be here with me.”
I shrug, my voice flat, steady. “You think too much of yourself. I came here for the rooftop, not for you.”
The corner of his mouth twitches.
A long pause stretches between us, too long.
Then I move without asking. I reach out and pluck the cigarette straight from his lips.
The filter is warm against my fingers. It still carries the taste of him.
I take a drag. The smoke burns on the way down, scraping my throat until my lungs ache. I do not cough. I do not break. I hold his stare as the smoke settles inside me and let it spread until it’s burning me alive.
His mouth quirks again, but there is no humor in it.
“Did not peg you for a smoker.”
“There are a lot of things you do not know about me,” I answer, flicking the ash from the end with a steady hand, as if I have been doing this my whole life. I let the smoke slip slow from my lips, eyes locked on his. “You bring out the worst in me.”
That earns me a smirk.
A real one this time. For half a second, I feel like I’ve won something. Then it’s gone, his face hardening again, like it cost him too much to let that slip.
He leans over and takes the cigarette from my fingers.
I tilt my head back, eyes tracing the sky.
Stars scatter above us, sharp as broken glass, glittering in patterns that pretend to mean something. They shimmer with the shine of promises no one ever keeps. Fragile. Untouchable.
The words hesitate at my throat, but the need for answers drags them out anyway.
“Why have you been ignoring me?”
Zane freezes. His whole body goes still, like the truth is a gun pointed at his chest.
The cigarette hangs between his lips, forgotten, smoke curling up into the dark.
When he finally speaks, his voice is low, rough around the edges. “You mess with my head.”
My breath falters. “What?”
This time he turns. The hood cuts shadows across his face, but his eyes pin me in place, burning hot and unflinching.
“You get under my skin, Sky. And I don’t know what the fuck to do with that.”
My chest caves, breath catching somewhere between disbelief and something I can’t name.
He drags a hand through his hair, fingers rough, frustration carved into every line of him. “I have been through a lot of fucked-up shit.”
“Yeah, and who hasn’t,” I shoot back.
His silence answers louder than words, stretching until it hurts.
Finally, he mutters, “You’ll be rid of me in a month.”
The words land like a punch.
“What if I don’t want to be rid of you?”
That cracks him. His head snaps toward me, his eyes wide, the fight clear in them.
“I have had girls. I’ve had chaos. I have set fire to everything I touch. But you…” His jaw locks, his eyes never leaving mine. “You make me want things I shouldn’t want. And that,” his voice drops to a whisper, “that terrifies the fuck out of me.”
He turns away, pulling smoke deep into his lungs, holding it there until his chest strains before letting it bleed out slow, as if the release could steady him.
Then, with a sharp flick of his fingers, he sends the cigarette arcing off the roof into the night.
“Say something,” he mutters.
The words are rough, scraping the space between us.
I swallow, my throat raw, pulse thrashing against my ribs.
“People don’t stay. Not for me. I learned that a long time ago.” My voice drops, softer, even though I hate that it does. “So if I want you to want me, that’s because I don’t know what the hell it feels like to be wanted.”
His breath punches out, sharp enough to sting.
“Sky…” The crack in his voice ruins me.
I drag in air, desperate and shaking.
“You have no fucking idea how much I want you to want me, Zane”
His jaw locks, muscles twitching as if he is holding himself together by force. “You don’t get it. I am no good for anyone. Least of all you.”