Now you know
Chapter 33
SOPHIA
I make it to the girls' bathroom in under a minute.
I slam my weight against the heavy door, slide over to the nearest sink, and twist the faucet on.
Cold water rushes out. I cup my hands beneath the stream, splashing my face once, twice, before pressing my wet palms flat against my skin.
I stay there like that for a long, quiet moment, listening to the steady hum of the running water, waiting for my lungs to remember how to expand.
When I finally straighten up and look at myself in the mirror, the sight is grim.
"I am completely insane," I tell my reflection.
My reflection offers absolutely nothing useful in return.
"Stop it, Shopi." I grab a rough paper towel from the dispenser, fiercely drying my skin. "Just...stop."
My eyes drop to my desk. No, not my desk.
I look down at my hands. I'm still holding the sketchbook.
It isn't closed tightly; my thumb is wedged between the heavy pages, holding it open to the exact sketch I fled from.
I stare down at it with the specific, suffocating panic of someone holding a piece of incriminating evidence they have no idea how to destroy.
Why did I draw him?
The question arrives with the exhausted clarity of something I have been aggressively refusing to look at directly.
Why out of everything, out of anyone in this entire miserable world did I draw Lorenzo Calloway?
I could have drawn a cat. A tree. Prince fast asleep with his paw draped over his nose. A completely normal subject, chosen by a completely normal person, having a completely normal afternoon in art class.
But no. I drew his jawline.
I snap the sketchbook shut with a definitive smack.
"Should I throw it away?"
I consider the trash can by the door seriously for approximately three seconds.
No. Absolutely not. Someone might find it.
Someone like Vivienne would dig through the paper towels, pull it out, and hold it up for the entire school to laugh at.
I need to take it home. I need to take it home, tear the page out, burn it to ash, and scatter those ashes somewhere far away so I never have to think about this moment again.
I nod at my reflection with the grim satisfaction of someone who has finally made a decision.
To my relief, the corridor outside is completely empty.
Stay cool, Sophia. Ten more minutes.
I start walking back to class. Then, something through the large window at the end of the hallway catches my eye, causing me to freeze.
The school parking lot spreads out below, a sea of glossy, expensive sports cars and sleek motorcycles. But it's the two figures half-concealed beside a dark blue G-Wagon that hold my attention.
When I look closer, my stomach drops. Ben and Alex. Why aren't they in class?
There is a third person with them, someone I can't identify from this angle. His back is turned, his hands raised in a gesture that looks like it started as an explanation and ended as defeat. He reaches into his jacket pocket. Pulls something out. Hands it over.
"I don't believe it," I breathe.
"What don't you believe?"
The dark voice comes from directly behind me.
I spin around. The sheer shock of him and the sudden, suffocating presence of him right where there was nobody a second ago sends everything crashing out of my hands. My sketchbook hits the floor with a heavy, flat sound and slides two feet across the linoleum tiles.
I stare at him, my eyes wide.
But he looks past me, his gaze cutting straight through the window. I watch his eyes the small, sharp movement in them, barely there, gone in under a second. He knows exactly what I just saw. He doesn't have to say it, I don't have to say it, and we both damn well know it.
"Nothing," I hiss quickly, crouching down to grab my sketchbook.
When I stand back up, I flash him the shortest, most deliberately unimpressed smile I own and try to step right around him.
But he is faster. His fingers wrap firmly around my forearm, his grip pure steel.
"Hey..." I pull back, glaring hard, matching his locked gaze without flinching. "What is your problem?"
"You," he says, the single word dropping between us like a heavy stone. He tilts his head, a dangerous smirk playing on his lips, his eyes darkening. "As I already told you, stalker, keep your nose out of my business."
"Fuck you " I rip my arm out if his grip .He takes a deliberate, heavy step into my space, his shadow completely swallowing me. "Oh my bad should I be worried about your boyfriend seeing us like this?"
Instead of shrinking back, I lock my knees. I don't give him the satisfaction of watching me retreat. I press my shoulders back against the cold glass of the window, using it as leverage to stand taller.
The distance between us is the kind that doesn't have a clean name. He looks down at me, trying to crowd me, trying to use his height to intimidate me. But I lift my chin, tilting my face up to meet his gaze head-on. For the first time, something shifts in his expression.
It isn't the usual dark amusement, it isn't the arrogant performance, and it isn't any of the curated versions of Lorenzo Calloway that I have been cataloging in my mind without meaning to.
It looks, briefly, like it actually means something.
"Maybe you should tell him that," he says, his voice dropping an octave, low and gravelly. I feel an unwanted heat rise in my face, but I don't look away. I hold his gaze, letting the fire in my own eyes burn right through his mask.
"And maybe," I say, keeping my voice steady through an act of pure will, "you should tell your friends not to conduct their illegal business in the school parking lot where anyone can see them."
A sharp muscle twitches in his jaw.
I push forward, matching his suffocating proximity by closing the remaining distance myself. I step right into his space, my chest nearly brushing his jacket.
"And since we're finally on the subject" My voice climbs slightly, but I snap it back into a sharp, lethal edge. "which one of your idiot friends spiked my drink that night? What exactly happened?"
"You wouldn't believe me," he says softly.
"Try me." I dare him. And narrow my eyes, boring into his, refusing to back down even a single millimeter.
He stays completely silent, just watching me with those unreadable eyes, testing my resolve.
He thinks I'll blink first. He thinks I'll break.
The silence stretches, thick and suffocating, until the anger inside me snaps.
I lean even closer, demanding his full attention, matching his dark energy spark for spark.
"Try me," I say again, the words spilling out fast, hot, and dangerous. "Whatever you think, Lorenzo, it's not true. I'm not scared of you. The moment you think you win, the moment you think you've beaten me it won't happen."
I am exploding now, the sheer force of my fury changing my face, twisting it into a mask of pure, untamed defiance. I don't look like a victim; I look like an adversary. I want to break something.
I want to break him.
"You can push me as much as you want," I breathe, my eyes flashing as I stare him down, my chest heaving with adrenaline. "You can try as much as you want, but I won't give it to you. I won't bow down to you. Ever."
I take a deep, ragged breath, planting my feet firmly. I watch his chest rise and fall in a heavy, matching rhythm, his own breathing fracturing under the weight of my defiance. Visible sparks dance in the suffocatingly small space between us, the air thick with our mutual friction.
He wants a fight? I can give him a war.
"Fine," he spats out. It is almost a whisper, his gaze dropping to my lips before snapping back to my eyes, burning with a dangerous new respect.
Fine? Is that it? Are we over?
Before I can even process his words, everything shifts. He tilts his head toward mine, testing my boundaries one last time.
"What are you doing?" The words are a breathless challenge, but I don't push him away. I stay exactly where I am, challenging him to make the next move.
I register it instantly. I register the terrifying fact that I am choosing to stay, that some nameless, magnetic pull is holding me in place, and instead of backing down, I am leaning into the danger.
"I'm showing you what happened," he murmurs. He pauses, a slow, calculated tilt of his chin as he raises an eyebrow. His dark eyes trace the line of my mouth, checking my resolve, daring me to flinch.
"Are you sure about this?" he whispers.
His warm breath brushes against my lips, sending a violent shiver straight down my spine. But I refuse to break. I lock my knees, keeping my gaze anchored to his—fierce, unyielding, and completely unafraid. I don't just want the truth; I want him to know he can't weaponize it against me.
I give him a sharp, decisive nod.
"Close your eyes," he demands. His voice is a low, gravelly rasp that leaves no room for argument.
I stare straight into his dark gaze, my heart hammering like a trapped bird against my ribs. I match his suffocating intensity spark for spark.
"You close your eyes."
"Close your eyes, stalker." It's quieter now. A command wrapped in a breathless plea, barely reaching the air between us. "And I'll show you."
Like a fool, I swallow the bait. I close my eyes.
His hand finds my hip.
The touch is an immediate, violent electric current. His fingers dig firmly into my skin through the fabric of my uniform, the heat spreading outward until it reaches places it has absolutely no business reaching. I have exactly one second to process the friction before his mouth slams into mine.
My breath completely stops.
He presses me back against the cold glass of the window, not roughly, but with the ruthless, devastating certainty of someone who knows exactly what he's doing. A sharp gasp, a sound I have never made in my life, escapes straight into his mouth.
My hands find his hair.
I am not even aware of making the choice. My fingers simply wind through the dark, soft strands with a desperate will entirely separate from my brain. The kiss mutates into something bigger, heavier a dark, magnetic pull that violently drags fractured, blurred images from the back of my mind.
Flashbacks.
The sudden rush of the past hits me like a bucket of ice water.
I tear my eyes open.
And shove him away.
"No." The syllable breaks against his lips, sharp and desperate
There is no way. Absolutely no way.
I look at him breathless and flushed. My shoulders press hard against the window, my lungs burning as I try to pull air into my chest.
My uniform is a mess, completely ruined compared to how it looked five minutes ago.
Lorenzo stands right in front of me, his expression doing that frustrating, calculated thing it always does, trying desperately to mask his thoughts, and not entirely succeeding.
A faint, dark hunger still lingers in his eyes.
"That," he says, his voice steady but rough, "is what happened that night."
I stare at him, my blood boiling.
"You just kissed me," I shout out. The words come out slowly, heavy and deliberate, like I am checking the weight of each one before releasing it into the quiet hallway. I reach up with trembling fingers, desperately trying to fix myself.
Be kind and strong.
I straighten my collar. My hair. My skirt.
Everything that has become completely unprofessional in the span of a few chaotic minutes.
"Now we're even," he says, adjusting his jacket as if nothing happened.
"Even?" I glare at him, my voice shaking with pure fury.
" What the hell do you mean, even..."
"I mean..." His eyes drop to my mouth for half a second, hot and lingering, before snapping back to mine.
"You kissed me. I kissed you. You know what happened that night. And now, you know that your little friend wants considerably more from you than just friendship."
My brain processes the information in agonizing stages.
I kissed him? First? I kissed Lorenzo Calloway first?
And what does he mean about my friend?
Instinctively, I follow his smug gaze.
At the far end of the corridor, standing perfectly still, is James. My schoolbag hangs limply from his left hand, his own bag slung over his shoulder. He is staring right at us, his face pale, trapped in total, silent shock. He doesn't say a single word.
That is the exact moment the floor drops out from beneath me. He kissed me because he saw James walking down the hall.
"You did that on purpose," I hiss, the sheer humiliation burning like acid in my throat.
"I hate you."
"You sure about that?" He looks like he absolutely enjoys hearing it, as if I had just told him I love him. His eyes drop to my lips again, a dark, teasing spark in them.
"You sure you didn't enjoy the kiss?"
"Positive," I glare at him, my voice cutting like ice.
"But you are right."
I watch him raise an eyebrow, waiting for whatever comes next. I take a sharp breath, swallowing down the lump of emotion in my throat before I speak the words.
"I don't just hate you," I breathe, my eyes drilling into his. "I despise you."
"Good." he leans in even closer, lowering his tone so the words are an intimate whisper meant only for my ears. "My recommendation" his eys darken
"Don't. Ever. Stop."
Stunned, I shake my head.
What I wouldn't give to just punch him across the face right now, to wipe that stupid, arrogant smirk clean off his lips.
Stay kind and strong.
"Don't you worry," I hiss, stepping forward "won't happen"
I push past him, shoving Lorenzo sideways as hard as I can. "You are a dick, Lorenzo."
I glare at him one last time, channeling every single ounce of my hatred into the look, before slamming my sketchbook against my chest and walking away.
My legs feel like lead as I storm down the hallway toward James, a toxic mix of intense embarrassment and deep, suffocating betrayal twisting in my chest.
"James, it's not what it looks like," I say frantically the second I reach him, my voice pleading. "Please believe me. He kissed me... I... it wasn't like that"
"Don't worry, Sophie," James cuts in.
He forces a grin, but it doesn't reach his eyes. The expression is completely hollow, masking the hurt bleeding through his features. "It's not like we're together or anything. You can do whatever you want."
He shoves my bag back into my hands and immediately turns on his heel, walking quickly down the stairs without looking back.
A few agonizing seconds later, the shrill, deafening ring of the school bell echoes through the hallway. Within moments, the quiet corridor floods with hundreds of loud, laughing students, swallowing me up in the crowd.
My day is officially over.
No.