Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
Elliana
If anything, having to go to school means knowing I won’t have to risk running into Carter out of nowhere the way I could easily do at home. Like yesterday.
The memory is still brutally fresh and sitting at the front of my mind on the way to school this morning. Carter hasn’t said a word as he drives—if anything, I’m sort of surprised he’s driving me at all. I figured he would leave without me, knowing no one could stop him. He wouldn’t be getting any phone calls from Paul, and it’s not like I can ask him to come back from Thailand to drive me the way I did the first time.
All I can do is sit with my backpack on my lap, arms wrapped around it, like it could possibly protect me. Especially once Carter is determined to do something.
Like choking me with his dick. Like fucking my face. It didn’t matter that I was struggling and ready to black out because I couldn’t breathe. It didn’t matter that I was crying and gagging. It was almost like that only made things worse.
My gaze drifts to the world passing on the other side of the passenger window. I can’t help but wonder as we roll by so many people of all ages whether any of them carry around the same shameful secrets I do. How many of them are struggling, too?
He doesn’t even bother saying anything before he gets out of the truck and slams the door. It’s times like this I can’t help but worry he’s going to send those pictures around the way he’s been threatening. I don’t want to believe he would, but can I really afford to put it past him? I just don’t know, and that’s maybe the worst part of all—the not knowing. Always waiting for the worst.
We don’t have a class together on Tuesdays, thank god. It’s bad enough having to ignore the faint snickers and whispers I still hear as I walk across campus. It’s not as bad as it was before. Maybe they’re getting tired of me, ready to move on to someone else. But I still hear it.
Though sometimes, even though it makes me feel ungrateful, I would rather push through and ignore the bullying than face kindness. I’m used to bullying. Kindness? I’m still not sure how to act.
Which is why I feel myself closing off when a familiar duo catches sight of me as I pass the library. “Hey! Elliana!” Wren chirps like the bird she’s named after. “How was the wedding?”
“Meet us at the cafeteria after class!” Maya calls out. “We want to hear all about it!”
Well, at least this way I can prepare myself for the hangout. That’s easier than being bombarded and descended on all at once. I hate that I even think about it that way, but the girls are just as overwhelming sometimes as they are sweet and friendly.
I wave with a smile before continuing on my way, prepared to tell them all about how cringe the day was. It was embarrassing—especially once Mom set the champagne aside and started drinking the hard stuff—but I would rather think about that than the humiliation in the kitchen yesterday. I still don’t understand what set him off in the first place, which is kind of terrifying. How can I avoid situations like that when I don’t know what started it?
That question is still on my mind by the time I head for the cafeteria. It only hits me once I’m through the glass doors that the girls didn’t say whether it would only be the three of us or not. Are their boyfriends going to be hanging out with us?
In other words, will Carter be there, since he’s glued to their sides?
It’s too late to back out now. The girls are sitting at the usual table—there must be some invisible reserve sign on it that keeps other people from sitting there—and they must have been looking out for me, because now they’re both smiling and waving me over. This is the kind of thing normal people do all the time. They have lunch with friends and talk about what happened over the weekend. As much as I wish most of the time that the rest of the world would leave me alone, I can’t pretend there isn’t a part of me that wants to live the way other people do. I can’t afford to pass up opportunities like this, where people seek me out and ask me to be their friend.
And I can’t, for any reason, allow Carter to dictate what I do. It would be one thing to turn the girls down because I’m overwhelmed or feeling shy. But to consider turning on my heel and bolting because there’s a chance I might see him? I can’t give him that power.
He already has too much as it is.
“So we want all the details.” Wren bounces up and down in her seat as I plop down across from her. “Did you take pictures? How did you look?”
“I didn’t really think to take any pictures—but we got a million of them from the photographer. As soon as we get the proofs back, I’ll show them to you.”
“Were there any tragic drunken speeches? That’s one of my favorite parts,” Maya teases, making Wren laugh.
“Actually, I left before everyone got too drunk.” And I really, truly wish the memory didn’t make me feel so warm all of a sudden. He was more human on Saturday night. He acted like a regular, almost decent person.
Everything changed the night before that, too. When we had sex. And then it was nice again on Sunday. It’s like being on a roller coaster all the time. Stupid me, not carrying my motion sickness pills around.
Thinking about him means I can’t pay full attention to the girls as they talk about what they did this weekend. Not that I really need to pay close attention since I know whatever it was, it revolved around their guys. It’s not that I’m jealous or anything like that. It’s just that I can’t relate. Even though they both go out of their way to make me feel included, there are times like this when I can’t share much of myself. I really wish that wasn’t so. All I can do is sit back and listen to their stories and laugh when it seems like that’s what I should do.
“There’s the most beautiful girl I know.” I’m just as surprised as Wren when Briggs comes up out of nowhere and wraps his arms around her from behind.
Tucker does the same thing with Maya, nuzzling her neck while she squeals and giggles. “Too hungry to wait for us?” he asks before dropping into a chair next to hers.
How na?ve can I be, thinking it would just be the three of us? But my heart doesn’t really drop until Carter sits practically at the other end of the table from where I am. Not that I would ever complain that he’s keeping his distance.
Oh, who am I kidding? I was actually starting to think he wasn’t so bad for roughly three seconds there—feeling strangely touched that he would go out of his way to be kind. Just because he’s acting the way he is now doesn’t erase the feelings that were starting to bloom in me, no matter how much I pretend otherwise.
I can hardly bring myself to glance his way. What has to happen to a person to inspire the kind of chaos that boils in him all the time? Why am I even asking myself that question? He is an enigma, and I don’t have the time or the energy to solve him.
“Elliana.” One of the twins—I still can’t tell the difference between Preston and Easton—grins my way as he unwraps a sandwich. “It was a shame you didn’t come swimming with us yesterday.”
I’m looking at him, but I can see Carter from the corner of my eye. That means I notice when Carter’s spine stiffens, and he sits up straighter, scowling down at his lunch like it insulted him. I wonder what his friends would think of him if I told them what he did to me after they left.
I wouldn’t have the nerve to tell them. I would be too humiliated. That doesn’t mean I can let the opportunity to score a point pass by. “Maybe next time,” I offer with a grin I don’t feel.
It doesn’t matter if I mean it or not. It makes Carter shoot me a dirty look nobody else notices. His blue eyes look black as they burn holes into me. I don’t care. He can choke on whatever it is that’s making him act this way—probably jealousy that he’s not the center of attention, the way he so clearly has to be at all times.
“Elliana was telling us about the wedding,” Wren explains to Carter, sounding playful and giggly. “I bet you had an amazing time, with half the married women in town clawing at each other to dance with you.”
“Not half. Maybe a third.” He is so good at pretending to be better than he is, nicer than he is. It’s a costume he puts on and takes off at will.
And when everybody else is busy chatting or eating, he lets that persona slip away long enough to narrow his eyes at me. Does it really bother him so much to know one of his friends is willing to acknowledge me? Can he be that immature?
What am I saying? Of course he is.
I feel safer and more secure when everyone’s around us, which means my knees are shaking by the time everybody starts getting up and gathering their trash. “I’ll text you later,” Wren promises before leaving with Briggs, hand-in-hand. Maya gives me a little wave before she and Tucker head off, while the twins and Kellan wander over to another table to talk to a handful of girls.
Which leaves me with the one person I wanted to avoid until it’s time to go home later.
And he’s just as pissed as he seemed to be—only now, he doesn’t have to hide it since his friends are gone. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he hisses, following me to the trash can where I empty my tray.
All my silence does is make things worse. He takes me by the arm and pulls me aside, crowding close to me with his back to the rest of the room. “What was that all about? Flirting with my friends? Can’t you get enough attention?”
It doesn’t matter what I do—he’s going to find a way to twist it around to fit his own narrative.
“I was just talking. That’s it.” All right, maybe I was trying to get under his skin. Clearly, I was successful. But still.
“If you want to catch their attention that much, I can make it easy for you.” Those strangely black eyes of his glitter as he looks down at me. “I’ll send them your pictures. That will earn you plenty of attention.”
I’ve never hated anyone the way I hate him now. All of the humiliation I ever went through, the misery I’ve experienced at the hands of other people—it’s nothing compared to what flows through me while I stare up at him. I can almost taste him in my mouth and can definitely remember the terror of thinking he would never let me up for air.
I would swear I can actually hear something break in me. Maybe it’s my sanity. Maybe it’s whatever little bit of self-preservation I was still holding onto. I don’t know. All I know for sure is I am sick and tired of putting up with this. When will enough be enough?
“You know what?” I shrug, and the surprise on his face is priceless. “I don’t care. Send them out. Send them to everybody you know for all I care. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“You’re full of shit,” he scoffs, looking me up and down. “All talk.”
“Whatever makes you feel better. Why don’t you send them to everybody—see if I’m bluffing or not?”
He’s wary now, like an animal testing its surroundings. One eyebrow slowly arches and his nostrils flare. “Yeah, right. Everything you’ve done so far to get me not to send them, and now you’re going to turn around and dare me to do it?”
“I wouldn’t expect you to understand, so let me spell it out for you.” I’m shaking—I’m wishing I’d never opened my mouth in the first place, but I can’t stop now. Besides, it feels good to tell him off. “I’ve already been through eight different kinds of hell. Getting bullied by you, by people at this school, and before then. You know about it. So anything that happens to me after people see those photos is nothing new.”
Pausing for a second gives me the chance to watch as he tries to put this together. I guess it’s not easy coming to the understanding that you’ve been wasting your time—especially when you’ve spent your whole life thinking your shit doesn’t stink and the moon and stars hang because you want them there. “So go ahead. I’m tired of letting you do whatever you want out of fear. Be my guest. Show the pictures around.”
He’s too surprised to stop me from slipping past him. Somehow, I manage to walk a straight line even though my entire body is shaking. What is wrong with me? Have I really lost it? Why not stick my hand in a tank full of piranhas while I’m at it?
As I walk out of the cafeteria on shaking legs, I can’t decide whether I’ve helped myself by standing up to him… or made things so much worse.