Poor Mr. Finnely, never catching a break.
Asher didn’t even bother glancing up. “Nah, I’m cool here.”
Tristan threw Dana and I glares, like we’d personally blackmailed Asher into sitting with us. I nudged Asher’s foot under the table. “Go with him,” I mouthed. Cobalt eyes narrowed at me.
“Asher, man, I think you should come with me.”
Tristan must have been completely oblivious to Asher’s mounting annoyance, but I wasn’t. Dana was too busy watching Tristan with barely concealed malice. If that boy knew what was best for him, he would run before Dana landed a fork in his thigh.
“For the last time, Bauer, fu-”
“Fudge.”
Asher stopped and looked at me, his irritation replaced with amusement.
Tristan, on the other hand, didn’t find it as funny.
“Don’t you know how crazy this bitch is? Why are you-”
Tristan never got to finish his sentence. In .5 seconds, Asher had Tristan flat on his back on the lunch table, pinning him down with a hand on his throat. Our lunches fell to ground or provided Tristan with cushioning. I found myself peering down at Tristan’s abnormally tan skin where my fertilizer lunch had been a mere second ago.
“You wanna repeat that?” Asher growled, hand flexing around Tristan’s throat.
Tristan sputtered incoherently, his cheeks turning a motley red from the lack of blood flow.
My brain finally recovered from the shock. The entire cafeteria was on its feet, anticipating a fight. Not on my watch!
“Asher!” I hissed, swatting at his arm. It was like hitting a wall. What did this guy lift, cement trucks? “Get off of him!”
“No! Didn’t you hear what he said?”
Frenzied with the panic at all the attention this was receiving, I wrapped my arms around Asher’s waist and pulled. “I don’t care!”
“I do!”
“Just let him go! I’ve been called worse!”
Dana was watching this with glee, but she rushed to my aid when I shot her a glare. She hooked onto one of Asher’s arms, and with our combined forces, we yanked with all our might.
He didn’t budge.
A crowd had gathered, and a few of Tristan’s friends were making their way towards us. Their confusion and nervousness was evident by how slow they were at coming to Tristan’s defense.
Oh God, this was going to turn into a brawl! And for what? Tristan had called me a bad name, whatever! I was a big girl, I could take it!
“Hey, man, get off him,” Greg Anderson said uncertainly.
“That’s not cool, Grayson,” another piped in.
Those twats were too afraid to take him on. At this rate, a staff member would notice the commotion and come investigating. Asher couldn’t afford something like this on his record, not if he was trying to keep his personal life separated from his academic life.
I had no choice. I really didn’t.
Aiming between his tensed shoulder blades, I dug my teeth into his flesh.
And bit him.
He flinched, instinctively releasing Tristan in favor of the new danger chomping into his back like a rabid dog.
Whirling, he regarded me with wide eyes, one hand reaching for the place I’d bitten him. When he realized he couldn’t reach it, he dropped his hand.
“You bit me.”
Everyone was ignoring Tristan, who was coughing and forcing oxygen into his lungs, in favor of Asher and I. The attention was seriously freaking me out. Dana wound her arm with mine and squeezed it.
“You were acting ridiculous! It was the only way I could snap you out of it.”
How many people were watching us? My knees started to tremble, and my breathing hitched. “That’s it,” I heard Dana mutter under her breath, and then I was being yanked away.
“Out of my way! If you value that toe, move aside,” Dana ordered, shoving through the crowd.
She didn’t stop until she’d located an empty classroom and sat me in a chair. “Breathe, just breathe,” she encouraged.
“I’m fine,” I waved her off, but gave her a small smile to show I was grateful.
A second later, the door burst open, and Asher was towering over me. “What the hell, Ivy!”
Dana cleared her throat. “I think I’ll go, um, get our backpacks.” Shooting me an apologetic look, she skedaddled. The traitorous boob!
“Care to explain what all that was about?” Asher demanded, glowering at me.
His indignation ignited my own anger. What was his issue? I was doing him a favor, keeping his butt from getting caught by the staff for assaulting another student.
“You went ape on Tristan Bauer! I was trying to keep you from getting in trouble, since school matters so much to you! Forgive my insolence!” I shouted.
He paused. “That’s not what I was talking about, but why would you think school matters to me?”
“Most people don’t take the classes you’re in ‘cause they’re just dollops of fun.”
Something flashed across his face too fast for me to catch, and then he was leaning over me, trapping me against a desk with his arms. This guy seemed to have a serious inclination towards caging me into his body heat.
“Now why would you do something so considerate for a guy you hate, Ivy?” His breath fanned my cheeks, and I was catapulted to my dream from last night again.
“I-I-I never said I h-hated you,” I stuttered, nearly cross-eyed by the proximity. “Now if you don’t mind, some of us value our personal space.”
“Interesting,” Asher murmured, more to himself that to me, before bringing his face close to mine, close enough that a dark lock of his hair brushed my forehead. “This isn’t over, angel.”
With that said, he retreated, leaving me a quivering mess of conflicting emotions. He held open the door.
“Ready for Physics?”
Chapter Fourteen The Ke$ha Complex
Curse you, Rebecca Black!
“Ivy, do you know what day it is? Because I do,” Dana sang. We were sitting on the bench, awaiting Caleb’s arrival. Dana hadn’t stopped singing that infernal song all day. If I heard another lyric of that song, I was going to go Ninja Turtles on their hiney.
“Hey guys.” Caleb plopped into the seat besides them. He looked haggard and worn from practice. There was a home game against Montacello High, our main rival, and Caleb’s coach was training them within an inch of their lives.
“Poor baby,” Dana cooed, pinching his cheeks tightly. He swatted her away and yawned loudly.
The week had gone by relatively fast, with no more cafeteria incidents, thankfully. Asher had ditched Dance and lunch the past three days, and every time she passed him in the hall he’d have a faraway look in his eyes.
“Get in the car, children,” I ordered. “Time to get you your binkies!”
Caleb scoffed. “Please, I graduated binky last week.”
“That’s a big boy!” Dana applauded as they piled into the car.
Caleb puffed up like a rooster. “Thank you. It was rocky at first-you know, with separation anxiety and everything-but my therapist really helped me pull through.”
Five hours later, we were lolling on Dana’s couch, bored out of our minds. Dana’s parents were divorced, and she lived with her Dad, who was a cop. This pretty much left her alone most of the time.
We were watching 27 Dresses for what had to be the hundredth time. “I think she looks better with Josh Duhamel,” Dana commented.
“Please, she’s not Fergielicious enough for Josh.”
“James Marsden is too…I don’t know, pretty. And he’s short. He’s shorter than her!”
“So what? He’s not applying to America’s Top Model, Dana.”
On the floor, Caleb mimed shooting himself. “I’ve really got to hang out with guys more,” he muttered. “I was watching TV yesterday and ended up screaming at Ryan Gosling not to let her go, and kiss her dammit!”
Dana and I laughed at the terror on his
face. We were sprawled in different positions over the room. Dana was occupying the entire couch, one leg dangling on the other side and her head drooping towards the ground.
Caleb was lying on his stomach in front of the TV, and I was horizontal on an armchair, legs kicked in the air.
“Guys, its eight o’clock on a Friday night and we’re sitting here watching this freaking movie again! Let’s go do something fun!” Caleb jumped to his feet, so excited he didn’t notice is foot clip Dana’s drooping head.
“Ouch! Watch it, you dumb jock!”
“Stuff it Tinkerbell!”
“Something fun like what?” I struggled to make my voice heard over their bickering.
Caleb grinned mischievously. “Greg Callavita is throwing a party tonight.”
“What for?”
Caleb shrugged. “Does there have to be a reason?”
That’s how I found myself in the backseat of Dana’s car, listening to my best friend’s argue like an old married couple. What had compelled me to agree to Caleb’s suggestion, I’ll never know. Maybe it was those puppy-dog eyes he’d mastered so well. Maybe I was sick of seeing Katherine Heigl have her dream wedding over and over again.
All I knew was that here I was, wearing a teal snowflake sweater and my bell-bottom jeans, heading to an undoubtedly crazy party.
Maybe I’d used too much maple syrup on my waffles. Could a side effect be temporary bouts of utter idiocy?
Dana parked haphazardly in front a sprawling mansion. It wasn’t in the same planet as Asher’s, let alone the same league, but it made my house look like a coat closet.
Glass tinkled as teenagers drank alcohol, grinded on anyone with functioning genitalia, and ‘danced’.
“That is not dancing,” Dana shouted over the music. Despite protesting earlier, she appeared excited. She was surveying the scene and grinning.
“Right, that’s pretty much glorified dry humping,” I agreed. Music was blasting from the surround sound system, shaking the room. In the middle of the dance floor, some guy with a mouth stuffed with Cheetoes raised a cup of beer high and spilled it over his head. Everyone cheered.
“Uh, Dana?” I asked, but she’d vanished. So had Caleb. I spotted him beefing it up with a few of his teammates from soccer.
A guy rammed into me, sending my feet stumbling forward. “Thauuury,” he drawled, saluting me with his cup before shuffling on.
Maybe I should wait in the car.
Why did I agree to come here? There is absolutely nothing wrong with watching 27 Dresses for the tenth time!
Somehow, I found myself being deposited by the crowd in front of the bar. Greg Callavita had a bar in his house? That boy was loaded. Hopping onto a stool, I entertained myself by watching the drunken antics of my schoolmates.
“Can I get you anything?” A twenty-something year old guy asked from behind the counter, wiping his hands on a towel before tucking it into his waistband.
“Um, no thanks. I’m okay.”
He rested his elbows on the counter and smiled at me. “What’s a girl like you doing at a party like this, anyway? You don’t strike me as one of Mr. Callavita’s close friends,” he said meaningfully, tilting his head at the girl who’d climbed her boyfriend’s shoulders in an attempt to swing from the chandelier.
Normally, I was all for ‘Stranger Danger!’, but the friendly bartender wasn’t asking anything intrusive or trying to cart me away in a white van, so…
“My friends dragged me here,” I confessed.
“Ah,” he nodded. “That makes sense. Are you sure there isn’t anything I can get you to drink? Mr. Callavita is footing the bill, so I highly encourage you to take advantage.”
I hesitated. It was Friday night, at a high school party, with my friends. Freshman year, even the first half of sophomore year, I wouldn’t have hesitated. I would have been the girl swinging from the chandelier with a Tarzan battle cry.
Enough of living under a shell.
“Give me something alcoholic,” I said, trying to keep the trepidation from my voice. The bartender-Gabe, according to his nametag- grinned and bowed.
“Coming right up, madam.”
“This here is a Pina Colada,” Gabe said a few minutes later, in which I’d second guessed myself fifty-six times. “I’ve got some whiskey and tequila on the side if you feel ready for those.”
Gulping, I pinched my nose and tilted the murky cup in my mouth. Liquid set my throat and lungs on fire as I coughed.
“Told you,” he said. “It’ll get easier the more you drink.”
So I drank.
“Woo!” I cried as I climbed clumsily onto the table. My fans cheered. “Raise your cups, girls and boys, it’s Friday! Is this how excited you are?”
The cheering intensified. “Turn it up, DJ!” I hollered. “Let’s dance!”
Ke$ha blared through the speakers, and I whooped. Trying to dance without spilling my drink was so hard. They should invent cupholders for our clothes. Maybe I could do it! I’d be a trillionaire! Maybe I’d even buy a big fancy house, too. Then all my new friends could come live with me and we’d dance forever.
“Ivy!” I glanced down to find Dana trying to yank me off the table. Caleb was making his way over here too, elbowing aside my fans.
They’d been trying to make me go home for an hour. “Loosen up! You guys are always telling me to loosen up! Haha! Now I’m telling you!”
“This isn’t loosening up, Ivy, this is going off the deep end,” Caleb chided.
“Caleb, man, is everything okay over here?” Greg Callavita, the man of the hour himself, appeared beside my friends.
“Booty call!” I screeched as the song started playing. My fans shouted, “Booty Call!” in reply.
My hair had dropped from its bun at some point, falling in waves to the end of my spine. “What are we going to do?” Caleb asked Dana with frustration. Ugh, they were such party poopers. Why did I bring them here, again?
“Where’s her phone?” Dana said suddenly.
“By the bar, in her purse,” Caleb replied, then frowned. “Why do I know that?”
Dana scurried into the masses while Caleb tried to wrestle me off the table. But those amazing magic drinks made me stronger than Caleb.
“Cuddly Caleb! Cuddly Caleb!” I shrieked with laughter. “You’re not cuddly at all!”
Two of my fans clambered onto the table with me. They were that couple that’d attempted to swing from the chandelier. “Hiiii!” The girl giggled.
“Hellooooo!” I replied, and like that, the three of us were best friends forever.
We slung our arms around each other, with me in the middle, and tried to line dance, but we kept getting our legs tangled with each others. At one point, Carina- the girl’s name, as I’d discovered when our fans cheered us on- had slipped and fallen on Trent, and they were still slobering on each other.
Dana returned, my phone clasped in her hand, and nodded at Caleb. “Got it covered.”
“Dana!” I crooned. “You’re so pretty. Like a pixie. A fairy pixie!”
Caleb snickered. “Can’t say she isn’t a funny drunk.”
“Cuddly Caleb!” I giggled.
It was Dana’s turn to laugh. “She is, isn’t she?”
Five songs later and the world was whirling around my head in a kaleidoscope of colors. A ripple went through the crowd, and my fans turned to stare at the door for some reason. I pouted.
“Finally,” Dana muttered.
Whatever. I grabbed Carina and Trent, who was trying to carry me and Carina at once.
“What happened to her?” A familiar voice pulled me from my haze. I untangled from Carina and Trent. A tall guy with dark hair and a frown was glaring at Dana and Caleb.
“Ohmigosh! I know you!” I screeched excitedly, pointing at the guy.
He blinked. “Wow, she’s even more gone than you said.”
“That song is by Kelly Clarkson. We should play it! DJ! We want Kelly Clarkson. Right, everyone?!�
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“Wooo!”
“Alright, that’s enough Kelly Clarkson. You want to get off the table?” the guy asked patiently.
“Why would I wanna do that? You should come here with us! Carina, Trent! This guy wants to dance with us!”
They whooped. Carina batted her lashes at him. I think Trent did too, but he could have just been trying to eject that olive I’d thrown at his eye.
“She’s been like this all night,” Dana revealed. What a tattle!
Caleb, who had scowled at the guy since his arrival, said acidly, “What do you think you’re going to be able to do that we can’t? I don’t even understand why Dana called you. Ivy barely knows you.”
“That’s my name!” I said happily. I then proceeded to say it over and over again.
“I called him because we have no experience with a situation like this, Caleb!”
The guy was ignoring my friends, his cobalt blue eyes following my every move. Finally, I scooted off the table and dropped to the ground, almost face-planting until Caleb caught my arm.
“Hmm…” I murmured, staggering slightly. “You’re pretty,” I deduced.
The guy smirked. “Pretty?”
Reaching out, I smacked my palms against his face and squished his cheeks together. “Who’s a good boy? Who’s a good boy?”
He laughed, and a wicked smile split his lips. “Not me.”
Then, he bent and hauled me over his shoulder. Caleb and Dana cried out, hurrying to keep up with him as the guy carted me across the dance floor, shoving people out of his path.
“Where are you going? She’s supposed to be sleeping over at my house!” Dana protested as he walked into the street. I bounced against a muscular back, and something about this situation was oddly familiar.
What a nice butt he has…
“Your father is a cop, and she’s a minor. Do you really want to get Ivy in that kind of trouble?” he snapped.
“Then she can stay with me! Or we can drop her off at her house!” Caleb planted himself in front of the guy’s car.
“I assume you have parents? She is going to be throwing up for most of the night, and she’s gonna have a hell of a hangover in the morning. She needs peace and quiet, and my house has plenty of that.”
The Bad Boy's Dance Page 11