Love Me, Hate Me: Friends to Lovers Romance

by Hawke Oakley

  “Why the fuck do you care so much, anyway?” Riley mumbled.

  “Why don’t you care?” I countered. “My parents don’t exactly love everything I do, and it upsets me. Hell, there’s things I can’t even tell them because I’m afraid of their response. That’s why I care.”

  “You stubborn little ass.” Riley exhaled. “Fine.”

  I shuffled closer. Suddenly I felt like Caroline, on the edge of my seat for some juicy gossip. I tried to tone it back a little.

  “They read something I wrote, once, when I was younger,” Riley began, his voice lowered. “I guessed they didn’t like the content because my mom went fucking ballistic and threw it in the fireplace and made me watch it burn.”

  My jaw dropped. “What?”

  “Yeah. Anyway, I’d typed it out on the computer and printed it out, so she banned me from using the computer for a while. Thought I saw something sick on the internet or something.”

  I stared at him in shock and sympathy. “That’s horrible. How old were you?”

  Riley grimaced. “Like, eight.”

  “What the hell?” I spat. “What did you write that made her go so mental?”

  Riley averted his eyes again, pretending to listen intently to the lecture suddenly. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

  “Dude, come on,” I said softly. I took the chance and reached out to touch his arm for a brief comfort. “I can tell it mattered to you a lot, and what your mom did really hurt you.”

  His eyes were ringed with wild fear again, just enough for me to notice. His arm felt warm under my hand.

  “I can’t tell you,” he said.

  I clenched my teeth. The words that came out next spilled out of my mouth before I could stop them, like a dam breaking wide open.

  “You can tell me anything,” I said.

  Time slowed. The rest of the people, the lecture hall itself, seemed to disappear. Riley’s eyes on mine were the only thing that mattered. I felt his pulse beat under my fingers.

  His eyes flickered. “Fine. But not here. At the dorm.”

  How big was this secret thing 8-year-old Riley wrote that he couldn’t even tell me in public?

  He settled on his bed, and I settled on mine. We’d been quiet for the rest of the math lecture, and when it was finally over we headed back to the dorm. Never having walked back together, neither of us really know what to say, so we walked mainly in silence. It was strange, but it wasn’t bad.

  I could tell he was putting it off now, telling me what he wanted to tell me. I had to prod him again.

  “Well?” I asked. “We’re here now.”

  “Yeah.”

  He licked his lips anxiously and played with a loose thread on his comforter. I wanted to stand up and yank it out of his hand.

  “Riley,” I said firmly. “Come on. You can tell me.”

  “I don’t want to anymore,” he mumbled.

  “What?” I stood up, exasperated. “Why? You dragged me all the way back here to tell me, and now you’re not going to?”

  He glared at me. “Yeah. Got a problem with that?”

  I threw my hands up. “Fucking – yeah, I do!”

  “Too bad, I guess,” he snapped. He turned, throwing himself on the bed and facing the wall.

  I sighed loudly. “Is that how you’re gonna be? I thought we were getting along for once.”

  “Guess we weren’t,” Riley muttered.

  “Why are you being like this?” I barked. “I just said you could tell me anything! Don’t you trust me?”

  Riley turned, slowly, over his shoulder. His eyes were guarded. “I don’t know. I thought I did. But now you’re freaking out at me.”

  My face softened and I sighed. “I’m sorry, I – I’m not trying to freak out, I’m just frustrated.”

  I flopped down on the edge of my bed. “We were doing so well, for like, a day.”

  “Yeah,” he agreed quietly.

  “I don’t wanna lose that,” I continued. “I want – I want us to be friends, Riley. For real.”

  He kept watching me, like I was going to betray him any second.

  “I don’t like fighting with you all the time,” I said, looking at the floor. “I don’t like coming back to the dorm wondering what our next argument’s gonna be.”

  Riley swallowed thickly. “Yeah. Me neither.”

  “Then I need you to try,” I pleaded. “You can open up to me. Please… trust me.”

  Riley shifted, turning all the way over so we could look at each other. Wariness flickered in his eyes, but there was something else too. Like hope. He needed a final push.

  “If – if I ever do something stupid and betray your trust, you can beat the shit out of me,” I said. “I won’t even fight back. I promise.”

  He laughed, the first real laugh I’d ever heard from him. I couldn’t help but smile. When he finally stopped he rested his cheek on one hand and raised the other one out to me. “Deal?”

  I took it. “Deal.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Riley didn’t end up telling me his secret that night. I pulled back, eased off some of the pressure, the way we do with horses. He said he trusted me. Now I just had to sit back, relax, and believe him.

  It had been two weeks since Dr. Z assigned us our special project, and he pulled us aside once after class to ask us how things were going – basically, just to make sure we’d actually started. We had, to his utter relief.

  Now with two weeks left, we had to kick things into high gear. The real stuff had to come out – just in time, since I got Riley’s confirmation of trust. I was sure he had more dirt on me for the project than I did on him, and there was no way I was gonna let him out-do me. If Dr. Z wanted us to get along, I’d be the best at getting along, damnit.

  Tonight was one of those nights where we promised to get together and work on it. It became sort of routine now, compared to the rocky start. We’d show up, do the work, a tiny bit of friction would ease off, and we’d go back to our lives.

  Except tonight, Riley didn’t show up.

  Maybe he was just running late. I waited. Half an hour passed. No sign of him.

  I dug out my phone and texted him.

  Aaron: dude where the hell are u

  I put it face up on the bed so I’d see a response right away, but after another five minutes without one, I snatched the phone, got up and stormed into the hall.

  I swung inside Connor’s room. “Hey, have you seen Riley?” I asked.

  “Nah,” he said, digging into the button of his game controller. He was fighting Zack in some videogame.

  “Zack?” I asked.

  “He’s your roommate, dude, did you lose him?” Zack said with a laugh.

  Thanks for nothing.

  I left them, heading down the hall to Beth and Caroline’s. The door was open, as usual.

  “Hey, you guys,” I said, poking my head in the door. To my surprise, only Caroline was there. “Oh. Hey, Caroline.”

  “Oh, hi, Aaron!” She put her book down and came over to give me a hug. “What’s up?”

  “I’m looking for Riley, we’re supposed to be working on our project right now, but he’s half an hour late and not responding to my texts,” I explained.

  “Weird,” she said. “Maybe he’s out with his friends and forgot to check his phone?”

  I tried not to grimace. I don’t think Caroline knew Riley was entirely friendless, except maybe for me.

  “I don’t think so,” I mumbled. “He never misses these sessions. And he’s usually back to the dorm by now anyway. All his classes are over for the day.”

  She crossed her arms and put a finger to her lips in thought. “Huh. Maybe he’s in the caf?”

  “That doesn’t explain why he wouldn’t answer his phone,” I said, shaking my head. “By the way, where’s Beth?”

  “One of her friends invited her to some thing on campus,” she explained, rubbing her arm. “She kind of made it sound like she wanted to go by
herself, so I didn’t push her.”

  “That’s fair,” I said. “I guess we can hang out together while our roommates are off gallivanting somewhere doing who-knows-what.”

  This made her smile. “Right? Like, I can’t believe they ditched us!”

  “We’re too cool to be ditched,” I said. “Maybe they just couldn’t handle our awesome auras anymore and needed a break.”

  Caroline giggled, a pleasant sound like a songbird in the morning. “Oh!” she said suddenly, reaching into her jeans pocket. “Whose texting me?”

  I watched her eyes scan the text, and her face darken. My heart fell into my stomach.

  “What is it?” I asked. “What happened?”

  Caroline glanced at me with worry-filled wide blue eyes. “It was Beth. She’s asking if I know where you are.”

  “What did you say?” I urged. “Did you say yes?”

  She nodded.

  “Well?”

  “She says ‘you better come quick’,” Caroline murmured, glancing up at me with doe eyes. “It doesn’t say anything else.”

  My heartbeat skyrocketed. “Where is she?”

  “The square on campus,” Caroline said, getting to her feet. “I’ll come with you.”

  “Thanks,” I said, breathless. “Let’s go.”

  I saw the crowd of people first. The sun was setting, casting harsh golden light across the slope that led to the square. Then I heard the uncomfortable laughter. My heart felt like it was going to burst inside my ribs.

  Then I saw the tips of silken black hair a second before someone blocked my view. I pushed myself up the hill, the heat in my legs overwhelming but it was nothing compared to the ball of anxiety gnawing away inside me. I practically had to shove people out of the way to see what the commotion was all about.

  The scene was too much for me to take in all at once.

  I saw Riley first, his pale skin like a beacon in the darkening twilight, completely naked except for his briefs. His face was flush with embarrassment, but he was sweating also, like he’d run a long way. His expression was nothing less than mortified.

  I had to tear my eyes away from him before I saw her. Standing there, eyes glinting maliciously, holding both his shirt and pants out of reach and waving them around like a flag of humiliation, was Lily.

  I stood frozen.

  “You’re disgusting, you know that?” Lily’s sharp voice cut through the air like a knife. “You think you can just come crawling back to me after you humiliated me that night?”

  “I didn’t – ”

  She cut Riley off mockingly. “Oh, I didn’t! Bullshit. Nobody does that to me and gets away with it, especially not some loser like you.”

  “I was drunk, I didn’t know what was happening!” Riley snapped desperately.

  “Well, if being drunk got you into that mess, why’d you come groveling at my feet for more booze, then, idiot?” Lily said loudly. Her words were like a smack across Riley’s face and he winced.

  All around me people did nothing. They stood and watched. I felt sick. A burning fury erupted inside of me. I couldn’t take it anymore.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” I yelled, thundering towards Lily.

  Everything fell silent. Then a few people in the crowd started murmuring. Lily looked at me as if I was a fly that just landed on her food. But then the pure hatred in her eyes melted, and she grinned.

  “Oh, look who it is,” she mused. “Riley’s knight in shining armor.”

  “Don’t,” I snapped. “Don’t try to turn this around on me.”

  She crossed her arms, glaring down. Only now did I realize how much taller she was than me.

  “You should be ashamed of your roommate over there,” she said coldly. “He came to me, begging for alcohol, saying he was so sorry his buddy Aaron interrupted us that night.”

  A cold chill ran through me. I didn’t glance at Riley to confirm this story. I didn’t care if it was true or not.

  “What’s your point?” I growled.

  Her face fell, then twisted into a snarl. “The point is, he’s a loser who drowns his problems in alcohol, and you ruined his only chance of ever getting laid!”

  I felt the crowd surrounding us go dead still.

  “Call him a loser one more time,” I ground out.

  She cocked a thin manicured eyebrow. “What are you going to do, hit me?”

  “No,” I said. “I don’t hit women.”

  She chuckled, like this was funny for some reason.

  “But I have a sister who hates bullies, and she definitely will.”

  Lily laughed. “You need your sister to save you? That’s so cute.”

  But I wasn’t listening to her anymore. I ripped the clothes out of her hand in one swift motion and stormed away from her, over to where Riley was shaking in the cold autumn air.

  “Here,” I said quietly. He took them, not meeting my gaze, and put them on. I noticed now that his eyes were rimmed red, like he’d been trying not to cry.

  Their show over, the crowd began to disperse. Good riddance.

  Caroline and Beth ran to our sides.

  “Are you okay, Riley?” Caroline asked, her voice full of genuine sympathy.

  “Yeah, that was really not okay what she did,” Beth added with a nasty glance over her shoulder.

  I put my hand on Riley’s arm after he’d gotten dressed. He was still staring at the ground and wouldn’t look at any of us. “Riley?” I said softly. “Come on, let’s go back to the dorm.”

  But he wrenched his arm out of my grip, turned and began walking stiffly down the other side of the slope.

  “Riley!” I called.

  He bolted into a run, and within moments he had disappeared into the wooded thicket.

  Behind us a laugh that sounded like nails on a chalkboard rang out.

  “Look, you scared him,” Lily said, looking smug. “He’s like a little animal.”

  Before I could even open my mouth, Beth called loudly, “Hey, Lily! No one likes you!”

  Her jaw dropped and Caroline burst into a fit of laughter that she tried to cover with her hands. Beth didn’t spare Lily time for an answer. “Come on,” she said, leading us to the thicket.

  But Lily couldn’t let anyone else have the last word. As we walked away, she yelled for everyone to hear, “Good luck finding your boyfriend, Aaron!”

  I stopped. I turned around.

  “Dude, don’t bother, she’s not worth it,” Beth muttered.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. They hung back and watched as I climbed the slope back towards Lily. I stopped in front of her as she glared down at me expectantly. “You know what, Lily? He’s not my boyfriend, but I’d be glad if he was. He’s a nice guy with a good heart, and he deserves better than you, anyway. So why don’t you mind your own fucking business and find someone else to pick on? Or better yet, find a hobby that doesn’t involve you being a complete waste of air.”

  I didn't wait for her response as she stood there gaping at me. I returned to Beth and Caroline’s sides, and we headed for the thicket once more.

  The sun had completely disappeared by now and evening had fallen. Inside the woods, it was even chillier somehow. The canopy of evergreens blocked the sun’s rays all day, making it a few degrees colder than everywhere else. Riley must have been freezing without a jacket, I thought.

  “I hope we find him soon,” I murmured.

  “He can’t have run off too far,” Beth said.

  “Why don't we call for him?” Caroline asked.

  “I don’t want to make a big scene, and I don’t think he’d want that either,” I said. I sighed. “He seemed like he wanted to be alone, but I don’t want him to be out here at night.”

  We shuffled through the dark undergrowth. I took out my phone and booted up the flashlight feature, lighting our path. I couldn’t see or hear anything that struck me as another human being. A cold wind whipped through the branches, howling and blanketing any other noises.

/>   Then, as the howling wind died out, I heard a tiny whimper. I perked up and headed carefully towards it.

  “Riley?” I called softly. “It’s Aaron. Are you there?”

  The whimpering cut short. Then I saw the red of his t-shirt in the darkness. I turned off the light and crouched down, shuffling towards him.

  “Riley?”

  “Go away,” he snapped.

  I came closer until he was fully in my vision, sitting on the cold ground with his knees tucked up against his chest. His puffy eyes shone as they glared at me half-heartedly.

  “Go away.”

  “No,” I said. “I’m not leaving you here alone.”

  “We’ll head back,” Beth said gently, having accomplished her goal of helping me find him. “Come on, Caroline.”

  The two girls shot us a final glance before leaving the thicket. I waited until I could no longer hear their footsteps crunching the undergrowth before sitting down next to Riley.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked.

  “What do you think?” he muttered.

  “Well, I think you feel like shit,” I said.

  “You’re right.”

  Both of us went quiet.

  “Thanks for standing up for me, I guess,” he mumbled after a moment. “I didn’t need your help, though.”

  “I know,” I said simply.

  A cold wind picked up again. I felt Riley shiver beside me. I took my jacket off and ignored his brows knitting together in protest. “You need it more than I do,” I said. “You were practically – ” Naked, I almost said, but I held my tongue. “You’ve been colder longer. Just take it.”

  I draped it over his shoulders, and let him adjust it himself. He let out a humorless one-note laugh. “It’s too small for me. You’re so fuckin’ little. How old are you, again?”

  “Eighteen,” I said wryly. “I still get carded going into R-rated movies.”

  “Not surprising.” Riley put his chin on his knees. “I’m turning nineteen in February, so I guess that makes me older than you.”

  “Tiny bit.”

  “You’re a tiny bit,” he said.

  “Hey, lay off.” I shoved him with my elbow playfully. That made him laugh, which was music to my ears. I ignored how gay that sounded in my head.