by Unknown
I grabbed the photo back from Stone, ignoring his shocked expression as I slammed it against the wall.
“Recognise him?” I said, pointing to a fifteen-year old version of Logan. “What about her?” I continued, pointing to an eight-year old me.
“Oh, and you met Jake,” I snapped, pointing to the seven-year-old triplets, “Meet his triplets, Mike and Luke.”
“Want to guess the rest of their names?” I yelled, poking him in the chest, before pointing at each of my sisters, “They’re Victoria and Charlotte!”
“Let’s not forget Cooper! Or Harvey! Or Evan, Paul and Zane!”
I pointed to the man and woman in the centre of the picture and drew a deep breath, my whole body trembling as tears spilled down my cheeks, “And just in case you couldn’t guess, those are my parents!”
Stone gently took the photo from me, but I barely noticed as I flung my arm towards the computer.
“Those emails are from my siblings, Grant! Logan was here, hugging me, because we both needed the comfort!”
“Where were you last night after he called?” I accused, “Where were you when I went to bed alone and cried myself to sleep? Where were you this morning, when I needed you?!”
I flung my arm back around to point at the photo again. “That’s the last fucking photo I have of my whole family. Ten years ago today, my father was blown to fucking bits by a car bomb!”
I gasped for breath as I fell to my knees and Stone sunk down heavily on the bed, his head in his hands.
“He was in fucking pieces,” I whispered to the floor, “There wasn’t even enough of him to bury. Not enough for us to look at. Nothing for us to say goodbye to. We hadn’t seen him for four months and then there was nothing.”
I shoved to my feet and pushed wet strands of hair from my face. “I needed you,” I said fiercely, “And you were off fucking sulking because you couldn’t ask me a simple question.”
I stormed from the room, slamming the door behind me before breaking into a run down the hall. I needed to run. I needed to escape.
Donny stopped on the stair landing, halfway between the first and second floors. He took one look at my face and held out his arms, catching me as I crashed into him. The dam broke completely and I collapsed into his hold, clutching at him for support as I sobbed. I barely even noticed when he lifted me and carried me to his room.
***
When I finally cam back to my senses, I was lying in Donny’s double bed, wrapped snugly in his arms as heavy metal music pounded through his speakers. I sniffed hard and wiped my face.
“What the hell is this screamo shit?” I demanded with a raised brow, my voice sounding raspy and strained from the heavy sobbing.
Donny laughed and grabbed the remote, turning the volume down as he let me go and rolled to his back. “It fit my mood,” was his flippant reply.
“Wow, you must have some serious rage going on then,” I joked, shifting self-consciously as it suddenly penetrated my brain that I was in Donny’s bed. I didn’t know how I felt about that. I shuddered as I wondered when he’d last cleaned his sheets. I sat up gingerly, trying to unobtrusively examine the sheets for any suspicious-looking stains.
It took me a minute to work out Donny hadn’t answered my question and was staring at me thoughtfully. Finally, he said, “You seemed to have quite a lot bottled up as well.”
I cringed. “Did you hear everything?”
Donny nodded slowly and sighed, “I think everyone heard, honey.”
He rolled his shoulders and rubbed the back of his neck, “I’ve never heard Stone shout like that, so I came down to make sure you were okay.” The corner of his mouth tilted up, “Never expected you to shout back. Wouldn’t have been game enough myself…”
I smiled sadly and let Donny tug me into the crook of his arm as we sat back against the headboard. “I can’t believe I did that either,” I whispered, letting my head thump backward against the wall.
“Stone will come round,” Donny told me, “Now that he knows what’s going on, he’ll make it up to you.”
“What’s the point,” I said hollowly, “Even if we patch this up, there’ll always be the next misunderstanding. We’re doomed to failure because we don’t talk.”
Donny looked at me like I was an idiot, “Then talk.”
I raised an accusing eyebrow, “Like you and Fredi talk?”
“Ouch,” he said with a groan, “Winnie and I are complicated.”
I looked up at him curiously, but was hesitant to ask him about it. He must have seen the question in my eyes though, because he hugged me a little tighter and chuckled softly. “I take it Briar hasn’t told you anything about mine and Fredi’s history?”
I shook my head.
Donny closed his eyes and smiled. “Winnie and I have been friends for years,” he murmured, “We’ve always just clicked. We were inseparable as kids. She’s my best friend and I can’t stand fighting with her.”
“What happened?” I asked with a frown.
“Puberty,” Donny said with a laugh, “We reached high school and the both of us started competing against each other, trying to get the most dates, trying to round each base before the other, setting each other challenges and generally causing a lot of trouble.
“Then, towards the middle of grade eleven, Fredi asked me to be her date for the debutante ball her parents were throwing for her sixteenth. She hated the way her parents tried to show her off like a show pony. They tried to change who she was as a person. She couldn’t bear to sit through the whole night without me.
Donny suddenly grinned, “It was a great night. Winnie looked so beautiful in her white dress. We danced and laughed all night, before escaping out a back door when her parents wanted to take her home. She took off her heels and I piggy-backed her back to my place, where we climbed up into my little brother’s cubby house.
Donny’s smile turned wistful as he opened his eyes and looked at me. “It was this huge mansion-type playground. One of my step-fathers had bought it for Simon, but Fredi and I always used it as a hideaway.”
“So what happened?” I prompted carefully.
Donny glanced up at the ceiling and tensed. “Fredi asked me to take her virginity.”
My breath caught and I waited impatiently to hear the rest, but it was a while before he spoke again.
“She was all soft and feminine that night. She looked so pretty and happy, and there was nothing on Earth I wanted more, than to be her first.”
“You turned her down?” I guessed.
Donny shook his head. “I should have.”
“I was young and stupid and not ready for all the things I felt that night. It scared the crap out of me. I didn’t want to love my best friend. I didn’t want to give up fucking a different girl each week.
He shot me a pained look, “So when we all snuck out to a party the following night…I fucked someone else.”
I flinched.
“Yeah,” Donny agreed.
“So that’s when the fighting started?”
Donny shook his head. “Fredi wouldn’t talk to me. She was distant and sad for nearly two months before she let me explain. The others don’t know anything about it. We never told them. As far as they know, Fredi was upset over a family matter.”
“So…did she forgive you?” I asked.
Donny nodded. “We put it behind us and remained best friends. I stopped slutting around, and everything was great until the end of grade twelve. We got a little heated at graduation and I came to the decision that we could be something good. Fredi agreed and we officially dated for two months.”
“So what happened?” I asked with a frown, “Did you cheat again?”
Donny shook his head. “She did,” he said with a sigh, “Our first week at the university…with a woman.”
He growled, “She called it experimenting. A bit of fun. I disagreed with the way she’d gone about it and we had a huge fight, bringing up my mistake again and saying a lot of sh
it we didn’t mean. Ever since then, it’s been pretty much how you’ve seen it this year - me whoring around and Fredi pretending she prefers women.”
“That sucks,” was all I could think to say.
Donny laughed, “It sure does.”
I rubbed my temples and groaned, “I’m so tired.”
Donny stood up and removed his shirt, holding it out for me. “Go change into this and you can crash here,” he offered, turning his laptop on and pulling out some study books.
“Thanks,” I whispered shyly, suddenly self-conscious again. I hurriedly changed in the bathroom and climbed into his bed, snuggling under his Betty Boop covers and quickly falling to sleep.
It didn’t occur to me that Donny would also be sleeping in the bed…in his boxers.
And it sure as hell never occurred to me that Stone would find us snuggled together like that when he barged in the next morning…
Or that Fredi would be one step behind him.
Thirty-Six
The first thing I saw when I was startled awake, was Stone roughly lifting Donny from the bed and dropping him on his feet, giving him a hard shove towards the door. I jolted upright and my mouth opened and closed like a goldfish as I hurriedly tried to clear my sleep-fogged brain.
“Grant?” I asked with a frown, “What-”
The angry glare he sent my way chilled me to the bone and snapped my mouth shut. Donny sighed softly and ran a hand through his hair. “Just let me get dressed, man. You can beat me up in a minute.”
Fredi came jogging into the room and stopped dead in the doorway. Her eyes swept over the three of us, before swinging back to me. “You bitch!” she snarled, taking a step toward me with murder in her eyes.
“Fred!” Donny growled softly in warning, but Stone grabbed hold of one of her arms, halting her process. She whirled to face him, her chest puffing up in a fierce protest, but Stone shook his head.
“Look at her face,” he barked in a rough command. Fredi spun back towards me with distrust, but I must have looked pretty damn terrible, because after a moment, her expression changed and she whirled towards Donny, picking up the kettle from the sink beside her and rearing it back for a hard swing. Donny ducked and Stone started to tug her toward the door. Fredi threw the appliance instead, hard enough to leave a small dent in the wall as Donny jumped aside.
“You asshole!” she screamed, “How fucking low can you get?!”
I flinched. It seemed both Stone and Fredi had jumped to a pretty bad conclusion. I couldn’t believe they’d think sweet, loyal Donny would take advantage of me that way. “Fredi,” I said desperately, “It’s not what you think!”
“Don’t talk to me,” she said harshly, barely looking in my direction. Stone gave her a hard push and a final glare, before Fredi grudgingly marched off down the hall. His gaze turned back to Donny, avoiding me completely.
“Rugby field,” was all Stone said, before leaving the room with a slam.
Shit.
We didn’t move. We stayed exactly as we were – me on the bed, clutching at the sheets, and Donny standing in just his boxers in the middle of the room, his short hair standing on end.
Finally, I asked, “Do you want me to try and explain it to him?”
Donny chuckled. “Trust me, darling. He’s not going to listen and I’m not going to make you face him just yet.”
“B-but…he’s going to hit you,” I said worriedly.
Donny winced. “Yeah, but it’ll probably only be a punch or two. Then I’ll be able to explain.”
I shuddered as I remembered the way Stone and Jack had gone at it, “You sure?”
Donny smiled softly, “I’m not dumb enough to hit him back. I’ll be fine Evie.”
“I want to come with you,” I whispered, even though I really didn’t.
“Trust me,” he said again, as he finished pulling on his jeans and opened the door, “That’ll make things worse. Go find Briar and fill her in.”
“Okay,” I whispered, willing back the tears as he casually strode from the room.
***
“There you are!” Briar and I shouted simultaneously as we nearly collided in the dining hall.
“Bri,” I said urgently, “You need to talk to Stone. He’ll listen to you.”
Briar let out a long breath, “Evie, I’m not exactly Stone’s favourite person right now.”
“What? Why?” I asked, startled.
Her lips tilted ruefully. “He and I had a little chat early this morning…and I filled him in on what Donny and I had been doing. That it had all been my idea, with a little influence from Fredi at the beginning…and then Donny caught on later and decided to play too. I told him the whole story.”
“So…he’s angry at you?” I whispered.
Briar nodded, “He’s annoyed alright. He left straight from my room to find Donny, and then he was going to look for you.”
“He found us,” I said softly.
Briar’s eyebrows shot up, “What do you mean?”
“Donny let me crash in his room last night,” I whispered, “He gave me one of his shirts to wear.”
“Oh shit!” Briar whimpered.
“Fredi found us too,” I added quickly, “But Donny’s going down to meet Stone on the Rugby field and you have to stop him! I feel so stupid and guilty!”
“Sshh,” Briar soothed, wrapping an arm around me, “Donny and Stone will sort it out in their own way. I’m not going to be able to say anything.”
“But-”
Briar shook her head, “Don’t worry, Evie. Stone has more self-control than people give him credit for. He’s not going to beat Donny to a pulp.”
I frowned at her dubiously.
“C’mon,” she sighed, “Let’s go get some ice-cream. I have a feeling we’ll need it.”
***
After the much needed ice-cream, I returned to my room and pulled out my notes, forcing myself to study. Donny sent me a text message assuring me that he was alright – he’d just copped one hell of a punch to the jaw before he and Stone had talked it out. Stone was still angry at him, but at least he hadn’t needed a trip to hospital.
Things remained tense over the weekend too. Stone and Fredi sat together in gloomy silence, whilst Donny and Jamie sat with Candy and Mason, and Briar and I sat by ourselves. Alec moved between the three groups, carefully avoiding all tricky subjects and dividing his time fairly equally. I could tell the stress of walking on egg shells was starting to get to him.
On Monday though, things for the band looked a little better. Candy and I sat at a table by ourselves, while Mason, Briar and the band sat at their usual table. It seemed Stone had forgiven Donny and Briar, though Fredi sat as far from Donny as possible. I glanced away as Stone’s eyes met mine for the tenth time today. There was no way I was going to sit with him. We were through. I didn’t know if I’d ever sit with the band again – though I was content to remain friends with the others. Fredi shot me a small smile and a tense nod when I looked in her direction, but she hadn’t seemed to fully forget the incident just yet. My eyes left the band table and I blushed as I realised everyone in the hall was watching me covertly.
My fight with Stone was definitely the hot topic of conversation. Great.
“Let’s go,” I suggested to Candy with a sigh. She glanced around at our audience and nodded her agreement. We bundled up the last of our dinner and walked up to our room.
“How are you doing?” Candy asked me as she flopped down on my bed.
“Fine,” I said with a shrug as I booted up my computer, “I’m nearly ready for the exams. I’ll just need to do some revision the day before each one to refresh it.”
And I still needed to do my Photography assignment.
“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” Candy said with a no-nonsense frown.
I swung around to face her properly. “I’m fine,” I said firmly, “Stone and I weren’t serious. I’ll miss the sex…but that’s it.”
“Liar,�
� Candy said with a sad smile.
I sighed and turned back to the computer, not wanting to have this discussion right now.
“You should talk to him,” Briar’s voice from the open doorway startled me, but I didn’t turn to look at her.