Convinced myself that it didn’t hurt, the way they left me out.
How they’d just pretended to like me because of my friendship with Sam.
I feel Whitney watching me and my face burns.
Should. Have. Stayed. Home.
“I’m here with Sam,” I tell Kenzie.
Her eyebrows draw together in confusion. “Why?”
I roll my eyes. Does everything have to be studied and dissected and questioned to death?
God.
“Because he asked me to come with him.”
“You and Sam are back together?”
No point mentioning we weren’t ever together. Not in the way she means.
Kenzie had always insisted that Sam and I were Meant to Be.
She has a wild imagination and an extra-wide romantic streak.
I should set her straight. I should remind her that Sam and I were only ever just friends, but I can’t. Well, I could. I mean, it’s not like I have anything against lying. But I don’t want to.
And I am not going to even consider why not.
“This is Whitney,” I say, gesturing toward my new neighbor. It’s a diversion tactic, which is like avoidance but sneakier.
It takes Kenzie a moment to process this turn of events—and turn in conversation.
Whitney smiles and sticks her hand out. “Nice to meet you.”
Kenzie pulls up short, as if instead of a friendly handshake, Whitney’s just jabbed a knife in her direction. She looks my way for reassurance or clarification or something. “Who?”
Forget on her way to being trashed, Kenzie is there. I look around for Tori—she needs to shut her best friend off—but she’s on T.J. Hopkins’ lap near the fire, having a serious make-out session.
No help from that corner.
“She’s Whitney,” I say as Whitney lowers her offered hand. “She moved in across the street from me,” I continue but Kenzie’s still frowning so I keep going. “She’s going to go to our school this fall.” Still nothing and I’m floundering, wondering if I should knock Kenzie’s beer out of her hand or just let this whole awkward conversation die and walk away. “She’s from Mississippi.”
Kenzie’s eyes light up and she whirls toward Whitney.
Beer sloshes over the side of Kenzie’s cup.
That’s right. Whitney is not from Georgia or Louisiana or Alabama of any other state that ends with an a. She’s from Mississippi, is an only child, and she and her mother moved here because her parents recently got divorced and her mom, a teacher, has a friend in town who helped her get a job up here.
I’d insisted she sit up front with Sam for the drive to Beemer’s, telling myself it was the polite thing to do.
Ha ha. So funny! Me, worrying about manners and whatnot.
More like I’d been worried about getting too close to Sam again. I’d needed space and had wanted to prove that this, us going to the party together, changed nothing. Meant nothing. And the best way to do that had seemed like hopping in the backseat and telling Whitney to go ahead and climb in up front.
But like so many of my decisions and most of my choices, it backfired in spectacular fashion.
We hadn’t even gone a block before Sam and Whitney were laughing over some YouTube video they’ve both seen, the happy, oh-so-carefree sound of their combined chuckles filling the SUV. They became fast friends who, by the end of the night, will be sharing secrets, making playdates and swapping BFF necklaces.
Kenzie leans toward Whitney, all excitement and unsteadiness. Whitney, God bless her, holds her ground and her soft smile—though her eyes look a tad panicked at the drunk girl invading her personal space.
“You’re Southern?” Kenzie asks, words painfully slow and, to be honest, not all that easily decipherable. “Do you have an accent?”
“Not at all,” Whitney says, her accent thicker than I’ve ever heard, all long vowels and soft consonants that seem to take forever for her to form. “But all y’all sure do talk funny up here.”
“All y’all?” I ask. “Is that grammatically correct? Because you seem like the type of person who cares about that sort of thing.”
“Y’all means one or two people,” Whitney tells me, serious as a heart attack. “All y’all means more than two, so yes, it is correct. And of course that’s important. What are we? Neanderthals?”
I can’t help it. She’s so adamant and serious with her hippie clothes and Southern drawl and strict English-teacher tone. I smile.
She smiles back.
“I don’t understand,” Kenzie says to me. “Does she have an accent or not?”
Before I can answer, Whitney turns her smile to Kenzie, her expression softening. “I do have an accent. I was just teasing.”
“Oh.” Kenzie nods, her mouth pursed to the side. “Okay. Ohmigod,” she says again, this time louder and with more feeling, “you have to meet Tori! She loves accents.”
Kenzie takes Whitney’s hand and tugs her down the steps. Whitney glances back at me but doesn’t stop. Doesn’t pull away.
Doesn’t ask me to join them.
Whatever. That’s why I invited Whitney. So she could meet people and get started forming those lifelong friendships high school is so flipping famous for.
Leaning my hip against the wooden railing, I watch the party below, shooting for carefree and nonchalant. It doesn’t work. I’m grinding my teeth and my shoulders are rounded and tight with tension—a redhaired, hunch-backed troll in a tower watching the beautiful people below living it up.
I roll my eyes. Ugh, that’s more self-pity than even I can justify.
Straightening, I stare up at the darkening sky, count stars as I exhale and wiggle my jaw. I get to fifty and lower my gaze again. It snags on Sam’s. Though he’s in the center of a group of people all vying for his attention, a brilliant sun for them all to orbit, he’s watching me.
He doesn’t look away like he used to when I’d catch him staring at me, a guilty flush staining his cheeks. No, he holds my gaze, lets me see everything he kept hidden from me for years. How he feels about me. What he wants from me.
It’s too much, way more than I can handle, and I drop my gaze.
From my peripheral vision, I see him say something to his fans…er…I mean his friends…and extricate himself from Abby and head toward me.
I keep my eyes on the fire. Tori is standing next to the chair, T.J. beside her, his arm around her waist, while she talks to Whitney and Kenzie who is now without a cup, thanks, I’m sure, to Tori.
I keep watching them when Sam joins me. He rests his elbows on the top rail and gazes out over the yard with me and I wonder what he’s feeling. What he’s thinking. Is it different for him, too? Being here, no longer a part of this, not the way he used to be? Separated from these people by time and distance and his own choices? Or does it feel familiar, like coming home at the end of a long day? Like no time has passed at all?
Does he regret leaving?
Does he regret coming back?
I wonder. But I don’t ask.
“You want to go down,” he asks after a few minutes, “talk to Kenzie and Tori?”
His tone is quiet. Kind.
I shake my head.
He turns to me. “I’ll go with you.”
Why does he have to be so sweet? So thoughtful?
He tempts me, that’s for sure. Tempts me to forget what he did. How much he hurt me.
“I already talked to Kenzie,” I say, keeping my tone mild as if this whole conversation bores me. “Besides, they’re talking to Whitney right now. I’d hate to interrupt the beginning of a BFF threesome—that’d be rude.”
And I don’t go where I’m not wanted. Not anymore. I never did fit in with Sam and those like him. Popular, smart, athletic. But it seems they’ve taken to Whitney fast enough.
She’ll be one of them by the night’s end.
That thought leaves me unsettled, the idea of her being so easily accepted when I was only tolerated. I’m reminded,
once again, why Sam and I weren’t meant to be friends.
It’s those differences between us. Too many differences.
“That was nice of you,” he says. “Inviting Whitney to join us.”
“Yeah, well, you know how much I love bringing people together. Gives me a break from polishing my halo.”
Elbows still on the railing, he links his hands together. “I thought you invited her so you wouldn’t have to be alone with me.”
I shrug. “That, too.”
And then Sam does the darnedest thing. He grins. Like he’s thrilled I admitted it.
Like he’s happy I chose to tell him the truth when I could have easily lied.
“It was still nice,” he insists, like it’s important for me to believe it.
Or maybe that’s not it. Maybe it’s more important that he convinces himself.
Then he can say he was right about me. That there’s more to me than snide comments, social awkwardness and a boatload of cynicism. He can claim to have seen something inside of me, deep, deep down, that everyone else missed. That proves I really was worth his time all those years we were friends. That I was deserving of his feelings.
I’m not. I’m too guarded, too stingy with how much I offer other people, too careful with my emotions.
I make too many mistakes.
But from the time we were little kids, Sam has seen good in me.
For a while he’d even managed to get me to start seeing it, too. And then he hurt me and left me and I did the worst thing ever.
So, no. Not nice. Not good.
Just me.
14
“You okay?” Sam asks.
I snort softly and cross my arms. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
Don’t be nice to me. Don’t look at me like there’s something special about me.
Please, please don’t ever leave me again.
That last thought, the one that popped up unbidden, unwanted, remains, stuck on a loop, spinning around and around in my mind.
Please don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me.
Oh, God, I’ve been such an idiot. So stupid to believe things were over between me and Sam. Naïve to think I stood any chance against his honesty and patience and kindness. Against my own conflicted, confusing, terrifying feelings for him.
“Hadley,” he says, touching my arm, bending so he can see into my eyes. “What is it?”
“Sammy!”
At the sound of his name, Sam and I both turn. Abby is calling for him.
I could kiss her.
Which, honestly, would be a big hit with this crowd.
In that moment, Sam’s attention is diverted from me, from what I’d been about to say. Thank God for Abby O’Brien and her deep and abiding obsession with Sam Constable and her never-ending quest to separate him from me.
She must’ve been in her own version of heaven these past eleven months, what with Sam being far, far away from me.
Abby’s dream come true.
She grins widely and gestures for him to join her, her head tipped to the side, hip thrust out slightly, coy look on her face.
Ugh. Does she practice that pose in the mirror? And what’s with those under-the-lashes glances she keeps tossing his way? Subtlety, thy name sure as heck isn’t Abigail O’Brien.
He holds up a finger to Abby, indicating he’ll be with her in a minute. She nods, smile amping up, all but shooting sunbeams from her fingertips and hearts and flowers from her eyes.
Until Sam turns to me. Then her smile fades, her fingers curl into fists and she glares at me, trying to kill me dead on the spot with one vicious look.
I’m the bane of her otherwise perfect existence.
And what she sees as the only true obstacle to happiness as Sam’s girlfriend once again.
Yeah, they were together sophomore year, from mid-November to just after spring break. For four months it wasn’t Sam and Hadley. Hadley and Sam.
It was Sam and Abby. Abby and Sam.
Four months, two weeks and four days.
Not that I counted or anything.
Or celebrated their breakup with a huge slice of chocolate fudge cake with mocha frosting that I might or might not have made to commemorate the event.
It’d been so awkward, sharing Sam with another girl. He’d gone out with girls before, but nothing serious. Not until Abby. It’d been the first time one of us had another person in their life who was more important.
A person he wanted to be with more than he wanted to be with me.
She blames me for the breakup. Blamed me for most things that went wrong when they were together, too. Any time I spent with Sam was dissected, analyzed and argued over. Any texts to or from me were read so she could try and decipher some hidden meaning. Any comment about me was questioned.
It was the second-worst time period in my life.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Sam asks me, clueless to the fact that, as we speak, his eyes on me, his body leaning over mine, his ex-girlfriend is a seething, writhing mass of jealousy, ready to rip my hair out because, for some reason, it’s always the other girl’s fault.
Boys. Not only clueless but also, apparently, blameless.
“I’m good,” I say, sensing Abby staring at me, drilling a hole between my shoulder blades with the force of her hatred.
No love lost between us two, that’s for sure.
I glance back at her and our eyes meet. I let my lips turn up slightly when her own mouth thins. After a long, tense moment, I face Sam again, satisfied and triumphant that he’s still with me, by my side.
It’s wrong. Wrong and mean and spiteful of me to feel that way, to be glad he chose me. But I can’t stop it.
Even though it means my feelings for Sam haven’t changed as much as I want to believe.
“You’d better go,” I mutter. What is it about this boy that has me such a freaking mess? “We wouldn’t want Abby getting upset.”
That was our mantra when they were a couple. Don’t do or say anything that will upset, anger or sadden Abby.
Forget a short leash, Abby had kept Sam under her thumb. She’d kept track of his whereabouts and, especially, every moment he spent with me. And if that time equaled even one more minute than the time and attention he’d given to her, there was hell to pay in the form of tantrums, tears and sulking.
And, okay, there may have been a bit of whining, complaining and hurt feelings on my end, too.
“I’m not here with Abby,” he says, and it’s as if the entire party disappears, the sounds of laughter and conversation muting, people fading into shadows. It’s as if Sam and I are the only two people on the deck. The only two people in the entire world. “I’m with you.” He takes another step closer, his voice going husky. “I’d rather be with you.”
His words, the way he’s looking at me make me jittery and confused and excited. Before he left, he never would have said something so flirtatious. So honest.
Would never have looked at me with such hope and longing, as if I’m the only thing he needs. The only thing he wants.
My resolve weakens even more and I sway toward him, unsure of everything, especially my intentions. Uncertain about what’s right and wrong between us. What’s smart.
“Hey, Hot Hadley! You made it.”
Max’s voice jars me and I stumble back, the world once more coming into focus. A reminder that we’re not alone, Sam and me. A harsh warning of why I can’t let my guard down around Sam. Why things between us can’t ever be what he wants.
What I want.
Max saunters up to us, a trio of sophomore girls trailing behind him, and wraps me in a full-body hug, lifting me off the ground.
Max is very touchy-feely with me.
But only when Sam is around.
The Constable brothers are extremely competitive with everything. Basketball. Grades. Their mom’s affection. Their dad’s attention.
Me.
Not that Max is i
nterested in me. What he’s interested in is bugging Sam and nothing bothers Sam more than Max flirting with me.
Max is still hugging me when behind him, there’s a wave of disappointed sighs. The sophomore girls had high hopes, and I have dashed them.
More like I saved them a lot of time, effort and heartbreak.
The Constable brothers can do a number on you, that’s for sure.
“Couldn’t stay away, huh?” Max asks as he sets me back on my feet.
He keeps his arms around my waist, like we’re dancing, and I twist to see Sam. He’s all scowly, his eyes on Max’s hands, which are palming my back just above my butt. I face Max again. “Sam asked me to come with him.”
It’s the truth. And the only reason I’m here.
Because of Sam.
Sam takes me by the arm and tugs me free of his brother’s hold. “You just get here?” he asks Max.
“A few minutes ago.”
“I thought you were leaving the house right after I did.” Which, considering Sam spent thirty minutes at my house, means Max should have been here much, much sooner.
Max smiles. “Had to make a pit stop.”
More like a pot stop. The boy reeks of it, his eyes glazed, his grin sloppy.
Sam’s eyes narrow. “Did you drive after you smoked?”
“Relax,” Max says, patting Sam on the head like he’s a puppy and not his brother who’s his equal in breadth and taller in height. “I’ve got it under control. And you’ve got enough on your mind without worrying about me.” He pulls me to his side, settles his hand on my hip and winks at Sam. “Like how you’re going to get your girl back after you royally fucked things up.”
Sam flushes, color climbing his neck up to his face. He takes a step toward us and I have a premonition of him taking my arm again, of being the rope in a tug-of-war between the Constable brothers. Winner gets Hadley!
I elbow Max in the side. Hard. With a grunt, he lets go of me and rubs his ribs, giving me an injured look. “What’d you do that for?”
I roll my eyes at him. High or not, he knows why I did it. “Because you’re being a dick.”
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