Life as We Know It: A Treasure Key Novel

by Sarah Bates

  “I think we still have about half an hour,” I whispered against his lips, and I smiled when I felt his lips curve against mine.

  “And I think I know just the spot where we can spend twenty of them,” he said, and I blushed softly as I eased back, and he reached out to crank the engine.

  Eleven

  I didn’t have much experience when it came to things like making out, but I quickly learned during those twenty minutes that a) it was a lot of fun, and b) Hayden was an excellent kisser. Not that I hadn’t already known this, of course, but having a whole twenty minutes to experience the full impact of his skills had told me that he’d been holding back before.

  When those twenty minutes – which had been spent discreetly parked in the far end of the parking lot at the local park, away from all streetlights – he took me home, so that I was there precisely one-hour from when we’d left the boutique.

  My mom greeted me in the foyer with a smirk on her face, and my backpack in her arms. We didn’t say anything to each other, I simply took my backpack and went to Kat’s room to get changed for bed, and to work on my most pressing assignments, while Kat peppered me with questions about Hayden, and studiously ignored my own questions about this new development between her and Leo.

  It was probably for the best that she didn’t say anything, anyway, as Jamie had excellent hearing – when he wanted to, at least.

  Still, the next morning she was uncharacteristically eager to get up and get ready for school, and had been showered, dressed, and ready to go by the time Jamie and I got back from our usual morning run.

  Since Leo was with us, I let Jamie take the shower first, using the excuse that I wanted to do some yoga before I got ready. As soon as he was locked away in the bathroom, Leo followed me into the garage, and smiled when he saw Kat sitting on the weight bench.

  She smiled and blushed when she saw him, and I decided to give them some privacy, so I went back to Kat’s room to figure out what I wanted to wear for the day. And just so that I wasn’t a complete liar, I did some yoga stretches as well, to help loosen me up.

  I was just finishing up the last of the stretches when Kat joined me. I didn’t say anything, just lifted my eyebrows as I crouched to roll up my mat.

  She caught her lower lip between her teeth as she sat on the foot of her bed. “Thanks for that,” she said.

  “Any time.” I tucked my mat back into its usual spot and thought how strange it was to know that in a few weeks – fingers crossed – my mat, along with all the rest of my things, would have a new spot, in my own bedroom, in my own house.

  I guess I’d gotten used to sharing Kat’s space.

  “Am I a terrible sister because of this?” she asked out of the blue.

  I frowned and looked back to her. “No. I do think, though, that you’re going to have to tell Jamie. And sooner rather than later,” I added. “Keeping secrets from the people you love is never a good idea. Plus, you and Leo deserve to be able to be with each other out in the open. As your brother, and Leo’s friend, Jamie will just have to deal with it, because whether he likes it or not, he doesn’t get to tell either of you what you can and can’t do, or who you can and cannot be with. Besides,” I continued, because if felt a little harsh to say that after the way he had defended me the night of Neal’s party, “I really think his whole control issue thing stems from him just wanting to protect you. But if you show him that you’re strong and willing to fight for what you want, he might just back off.”

  She stared at me for a moment, looking surprised. “Wait. You think he’s just been waiting to see if I was willing to actually go toe-to-toe with him over Leo?”

  “Well, metaphorically…yeah. Think about it, Kat,” I said as I gathered my clothes quickly, knowing Jamie wouldn’t be much longer. “What was your first reaction all those years ago when he told you that you couldn’t invite Ian to the movies?”

  She frowned and considered this. “Disappointment,” she finally replied.

  “But…”

  “But I didn’t push him on it. I just did as he said, because Ian was his friend,” she replied.

  “Okay. Now what was your reaction when he told you the same thing about Leo?” I asked, digging through my jewelry for a pair of earrings.

  “Um, about the same. Crap,” she muttered, clearly finally seeing her error. “And because of that he doesn’t think my feelings for Leo are the real deal,” she said, looking back to me. “Because if they were, I actually would have put up more of a fight about it. Because I didn’t, he thinks it’s just a crush, or attraction, nothing substantial. But if I stand up to him, explain to him how I really feel, and Leo explains how he really feels, he might be okay with it. Because if it’s real, we’ll do everything we can to make it work, and last.”

  “I can’t say for sure that’s the way it’ll go, but yeah, it’s a strong possibility,” I said.

  She hummed as she considered this, then got up and tossed her arms around me. “Thanks, Coco.”

  I hugged her back as best as I could with my arms full, then, when Jamie shouted that the bathroom was free, hightailed it there before Zach could lay claim to it, and use up what was left of the hot water.

  Once we were all ready, we piled into the van and Jamie, as usual, drove us to school.

  Hayden greeted me at the door, with both a quick kiss as well as an iced coffee from Cooke’s, fixed just the way I like it.

  It made me smile, and that overwhelming sense of happiness that I had felt the night before grew even stronger. It was so strong, in fact, that I didn’t think it was possible for anything to diminish it.

  Then we reached my locker.

  I froze, my eyes going wide, my belly churning with instant dread.

  All over the front of my locker door were pictures of Hayden with Ava Humphrey. There were selfies of them smiling at the camera, others at each other, several of them kissing, a few of them dancing together in that grinding sort of way at different parties. In several of the pictures Hayden held plastic cups of varying colors, in others he was smoking cigarettes, and in one he was clearly smoking a joint, his lips curved in a smug grin around it, as he looked toward the camera, while a bikini clad Ava was wrapped around him, pouting her sultry pout into the camera.

  And in the center of my locker, in large, bold red marker was one word: Mine.

  Margo, who had been trying unsuccessfully to pull the pictures free with none other than Demi’s help, sighed helplessly when she saw me, and held her hands out. “She glued them on,” she said.

  I looked from her back to the pictures, and felt a sharp, almost painful anger burn in my belly.

  “Coco, I,” Hayden shook his head when I turned from the sight of it to look at him. “I’m so sorry. I,”

  “What do you have to be sorry for?” I asked, scowling at him.

  He gestured helplessly to my locker. “For Ava. For that. For all the crap she and Neal,”

  “Yes. She and Neal. You didn’t do that.” I gestured to my locker.

  “They’re pictures of me,” he said.

  “Pictures taken before you even knew I existed,” I pointed out. I shook my head and looked back to my locker. “Clearly she has problems moving on.”

  “Here, this might help…oh.” Wes came to a stop beside Demi, a plastic putty knife in hand. He grimaced and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Ah, hi.”

  “Hi.” I sighed and reached out to take the putty knife from him. “Thanks.”

  “Ah, yeah. Sure.” He shifted, then apparently deciding it was better to retreat, reached out and caught Demi’s arm and tugged her along with him, gesturing for Margo to come with them.

  She hesitated, then reached out to rest one of her hands on my shoulder. “She’s a bitch, Coco. Don’t let her get to you.” She nodded subtly at Hayden, clearly indicating that I shouldn’t let Ava get between us.

  “I have no intention of letting her do so,” I said, then I stepped forward and began to scrape the putty k
nife along the edges of one of the pictures.

  She watched me for a moment, then simply nodded, and went to go join Wes and Demi.

  “Coco,”

  “Don’t. Do not apologize again,” I said between gritted teeth as I scraped as hard as I could at the picture. She must have used superglue because the thing just wasn’t budging.

  “Coco.” Hayden reached out and covered my hands with his, stopping me. When I looked at him, still furious, he lifted his eyebrows. “I wasn’t going to apologize again,” he said calmly. “The janitor’s here.”

  I took a breath, a slower, deeper one, as I realized I had been breathing a little too fast, and cleared my throat. “Oh. Thank you.” I lowered my hands and turned to face the older man who took care of keeping our school clean. “Hello.”

  He grunted at me, then simply scowled at the pictures. “Stupid brat,” he muttered, and shook his head as he pulled his cart closer, and Hayden and I backed up.

  “Come on, you can store your stuff in mine for now,” Hayden said.

  “Yours is the next stop I’m making,” the janitor said as he got to work at removing the door completely.

  Hayden blinked in surprise. “Mine?”

  “Oh, yeah. This is tame compared to what she did to yours,” he said.

  Hayden made a face, but he refrained from saying anything as he hooked an arm around me, and simply turned us in the direction of my homeroom.

  “I’m going to deal with her,” he said when we reached the door to my classroom. “I promise she won’t ever do anything like this to you again.”

  “You’re right, she won’t. To either of us,” I said as I shifted to face him. “And I’ll deal with her myself. I’m going to deal with both.”

  “Coco,”

  “I’m not going to do anything stupid,” I told him. “But I’m going to fight my own battles. I don’t like bullies,” I told him. “My dad is a bully. A spoiled, rich brat bully, who’s used to getting what he wants, anyone else be damned in the process,” I added. “So, trust me, I have experience with their kind. I know how to speak their language.” I pushed up on my toes and kissed him. “You’re not hers, Hayden. She doesn’t get to lay claim to you just because she’s jealous.”

  “You’re right, I’m not,” he agreed. “I’m yours.”

  “No.” I shook my head. “We’re each other’s,” I corrected him, and I took his hand in mine and laced our fingers together.

  “In that case, shouldn’t we deal with them together?” he asked. “I might not come from the same side of the island as them, but trust me, I’ve spent enough time around them to know the inner workings, too.”

  I opened my mouth, then closed it and considered this, and hummed. “Well, when you put it that way, yes.” I sighed as the first warning bell rang. “I guess we’ll figure it out later.”

  “Later,” he agreed, and he leaned forward and kissed me.

  ☼

  If I thought that Hayden had been protective the day before after my encounter with Ava in the cafeteria, it was nothing compared to how he was after the locker incident this morning. Not only did he walk me to all my classes, as well as lunch, but he kept a very blatant lookout all the while holding me basically plastered against his side.

  At lunch he’d very pointedly kept me between him and the lunch counter, and when we reached our usual table, he made sure that I had one of the seats with my back facing the wall, instead of on the opposite side, where I usually sat.

  After the final bell, he walked me straight out of the building to the van. If it hadn’t been for the fact that he had to get home and get ready for work himself, I knew he would have driven me across the street to the Courtyard and escorted me to Aunt Nora’s boutique.

  As it was, he stayed with me until Kat and Jamie joined us – apparently Zach had made plans to meet up with his friends for another pizza-fueled study session at Pasta and Pie.

  “Text me when your shift is over,” he said, reluctantly taking a step back from me. “Let me know you’re home safe.”

  I nodded. “I will,” I promised, wishing we didn’t have to part ways for the rest of the day. Despite all the time we’d spent together between classes, it didn’t feel enough. “You do the same.”

  “I will.” He leaned forward and pressed his lips to mine in a soft, gentle kiss. “Maybe we can see each other later. If not,”

  “We’ll still talk,” I finished for him, and I nodded when he did. “We’ll work everything out,” I added, and I gave his hand a gentle squeeze. “Don’t worry about it, Hayden. That gives her too much of your attention, which is exactly what she wants.”

  He sighed. “I know. I’ll do my best. Until then, have a good first day at work.” He kissed me again, then stepped back.

  “Thanks. Here’s hoping that I don’t screw up something on the register.” I held my crossed fingers up and tried to smile.

  “You’ll do great,” Kat said from her spot in the middle row of seats in the van. “Though if we don’t get a move on it, we’re all going to be late for work,” she added, and she gave me a sympathetic smile.

  “Right.” Hayden sighed and kissed me again, then stepped back. “Later.”

  “Later,” I agreed, and, though I was reluctant to do so, I turned and climbed into the van. When I shifted in my seat, I saw that he continued to stand there waiting. When I closed the door, he nodded and waved as he turned and headed across the lot to where he had parked his truck.

  “I think he’s gotten a little too possessive,” Jamie said as he watched Hayden go and reached forward to crank the engine. “I don’t know that I like it, Coco,” he added, looking back to me before he pulled out of our parking space.

  “He’s not possessive, just protective,” I said, frowning at him.

  “Protective because he’s got a psycho ex-girlfriend who has decided to put you in her cross-hairs,” he said, driving toward the entrance to the lot. “Then there’s the whole Neal issue.”

  “Hayden has nothing to do with what happened with Neal,” I said, narrowing my eyes at him in annoyance.

  “Bull,” Jamie countered. “He’s the entire reason behind it. Humphrey isn’t interested in local girls, beyond a quick roll at a party,” he added when I opened my mouth.

  “Neal started hitting on me before he even knew Hayden had an interest,” I reminded him, remembering the first day of school.

  “Yeah, but that’s only because you’re new. Trust me, he’d have gotten bored with you before the party came around, especially because of the way you brushed him off. He likes to be flattered and fawned over, and because you clearly aren’t interested, he’d have taken the hint and moved on. His interest in you is strictly because Hayden’s been hanging around you, and he hates Hayden. Because he does, he’ll do whatever he can, and use whoever he can, to make his life as miserable as possible.”

  “Why?” I asked, scowling at that. Clearly Hayden and Neal had been friends once, but had had some kind of colossal falling out.

  “Honestly, your guess would be as good as mine,” he replied, waiting in line for his turn to pull out of the school lot. “I’m just saying that you might want to cool it a bit where he’s concerned. The Humphreys might back off if you do.”

  “And how would that be fair to Hayden, or me?” I asked him, and I shook my head when he glanced at me quickly. “Hayden makes me happy, Jamie. And since I haven’t had a lot of that recently, I’m not going to walk away from him.”

  “And you shouldn’t,” Kat said from her place behind us.

  “Katerina,” he said in warning as he drove out onto the main road.

  “Oh, stuff it, James,” she said before her brother could say anything else. “Coco’s right. It’s not her fault, or Hayden, that Neal and Ava are on the war path.”

  “He’s the reason they are, though,” he argued, giving his sister a dark look in the rearview mirror before he drove through the intersection into the Courtyard’s parking lot.

 
“Just because he’s the reason doesn’t mean it’s his fault,” Kat said before I could respond. “And you should maybe stop trying to control everyone around you,” she added in a frosty tone.

  “I don’t try to control everyone around me,” he said.

  “Yes, you do,” Kat and I both said.

  I reached out and patted his shoulder when he brought the van to a stop at the main entrance to the Courtyard and shifted in his seat to look at both of us. “But you do it out of a place of love,” I added.

  “Or he just likes being bossy and controlling,” Kat muttered as she slid her door open.

  He narrowed his eyes at her as he watched her climb out, then glanced at me.

  “I love you, Jamie,” I told him. “And I know you’re only saying these things because you love me and want to keep me safe,”

  “Exactly,”

  “But Hayden isn’t going to hurt me,” I continued.

  “It’s not him I’m necessarily worried about,” he pointed out. “Neal might not make any moves toward you for a while, because he won’t want a repeat of last Saturday any time soon. But that doesn’t mean he’s given up on you. And Ava…we weren’t kidding when we told you she’s worse than him. She’s a bitch, Coco. But more, she can be a cruel bitch, and once she’s decided she wants something, she won’t stop until she gets it, anyone else be damned.”

  Because it came awfully close to the way I had described my own father to Hayden earlier this morning, I sighed. “I have experience with someone else like that,” I said, reaching out to open my door when Kat tapped on my window, then pointed at her watch.

  “Who?” Jamie asked, frowning.

  “My dad,” I replied, releasing my seatbelt before I climbed out.

  He hummed as he considered that. “I don’t have many memories of your dad, but what I do remember of him…yeah, I can see that.” He reached out to put the van in gear again when someone honked their horn at him. “Just remember how you and your mom dealt with him, though,” he added.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, just as I was about to close the door.