by R. Linda
Grrr.
He frustrated me more than anything.
My phone buzzed on the coffee table with a text. And then it buzzed again. And again. I contemplated ignoring it, but maybe it was important. And if it was important, I should at least check.
I had almost convinced myself that I was only checking whether the text was important and not that it was from Bennett. But really, I was hoping it was him and thinking maybe if we texted longer, I might actually fall asleep.
Bennett: Sorry, had a phone call.
Phone call for over an hour. Who was so important that he could talk for an hour? I wanted to ask, but we were done. It wasn’t my business. Unless it was another girl. Audrey. Was he talking to Audrey about me? About other things? What did they have in common?
Shaking my head clear, I read his next text, hoping for an explanation.
Bennett: So…
Bennett: What are you wearing?
Christina: My pyjamas. It’s late. I was asleep.
I wasn’t, but he needn’t know that. He left me waiting, and I was sick of his games.
Christina: Who were you talking to?
Crap. I shouldn’t have asked that. It really was none of my business. But the idea that he had friends, someone else to share his time with, unsettled me. I had no one. No friends—that was my own doing, I knew that. Only Bennett. And I couldn’t even have him anymore. I was destined to be alone. Perhaps it was karma for all the shit I caused when I was younger.
Christina: Never mind. It has nothing to do with me.
Bennett: Are you jealous, Ms. Brown?
Christina: No. Not at all.
Bennett: Sure. Where were we on this Twenty Questions game?
Christina: You got side-tracked and never asked a question.
Bennett: I did, and you answered. Not what I was hoping for, though.
Christina: What?
Bennett: I asked what you are wearing. Nineteen more to go.
Christina: Well…
I waited for his next question.
Bennett: Ms. Brown, it’s a school night, and I really should get some sleep. Don’t want to be late for my favourite class.
Christina: What class is that?
Bennett: Well, see, it used to be gym because I have great stamina and a lot of energy to exert.
Yes, I had firsthand knowledge of just how much energy he had.
Bennett: But now it’s English.
I smiled like a schoolgirl.
Christina: Any reason why?
Oh, my god, I was flirting with a student. I knew better. I should stop, but he made me want to throw caution to the wind and invite him over.
Bennett: Smokin’ hot new teacher.
I typed a response and deleted it, then typed another and cleared it. All the things I wanted to say and all the things I wanted to do, I couldn’t. Instead, I wrote the only thing I should.
Christina: The last two weeks never happened. We do not know each other. Good night, Bennett.
Chapter Six
Bennett
Brody was rushing out the door when I pulled up at the Kellerman house the next morning and handed him a coffee. He took it from me and stared at it like I had poisoned it. His eyebrows pinched together, and his eyes narrowed as he focused on the paper cup.
“What’s this?”
“A puppy. What does it look like? It’s a coffee.”
“Why?” He lifted it to his nose and sniffed, and I wanted to smack him in the face. He had that effect on me a lot. I liked to call it left over jealousy.
I snatched the coffee from his hands and placed it back in the tray I was holding. “If you don’t want it, I’ll give it to someone else.”
“I didn’t say that. I just…” He rubbed a hand over his face. “Why are you bringing me coffee?”
“Am I not allowed to?” Jesus, this guy. I tried to do something nice, and I got questioned about it. To be honest, though, I didn’t buy him a coffee. They screwed up my order and gave it to me for free.
He rolled his eyes and sighed. “You’re impossible.”
“Take the damn coffee.” I shoved it back in his hand. “You look like shit.”
He did. He looked exhausted. Maybe work was busy.
“Ah, thanks.” He nodded once, looked over his shoulder at the front door, and said, “She’s waiting.”
“I know.” I smirked and pointed to the front window where the curtain was pulled back slightly, and Audrey’s face was pressed to the glass. Brody laughed and waved goodbye.
I walked into the house, and Audrey pounced on me. “Is that for me?” Her eyes lit up at the sight of the two smoothies I was holding.
“No. It’s for our new English teacher. You know, to say welcome. Since the way I really want to welcome her is frowned upon in pretty much every bloody state in every country in the western world.”
She wasn’t impressed with that answer, if her punching me in the shoulder was anything to go by. I rubbed the spot she hit, pretending it hurt, and handed her the smoothie. She knew it was for her. I brought her one every day because I knew she rarely ate breakfast.
“There will be no welcoming the new teacher, in any way, shape, or form, Bennett Sawyer.” She scowled but quickly smiled after taking a sip of her drink. “Cake batter?”
“Of course.” It was really chocolate banana, but the smoothie place I went to had a way of making things taste different from what they really were. Which, I had to admit, was great because some smoothies were revolting. “Ready to go?”
“Yep, let me just grab my bag.” She walked off down the hall to her room and returned a minute later swamped in her hoodie with her bag in her hand.
“One of these days I’m going to get you out of the house without the jacket,” I said and reached for her bag.
“No, you won’t,” she said, and then called loudly, “Bye, Leanne.”
“Hi, Mrs. K. Bye, Mrs. K,” I called out to Leanne, wherever she was.
Her head peered around the kitchen wall, and she waved. “Have a good day.”
I opened the car door for Audrey and threw her bag in the back with mine. I was such a gentleman sometimes, it surprised me.
“So?” she said the moment I pulled out of the drive.
“So?” I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel in time with the music playing on the stereo.
“What did you do last night?”
“Talked to you on the phone.” I glanced at her, catching her roll her eyes. Same thing we did every night. We had one of those friendships where we always had something to talk about, only last night the subject of Christina never came up, except for Audrey to tell me that I should stay far, far away from her.
“After that?”
I shrugged, not wanting to give her an answer because I knew she wouldn’t like it.
“Bennett?”
“You probably don’t want to know, bro.”
“Does it involve She Who Must Not Be Named?”
“You’re implying Christina is the same as Voldemort?”
She slurped on her smoothie before turning to stare at me. “If the cloak fits.”
“The cloak?” I laughed.
“Or better yet, the witch’s hat!”
“She can’t be that bad. Maybe she’s changed.”
“Yeah, she’d want to have suffered amnesia or something, because there’s no way someone that horrible could ever change, Bennett. She’s not a nice person.”
Maybe I saw something different in her than everyone else did. I chuckled to myself. I saw a lot more of her than anyone else had. In many different ways. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” I said as I pulled the car into the school parking lot.
“You’re thinking about her, aren’t you?”
“Can you blame me? It’s so much more exciting now it’s not allowed.”
“You’re impossible.”
“Funny, Brody said the same thin
g this morning.” I turned the car off and sat there playing with the keys. We were early. “But seriously, I don’t really know what happened back in high school, only bits and pieces, but it can’t be that bad. Everything is so much more dramatic when you’re seventeen and trying to be popular.”
“It was much worse than bad.”
“So, fill me in.”
“It’s a long story, and we’ll be late.”
“I’m sure I can persuade the English teacher to let us get away with it.”
Although, after last night’s text messages, I was probably the last person Christina wanted to see. I would try to behave, but it just wasn’t in my nature to do what I was supposed to do. I tended to rebel against everything my father said. I knew he wouldn’t like this if he found out, and that made it so much more appealing.
“There will be no persuading,” Audrey scolded.
I stared at her and waited. She shifted in her seat, slurped on her drink some more, and took a deep breath. “Okay, you asked for it.”
I raised an eyebrow and smirked.
“Mind out of the gutter, Bennett. So, Chace and Ryder were best friends, and Chace dated Kenzie, Ryder’s sister. Until he got her pregnant and demanded she terminate the baby, which she didn’t because…Cole. But she felt she had no choice except to leave town because of the way Chace and his parents treated her. They tried to pay her off,” Audrey said with disgust. “So, she ran off to her aunt’s to have Cole and stayed away for a couple of years, too scared to come home because Chace is a giant dick face to everyone. Meanwhile, Chace moved on and began dating Bailey almost the instant Kenzie and Ryder left town.”
“Wait.” I covered her mouth with my hand because that part didn’t make sense, and she was going to keep rambling and waving her hands around everywhere if I didn’t stop her.
“What?”
“One, Bailey wouldn’t date Chace if she knew he’d done that to Kenzie. And two, if she did, then I can’t see why Ryder would have been interested in someone who dated his sister’s ex-b—”
“Dick face.”
“Ex-dick face.”
Audrey took a deep breath. “Because Kenzie didn’t go to this school like everyone else. She went to school in Storm Cove, for whatever reason.” I reached over and grabbed Audrey’s hands to stop them flapping around before she gave me a black eye and held them on the console between us. It didn’t even put a pause in her speech. “And Bailey didn’t know much about Ryder at the time because, apparently, he was super quiet, and I guess, like, not popular,” she whispered conspiratorially and giggled. “Let alone that he had a twin sister, until he returned to school after Kenzie was settled with her aunt, looking like the total badass he is now, just with fewer tattoos. And then everybody noticed Ryder Freaking Jones.”
I quirked an eyebrow, and Audrey blushed. “Sorry, too much time with Indie and Bailey. Anyway, Bailey noticed him too. But she was dating Chace, and Ryder quickly got a bad reputation, which only made him hotter.” She paused. “Don’t tell Brody.”
I barked out a laugh. “Secret’s safe with me, cupcake.”
“So, Ryder secretly pined for Bailey because he’s a romantic and had been in love with her forever, hence why he hated Chace even more. Then Chace dumped Bailey in front of the whole school and hooked up with Christina a few weeks later. But it turned out…” she paused and looked at me, squeezing my hand tighter before speaking through clenched teeth, “Christina had been sleeping with Chace behind Bailey’s back.” Audrey sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know how Bailey dealt with it. I can barely get myself out of your car in the morning to face the kids at this school, let alone having to see your ex-best friend and ex-boyfriend rubbing their relationship in your face every chance they got.”
“It would suck. But you have me, and there’s no way I’d ever hook up with Brody behind your back.”
“You’re an idiot,” she said with a laugh.
“Besides, I’m into blondes now.” Though after hearing the full story and realising why they all hated Christina so much, I should have probably focused my attention on brunettes. I shot a sideways glance at Audrey as she brushed her dark hair out of her face, her laugh fading into a silent scowl. No, not brunettes. That’d get me in as much trouble. Redheads. Fiery redheads would be the perfect distraction. Too bad I didn’t know any.
The way Christina treated Bailey was a pretty fucking shitty thing for a best friend to do, so I understood why they all felt that way about her. But people changed all the time. Surely, she deserved a second chance. She was young and dumb, like everyone at this age.
I reached over into the back seat and grabbed our bags before we really were late for class. I couldn’t afford any more detentions, otherwise I’d get suspended, and there was no way I could do that. I couldn’t leave Audrey alone to fend off the wolves.
“I’ve noticed,” she muttered and glanced out the window. Her face screwed up, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She struggled the most with walking into school in the morning or going into a room because she was still convinced all eyes were on her and that everyone was talking about her.
I hated it.
She had no reason to be embarrassed or feel ashamed. She was just as beautiful on the outside as she was on the inside, and if any of those wankers at school bothered to get to know her, they’d see it too.
I climbed out of the car, and like I did every morning, I rounded Audrey’s side, pulled her out, and wrapped my arm around her shoulder. She fit perfectly beside me and snuggled against my ribs. Her confidence would grow slowly throughout the day as she relaxed a little, but the mornings were the worst. We walked inside and stopped by my locker to dump my stuff.
“Did you read the review sheets Bailey…” Audrey paused and looked around with wide eyes as she realised she referred to Bailey by her first name, which was frowned upon by Principal Douche, “I mean Ms. Mitchell sent home last night?”
I whistled a little tune and looked up at the ceiling, avoiding her piercing gaze.
“Bennett?”
“Well, I was kind of preoccupied.” I shrugged, grabbed her hand, and dragged her down the hall to her locker.
“With what?”
“Really, bro? You can’t figure it out?”
“Don’t tell me Ch—” she started, but I cut her off.
“Trying to get her to sext me.” I grinned.
“What? You can’t be that dumb.” Her voice was high pitched as she turned by her locker and poked a finger in my chest. It was cute that she thought she intimidated me.
“Jacket?” I ignored her and held out my hand for her jacket. Hesitation flashed in her eyes, but also determination. She growled and pushed my hand away. “What, no help today?”
She just stared at me and stuck out her tongue.
“Real mature, Audrey.”
“Coming from you?” She giggled as she looked from side to side down the hall before grasping my shirt and pulling me to stand directly in front of her. I stretched out my arms and placed them on lockers on either side of her. I was her shield. Her human dressing room—which wouldn’t be so terrible if I at least got to peek down her shirt once in a while, but Brody would kill me.
She had this fear of removing her hoodie in public. I didn’t get it. But she was confident that if she removed it, everyone would stop to watch “the freak” undress, and it gave her a panic attack just thinking about it. So, I stood guard in front while she discreetly stripped out of the oversized black hoodie I was sure came out of Brody’s closet. Her fingers fumbled with the zip, and she dropped it four times.
“Dammit,” she whispered.
“What’s wrong?”
“You,” she grumbled and lowered her head.
“Are you grinding your teeth?”
“No.”
“I can hear it.”
She fumbled again with her zip, and I reached down to stop her. “Relax,” I said softly. “It’s just us.” I wrapped my hand around hers a
nd pinched the zipper between her thumb and forefinger and pulled it slowly down until it opened and I could peel the jacket from her shoulders. “Want to tell me what that was about?”
“You.”
I folded her jacket and put it in her locker. “You keep saying it’s me, but you’re not telling me why.”
“Because you worry me, okay?”
“You don’t have to worry about me. I’m great.” I winked at her, waiting for a smile.
“We have ten weeks of school left, so stay away from her. Please.” Audrey frowned up at me, and my chest tightened. She cared about me more than anyone ever had, and I owed it to her to try. I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardise our friendship. She meant more to me than anyone else.
I nodded.
Her face lit up, and when she smiled, her right eye crinkled. She wrapped her arms around my waist and hugged herself to my chest before looking up at me. “You weren’t serious about the sexting, were you?”
“Don’t make me lie to you, bro.” I rubbed my hand up and down her back. It started out as a way to calm her down or comfort her when she freaked, but it became a habit. I did it without even realising now. I was always touching her in some way, and she never complained, so I wasn’t going to stop. I thought she liked it, the comfort I provided her, like a giant teddy bear.
“You really are that dumb,” she groaned and smashed her head into my chest.
“Nope, just that horny,” I said with as much seriousness as I could.
She let out a deep breath and pushed out of my arms. “I’m best friends with an idiot.” Audrey crossed the hall to her homeroom, shaking her head in disbelief.
Picking up her bag and closing her locker, I called over to her, “But you love me anyway!”
“I question myself sometimes.”