Bad Guy: Providence Prep High School Book 1

by Allen, Jacob

  “You better not have any funny business up your sleeve,” I said as Adam approached. “So help me God, you’ve pushed me to the point where, this conversation aside, I hate you. If this is another trick, I won’t just not give a shit about you anymore. I will actively go out of my way to ruin you with everything you just told me.”

  “I know,” Adam said. “That’s why I told it all to you. So we’re on even ground.”

  Once again, Adam had a way of flooring me. The truth was, even if this was another prank or another taunt, I doubted I’d have the energy to strike back. I was, at this point, indifferent… with a small glimmer of possibility that he could be forgiven and we could go back to the old ways. That small glimmer was growing right now, and Adam was doing right, but it was still small all things considered.

  All it would take was one fuckup on Adam’s part to ruin all of the work he was attempting to put in.

  I opened the door, went around the side of the school, and saw his Corvette parked right in front of the main entrance. As best as I could tell, it was still the same as always. It was a sweet car, a rich kid’s car for sure, but not anything different from what I normally saw.

  “OK, you brought me out here for… what, exactly?”

  “Look.”

  He pointed me to the left.

  “Are you fucking kidding—”

  A sign unraveled, held up by Ryan, Kevin, and even Nick, my homecoming date, that read “I’m Sorry, Emily Zane. -Adam C.,” in big black letters. It seriously had larger typography than most billboards.

  “I know you hate public displays like this,” he said. “But I also know that you secretly like it when I do them.”

  God, I wanted so bad to count that as a fuckup. I wanted so bad to say that was a reason enough to walk away from Adam and never see him again. If only that was enough for me to avoid getting hurt now and forever.

  But it would be dishonest to do so.

  “Look, I had to apologize the only way how,” he said, perhaps sensing my slight disquietude with how I felt about this. “But look, between you and me—ignore those Broad Street assholes for a second—I know I fucked up a lot. But I promise, I promise with everything I have, that I will work on making us last. I will work to better us every single day. And one of the ways to do it is by being honest about how we feel. So, here’s the truth, Emily.”

  Oh, shit…

  “I love you. I know you may not feel the same way, but I know now that what I always felt was love. I didn’t want to believe it was love, and I refused to believe it in part because of my past and because I didn’t want to get hurt. But now I know the truth. Now that I say it, it feels right. I want to make us work, Emily Zane. I love you.”

  I bit my lip. I hated every word that he said.

  I hated how right it felt.

  I hated how, all of these years, ignorance had failed as a strategy. I hated how, wherever I went, I looked for Adam and his presence. I hated how, even when he was up close to me in moments of cornering, I felt an electricity that no other boy gave me. I hated how he could say what he had said, and I could feel like it was the truth.

  But I loved that despite everything that he had put me through—and, recently, that I had put him through—I was still able to find the sincerity and the honesty in his words.

  “Adam,” I said, sobbing. “I never thought this day would come. I never thought the old eighth grade Adam has returned, and, I guess, well, I guess I was right. He’s not here. Someone better has. The mature, honest Adam.”

  Adam tried to keep his smile from growing too wide, perhaps cognizant of my sobbing turning into tears of joy.

  “When you say you love me, it feels… I feel like that little girl again who has found someone who connects to her. Someone who makes her thrilled to be in this world. Not like my alcoholic mother. Not like my stoic father. You bring a zest and a joy to my life that no one has ever given me, Adam. You’re right, you have to work on it every day. I have to work on it every day. We have a lot of work to do. We will for the rest of our lives. But, yes, Adam. I love you too.”

  Adam came over to me as I was sobbing, hugged me, and lifted me in the air. He kissed my cheek, and then put me down to kiss me on the lips.

  “We’ll do whatever it takes,” Adam said. “However many public apologies I have to make, however many displays of praise I have to do, I’ll do them.”

  “Oh, stop, don’t push your luck,” I said with a laugh.

  “Why?” he said with a smirk. “You better ask me to Sadie Hawkins before you change your mind and ask Nick.”

  I burst out laughing, and Adam joined me. If we could joke about me having gone to homecoming with one of his best friends, that was a pretty damn good sign.

  “Hmm, well, Nick is a nice guy, and you can be kind of a jerk sometimes, but he’s not you, so, OK. Mr. Adam Collins, will you go to homecoming with me?”

  “Homecoming?”

  “Ah, damnit, my mind gets frazzled in these moments!” I said, laughing.

  I couldn’t stop laughing. Really, I couldn’t. How great a moment this was—the previous three years would not repeat themselves. The depression of the last couple of days, gone. A giddy high had set in, and I didn’t anticipate coming down any time soon.

  “Sadie Hawkins. Will you go to Sadie Hawkins with me?”

  “Well,” Adam said. “Yes, if…”

  “If…” I said, leaning my head forward.

  “You go to prom with me?”

  “Wow, this might be a record for earliest prom date ask ever!” I said. “While you’re at it, why don’t I just ask you to my sorority semiformal next fall?”

  “Already planning on rushing, huh?”

  “No. I’m already planning of ways to go out with you.”

  Adam smiled with such genuine happiness that I snapped a mental photo of the moment, treasuring it and keeping it to memory.

  “If I may, Emily,” he said, taking my hands. “I’d actually like to start this with something much closer to the present.”

  “Hmm?”

  “This weekend, my parents will be going to Atlanta,” he said. “I’d like for you to spend the night. Can you do that?”

  My heart all but leaped out of my chest in excitement.

  “Yes! Yes! Of course, Adam!”

  “Good!” he said. “I do have one small confession to make, though.”

  “Oh?” I said, trying my best to stave off any potential downer statements.

  Not only did he succeed in not making me feel bad, his words actually were the best thing I could have heard.

  “You would be the first girl I’ve ever had actually sleep with me, in the literal sense,” he said. “So if I toss and turn, if I steal the blankets, if I make the temperature too high or too low… could you forgive me for that?”

  I giggled, rolled my eyes, and hugged him close.

  “I suppose I can,” I said. “I’ve forgiven you for a lot worse.”

  “And for that, I am grateful.”

  But for Adam having the courage to admit his faults and weaknesses, I was more grateful for. All I ever wanted since high school started was to just have a normal life. I just wanted to go through the halls without judgment I didn’t understand. As I had long thought, a big part of forgiveness was understanding, and if I could understand Adam, I could forgive him.

  Now, though, not only could I forgive him. I could have him as mine.

  “I love you, Emily.”

  I peered up into his handsome, beautiful, dark eyes.

  “And I love you, Adam.”

  Epilogue

  “Hey, asshole, keep talking and I’ll knock the shit outta ya.”

  Ryan stared across the balcony from me at one of our house parties. As usual, he was running his mouth about how, now that I had “retired” into relationship life, he was going to prove that he was the real man of the house and sleep with all of the women that I’d once targeted but had since let go with such ease, it made me
wonder why it hadn’t happened before.

  But unlike our previous house party, when we’d come to very public blows and I’d incurred an enormous bill on my parents’ credit cards, I now had Emily up by my side, under my arm. Now, when I said something like that to Ryan, it was not with actual intent to fuck him up, but brotherly love.

  Well, OK, maybe I did want to fuck him up a little bit. Just not for all of Providence Prep to see.

  “Whatever, man,” he said with an eye roll. “Emily, you are very sweet, and I am happy that you make my dipshit brother happy. But this has always been my world, and now people are just recognizing it.”

  “If you say so.”

  I really didn’t care if he claimed “the throne” or whatever other term he wanted to give to it. I had my one girl—my state champion in soccer girl, my future Vanderbilt alumna girl, and, hopefully, my forever girl.

  It was a strange change for many of us. Even though two months had passed, and we were throwing our end-of-semester party, I think many girls in my class still expected me to throw the party and come flirt with them. They expected the same Adam Collins that had shown up for the fall break party and the Senior Kickoff party.

  But that Adam was gone. That Adam was always a facade, a thin sheet of defense that looked thicker on the outside than it actually was. In his place was a content and happy Adam.

  “Hey! Adam! Hey!”

  I rolled my eyes as I turned to Kevin, hurrying up the stairs.

  “What, puppy?” I said.

  “Hey now,” Emily said, nudging me by the side.

  “Did you know Jackie is here?”

  “Umm, yeah, she’s like, Emily’s best friend.”

  “Samantha is,” Emily whispered into my ear. “Jackie is a good friend.”

  “I know, but I don’t get why she won’t leave me alone,” Kevin said. “I keep telling her I’m not interested, but…”

  “Kevin,” I said, realizing that he did not understand the irony of having his own little lap dog. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out. Maybe you can do what I did.”

  “Huh?”

  “Rope her in with dramatic public displays.”

  “Hey!” Emily shouted.

  “OK, I’ll take that idea under consideration,” Kevin said.

  “I was kidding!” I yelled, but Kevin was already going down the stairs.

  “See what you’ve done?” Emily said. “Now I’m going to have to deal with Jackie’s complaints about Kevin for the rest of the school year.”

  “I thought you already had that.”

  “Touche,” she said. “And besides, I already eliminated my worst enemy.”

  “And, in the process,” I added. “Gained your best lover.”

  Emily smiled, pulled me down by the collar, and kissed me.

  I had no idea how I’d pulled it off. I had no idea how, after as much as I’d pushed her away and what I’d done to her, I’d made Emily Zane mine.

  But because I had, I’d never been happier, and Emily had never been happier.