Before & After - Nazarea Andrews Page 0,24

your head out of your ass,” Lindsay says, “maybe you wouldn’t miss it.”

Scott snorts a laugh and I realize I’ve spoken out loud. I flush.

“I’m gonna go,” Lindsay says. Scott rises and kisses her briefly, and my eyes narrow. “Call me later?”

He nods and she waves at me with a narrowed eyed look before ducking out of the kitchen. I hear the apartment door slam behind her and my eyes go wide as I stare at my best friend like I’ve never seen him.

“What the actual fuck, Scott?”

He shrugs. “She’s a nice girl, man. And we’ve both been bored, with you and Pey so wrapped up in each other.”

I stare at him for a long minute, long enough that he fidgets and finally looks up at me.

His eyes are bright and daring me to say something. And because I'm an idiot, I do. "You actually care about Lindsay?"

"Why the hell is that so hard to believe?" he asks.

"Because that's not your M.O."

"Taking a month to fuck a girl isn't yours," he snaps back. And stands. Rinses his cup with his back to me.

It's covered in tattoos and scars, and I know all of the markings as well as I know my own hands. Fuck, I put some of them there. "She matters, Rike. End of story. Go back to your siren, and try not to fuck up what we both have going on here."

He doesn't say anything else as he stalks out of the kitchen and I'm left standing with a cold cup of coffee and no fucking clue how the hell our life got so weird so damn fast.

***

She's furious when I step into the little deli. It's off the campus of UT , cheap and not very good, but she likes it and I humor her. Right now, she's sitting in our normal booth, her computer on the table next to her BLT, ignored as she taps angrily at the phone in her hand.

Her gaze, when it swings up to meet mine, is hot and hurt, her lips a tight unforgiving line, and I let out an inaudible sigh.

"What the hell were you thinking last night?" she snaps while I slip into the booth.

"Why do psychologist hate elevators?” I stare at her, my gaze pleading for her to pick up her line of the joke, but she just sits back and crosses her arms over her pretty breasts, glaring and waiting for the explanation I don't have. "Because they drive you up a wall."

It doesn't get a response, but I didn't really think it would. I just had to try.

"I'm not in the mood for that shit, Jokes," she says sharply. "You fucking took my roommate home last night. How the hell do you expect me to overlook that?"

"I didn't know Peyton was your roommate," I say softly."

Her eyes go impossibly wide. "Is that really what you're worried about right now?"

"I think it is," I say slowly, deliberately, weighing my words. My gaze flicks over her face. "I think it's the issue. I know all the reasons we shouldn’t work. I'm not good for you. I have a shit ton of baggage. I deal with shit by avoiding it, or picking a fight. By taking another girl home to fuck. Those are all the reasons we shouldn't work. But that's not the reason we'll fall apart."

"No?" she says sarcastically and I shake my head, leaning back. I'm mirroring her, and it pisses her off--her arms drop almost defiantly to the table top.

"It won't work because you refuse to trust me. You won't tell me a goddamn thing about you. You don't mind seeing my world—"

"What, a shitty bar and a record store? A tattoo shop? That's the only part of your world that you'll show me."

"That's the only part of my world that matters," I almost shout. "That's what I give a fuck about. So you can think it's shit. I don't give a fuck. But that's the reality of my world. A dirty bar, a shitty record store and a rundown tattoo shop. A best friend who doesn't know what the fuck boundaries are. That's what's important to me. The question is if you can deal with it."

"What the hell makes you think I can't?" she growls.

"Because you bolt every time things start to get serious." I shoot back. "You like the danger of it. You like me finger fucking you on the stage, you like that I'm not like all the other frat boys you play