doesn’t attack her.
Again.
Harley finally notices something is up, his eyes darting between us as a smirk stretches across his lips.
“You fucked Annabelle again, didn’t you? Fucking idiot.”
It kills me to keep my mouth shut but the smug, shit-stirring air rolling off of him will disappear pretty fucking quick if he finds out what the real reason is.
Apparently me keeping my mouth shut isn’t good enough for Avery. “It wasn’t Annabelle so he gets to keep breathing for now, but if he ever attempts to touch my friend again, I will end him in the most cruel and creative ways.”
My teeth clench but I manage something close to a nod at her, stalking a little faster to class so I don’t have to see Harley’s reaction to this.
It doesn’t work.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Floss, what the fuck did he do?”
He gets a hand around my arm and yanks me back until we’re facing each other. I stare him down because I’m not afraid of him and even if we weren’t friends, I can hold my own.
Avery wedges herself in-between us and gives Harley a little shove. He barely moves because he’s a fucking wall of pent-up anger issues but her scathing tone gets his attention. “Neither of you are allowed to kiss her. Don’t throw stones, Arbour, now get to class.”
Harley clearly doesn’t want to let this go but Avery is a force of very deadly nature when she wants to be and she finally convinces him to get to his own class. She doesn’t say another word to me for the rest of the walk but when we walk into the classroom, she tucks her arm in mine and smiles at me, a show for the other students because there’s nothing she hates more than gossip about us all fighting.
Neither of you are allowed to kiss her.
Her words bouncing around in my head are enough of a distraction to get me through choir without losing my fucking mind about Lips pretending I don’t exist. She just stares at the floor the entire time and I start to obsess about everything that happened last night because, Jesus fucking Christ, she’s making me feel like I was a fucking predator or some shit.
Was I?
Fuck.
I need to just stay the fuck away from girls; this shit always blows the hell up.
Why did she have to be so fucking… perfect. Why did she have to be everything that I needed, everything I didn’t even fucking know that I wanted, and also be completely unattainable? So fucking off-limits that I might lose my dick if I can’t get my shit together.
Because even if she had reacted well, we’d still be fucking doomed.
I make it through my morning classes without hearing a word my teachers are saying and when lunchtime rolls around, I head straight back up to my room because there’s no way I’m sitting through another meal down there.
I’m supposed to go study with her tonight.
I’m not fucking going.
I decide that there’s no point in going back down for the rest of my classes, because I’m not fucking getting anything out of them, and I’m about to get absolutely fucking hammered when the door opens and the person I least want to see walks in.
Well.
The friend I least want to see.
I really don’t want to see any of our parents or guardians.
Harley doesn’t look surprised to see me, slinging his bag onto his bed and kicking his shoes off.
“I’m going down to the gym, grab your gloves.”
It’s more of a demand than an invitation but I stupidly think that this means we’re cool.
Boy, am I wrong.
My eye is fucking killing me when I get to the girls’ room.
Fucking Arbour and his shitty temper.
Avery sent me a text while we were in the ring to say that I had to show up to my tutoring, so my mood goes from fucking abysmal to borderline reckless nihilism. I shouldn’t be around people, let alone being around the girl I’m not allowed to like and her fucking keeper.
But I’m not a pussy so I show up, shit mood and all.
Avery takes up watch on her bed like she thinks I’m going to molest the Mounty against her will if she leaves us alone—which only makes things fucking worse—but I ignore her entirely.
It’s a hard thing to do when she’s glaring fucking daggers into my back the entire time.
Lips and I sit on the floor like we always do but everything is different now.