A satisfied smile tugs at my lips when nothing happens, but then Joel bursts through my door in a flurry of limbs and splintered wood.
“What the hell!” I shriek, eyes wide as he falls to the floor yowling in pain. I launch off my bed and hover over all six-foot-one of him writhing on the floor. He’s cradling his shoulder in his hand and stringing curse words together in arrangements I’ve never heard before. His knuckles are wrapped in bandages and his face is a mask of pain.
“I fucking dislocated my shoulder, goddamn it!” he curses. Rowan sidles next to me and Leti next to her.
“Did you seriously dislocate your shoulder?” Rowan asks.
Leti shakes his head with pity. “I told you not to do it.”
“No,” Joel snaps, “I’m joking, Peach. I just like rolling around on the floor for no fucking reason!”
She kicks him in the shin, and I burst out laughing. I’m still pissed as hell at him, but I can’t help laughing when he’s lying on the floor, bandaged and bruised with a dislocated shoulder, and my best friend is kicking him while he’s down. He’s a hot mess.
“I’m glad you find this so funny,” he growls up at me.
“I didn’t ask you to come over here.”
“Or to break down the door,” Leti adds.
“OR to break down the door.”
Joel sits up and glares at me until he sees my wrists. “Shit . . . Dee . . .”
Rowan and Leti follow his gaze and inhale sharp breaths, and I throw my hands behind my back to hide them from view. “It’s not a big deal. Stop staring at me like that.”
“Is that why you wouldn’t come out?” Rowan asks. Since there’s a half bathroom attached to my room, I didn’t have to see her at all yesterday, despite her multiple attempts to lure me out. And this morning, I vaguely remember her trying to wake me up to go to school, but I’m pretty sure I told her that my professors could go eat dicks.
“I just didn’t feel like it. God.”
Rowan steps toward me like she wants to hug me, pauses, and finishes her assault by throwing her arms around my neck. Since my wrists are out of commission, I don’t attempt to push her away.
“I’m fine,” I insist, and Leti’s hand lands on my shoulder, his gaze full of pity that makes me roll my eyes.
“You know who’s not fine?” Joel asks. “The guy on the floor with the dislocated shoulder. Is anyone going to help me up and take me to the hospital?”
“Why would we do that when there’s IHOP waiting to be eaten?” I ask, and Rowan chuckles before releasing me and teaming with Leti to lift him up.
IN THE WAITING room of the hospital, I’m sitting between Joel and Rowan with Leti on Rowan’s other side. My legs are crossed and there’s a plate of pancakes on my lap that is very quickly turning into a plate of just syrup. I offered Rowan a bite, but she said the scent of antiseptic stole her appetite. It probably would have stolen mine too if my stomach didn’t feel like it was trying to eat itself.
“What happened to your hands?” I ask Joel, too curious to keep my thoughts to myself.
He glances at Rowan, and I catch her staring at the floor. She already knows, but whatever happened, she’s kept it from me.
“Cody’s face,” Joel answers, his tone loaded with latent aggression I’m finally beginning to feel.
“Did you make him sorry?” I ask, and Leti answers before anyone else has a chance to.
“He nearly killed him.” When I lean forward to search Leti’s expression, he adds, “I went out to show Mark the bus . . . Shawn and Mike had to carry Cody out. He looked like Rocky Balboa decided to use his face as a punching bag.”
“He wouldn’t stop talking,” Joel explains unapologetically.
I find myself gently unwrapping the bandages from his hands, and Joel watches me do it, not pulling away from me. I frown when I see the angry red scratches and taped stitches. “You didn’t have to do that . . .”
“Yeah, I did,” he says matter-of-factly.
I release my tender hold on his hands and withdraw my attention, not sure how to feel about what Joel did for me. I carve off more pancakes and push them into my mouth, trying to make sense of it. What could he possibly have to gain from getting involved?
A nurse comes to retrieve Joel with her eyes buried in a clipboard, but when they lift, the friendly smile falls from her face. With his mohawk, torn jeans, and battered knuckles, he’s a disheveled mess. He’s also the epitome of a bad boy, and I’m trying to ignore the fact that he’s hot as hell.
She clears her throat. “Joel Gibbon?”
Joel nods his head in my direction. “Take her first.”
I cough around a throatful of pancakes. The nurse eyes me until her gaze lands on my wrists, and an embarrassed flame ignites beneath my skin.
“I’m fine,” I growl at Joel under my breath.