I sighed. ‘Nope. Sorry. On-campus tutoring only – university rules.’
Catching a strand of her long hair and winding it round her finger, she pouted her lower lip out. That act must work on some guys, or her parents, but it sure as hell had the opposite effect on me. My phone buzzed in the front pocket of my jeans. Jacqueline hadn’t left the classroom yet, and I wanted to leave the building before she came out. That probably wasn’t going to happen, now.
‘So it’s a group tutoring thing? And it lasts an hour?’
That hair wound tight round her finger, the girl in front of me swayed from one foot to the other, adding to my annoyance. I wanted to grab hold of her shoulders and make her stand still for the thirty seconds more I was giving this exchange. ‘Yeah. From one to two.’
She asked what I was doing after the tutoring session. As if she knew I wouldn’t tutor her off campus … but maybe I’d be game for hooking up. Jesus. Christ.
‘Work.’
‘You’re always working, Lucas.’
I couldn’t remember ever having the actual feeling of someone watching me before, so I wasn’t sure if that’s what it was. Maybe it was merely the fact that I knew she could be there. But I’d swear my skin heated and my muscles contracted and my breath hitched. I couldn’t keep my eyes from pulling up and zeroing in on Jacqueline Wallace in the crowd of people zigzagging through the hallway, as though I knew exactly where she’d be. As though she was the only other person in that hallway.
She was close enough that I could have taken four strides to reach her. I knew she’d heard my name. Now she thought I was Lucas, while she was emailing Landon. There was no reason for her to reconcile the two. In that split second, I was utterly relieved and then disgusted with myself and then torn right down the middle. Again.
Before I could move, she turned and disappeared into the flow of people, and I swear I felt her leave.
10
Landon
I walked to Melody’s house to give her the maps I’d drawn and the citations page I’d finished. I didn’t take into consideration what my face looked like before I went. Even though I’d showered away the blood and Grandpa had patched me up with a couple of bandages, my lip was swollen and split all the way through. The bruises would be there for a while.
Her older brother answered the door. I recognized him from school. He was a senior, on student council. Popular.
‘Who the fuck are you?’
‘Evan,’ a woman’s voice said, and her mom’s face appeared behind him, scowling.
‘Oh … my. Landon, is it? What – what do you want?’
Evan didn’t move. He stood glaring at me while his mother moved to his side as if the two of them were blocking me from entering. Which they were doing.
‘I, uh, was bringing these to Melody. For the presentation.’ I hadn’t thought this out well. I hadn’t texted her to say I was coming. I wanted to explain in person that I didn’t want to let her down. That the only reason this consequence – the suspension – bugged me at all was that fact.
Mrs Dover’s brow arched. ‘And you can’t just bring it to class yourself?’
I shook my head, eyes sliding to her shoulder. ‘I … won’t be at school Friday.’
‘I see.’ She sighed as though she’d expect no different from someone like me. She stretched out her hand. ‘I’ll see that she gets them.’
I swallowed and looked her in the eye. ‘Maybe I could see her? She’ll have to do my part of the presentation, too. We should discuss it.’
Her son crossed his arms over his chest, while her hand remained outstretched, waiting for me to hand over what I’d brought. ‘I don’t think so.’ Her smile was full of the fakest kindness I’d ever seen. Her voice was ice. She said nothing else.
I handed her the folder and left.
By the time I went back to school a week later, everyone had returned to their usual seats in world geography. Clark Richards smirked at me from his reclaimed chair next to Melody. Melody didn’t look at me at all. The presentations were all done, and Boyce Wynn and I had received zeros. Mrs Dumont gave the two of us a pop quiz to ‘make up for’ the missed grade, but with no knowledge of the material and no chance to study, I bombed it. She stuck us in the hallway, sitting on the floor on opposite sides of the door, to do it.
We weren’t supposed to talk. Of course, Wynn broke that command like it was a suggestion he could choose to follow, or not.
‘Hey, Maxfield. We’re doin’ a bonfire thing tonight, over by the inlet. Rick’s older brother – we call him Thompson senior – scored some extra weed from a deal, and he’s payin’ Rick to do his chores. In weed.’ He chuckled.
I looked over at him and frowned, like And?
‘We’re meetin’ up at like eleven. Once the rest of this loser town shuts down, nobody will see us to report it.’ The bruises on his face looked like mine. Yellowing. Almost gone. His eye was still a little fucked up, and so was my lip. I wondered if this invitation was some sort of trick.
‘We friends now or something?’ I asked, peering at him sceptically.
He shrugged. ‘Yeah, why not. You, uh, know Richards paid me to do it, right?’
A million jumbled thoughts lurched through my head. ‘No.’
He smirked. ‘Yeah, he found out you had his little piece of ass at your place, and when he texted her she said she was home. He figured you were either tappin’ that shit or about to.’
‘So he paid you to jump me –’
‘Guy’s a rich dick, right? I was happy to take his money. Truth, though, you’d sorta pissed me off already. Gotta own up to that, man.’ He angled his head, thinking. ‘So that day in shop – that thing I said about Brittney Loper right before you punched me – you like her or somethin’?’
I stared at the floor, shook my head. ‘No. Don’t really know her.’ I didn’t really know anyone. I thought I was getting to know Melody, but that had been a pathetic illusion.
‘Then what? Because dude.’
My heart pounded. I had to say it. It was stuck in my throat, but I forced it out, an uneven murmur in the empty hallway. ‘You said you’d rape her.’
‘What?’ He frowned, confused. ‘That’s just an expression – I don’t mean anything by it –’
‘It means something.’ I stared at him. ‘It’s a – sort of … trigger word for me.’
‘No shit,’ he said, and I stared at the floor between my knees. ‘Okay, well. Sorry? I’ll remember that’s your apeshit word, man.’
He had no idea.