Page 42 of I Was Always Yours (RCA: Royal Crown Academy)

“What about you, Six?” Thayer asks, turning towards me with a sly smile on her face, “Any more confrontations with Phoenix?”

I school my face not to react when she mentions him. I never told her about my run in with him in the elevator, even though technically she was there too. She’d gotten stuck near the front, so she hadn’t seen… whatever it was that happened between us.

It’s been over a week and I still haven’t processed how he touched me.

God, how helookedat me.

His eyes fluttered closed when he hooked his thumb under my piercing and when they’d reopened, the intensity in them had taken my breath away.

I’d gotten the piercing at the same time as the ladybug tattoo. That was ‘fuck it’decision number two.

I’d been unsure about it, originally wanting a hoop through my cartilage before Nera suggested we get matching nipple piercings to celebrate our upcoming birthdays. She’d convinced me and so had Pierre, our piercer, when he’d told me guys loved them.

Based on Phoenix’s reaction, he hadn’t been exaggerating.

But neither had I when I’d told Phoenix that it was meant for anybody other than him.

Eighteen was going to be the year of my sexual awakening. The year I was going to finally get over Phoenix.

No matter what bullshit he decided to pull, I’d finally meet someone (fingers crossed), fall in love (hopefully), and have sex (touch wood…literally).

That moment in the elevator felt dangerous somehow, like we were teetering on the precipice of something that would take us both out if we gave into it.

It’s exactly like what happened at his house a couple weeks ago, a moment between us turned from hostile to charged with sexual frustration and electric chemistry in the blink of an eye.

This time, he’d looked at me like he wanted to rip my shirt off and suck my nipple into his mouth before he fucked me on the floor of the elevator.

That look, combined with the way his gravelly voice hit my ear and how his fingers tweaked my nipple, had sent all rational thought flying out of my brain.

I’d arched into his touch and let him manhandle me. Worse, if he’d tried to fuck me, I’d have let him.

I’d have liked it.

Even after everything he’s done to me.

I don’t know what the criteria are to be declared certifiably insane, but I’m ninety nine percent sure that I meet one hundred percent of them.

“Nothing outside of the usual hateful stares,” I say without expanding further.

“You must be looking forward to graduating and never seeing him again.” She says.

I freeze. In all the hundreds of hours I’ve spent obsessing over Phoenix and every interaction of ours these past 3 plus years, I never once thought about the fact that I was eight months away from likely never seeing him again.

That realization is the equivalent of having an ice-cold bucket of water dumped over me.

My head wants to move on, but I don’t know if my heart is ready to.

Or if it’ll ever be ready to.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Nera jumps in cryptically.

I take a drink of the seltzer. “What are you talking about?”

“Come on, Six,” She says, giving me a look, “You guys have been playing this hating game for so long, can you even imagine your life without it?”

“You know better than anyone that it’s not a game. He’s ruined every chance at happiness I’ve had since I was fourteen. Theonlyreason it hasn’t been for longer is because I didn’t see him for three years before that, as you well know. So of course I can live without the nastiness, the hatred, and the evil glares.”

“Alright,” she acquiesces, “But can you imagine your life withouthimin it?”

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