Page 49 of Between Us

It’s a lame question but it feels like I’ve just dropped a bomb in our silent sanctuary. All evening, I caught myself wanting to ask if she’s okay, but it felt more like insincere filler. Because even with only a crumb of information, it’s obvious that Blake wouldn’t have had that strong of a reaction to running into some girls if she was okay.

And asking who those girls are feels too forward. Blake needs to guide the conversation here, even though there’s a protective voice in my mind screaming at me to find out what’s wrong and immediately make it better.

She looks down at Benji and twists her lips to the side. There’s a large part of me that expects her to ignore the question. And even if it kills me a little, I’d do it if that’s what she feels she needs.

Butfuck, I want her to just take that last leap of trust toward me. It’s easy to assume who those girls are, or what they were to Blake in school. Except I don’t want to do that. It isn’t fair to start creating my own ideas of her, or her life, even if my intentions are good.

As I try to get myself to accept her silence, she finally starts talking. “Those girls in the gas station, they’re… I know the—they… they made my life hell, if you want the truth,” she finally spits out.

“I do,” I murmur close to her ear. “I want to know everything you’re willing to share.”

Turning to look up at me, her bottom lip trembles, but after a long moment, she nods.

She fucking nods.

And I know, even if it was made out of sheer desperation, Blake just made a decision about our blossoming relationship. It’s one that changeseverything, and one that I know there won’t be any second chances if I fuck it up.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Blake

“Idon’treallyknowwhere to start… I guess it’s easier to go back to the beginning?” I look at Adrian, feeling unsure about opening this wound, but not sure I could stop if I wanted to. He nods once and it fills me with enough courage to go on. “When I was in the sixth grade, I was offered a swim scholarship to the local all-girls private school. I was younger than my brother and our friends, so I didn’t really see why I shouldn’t take it. And my parents were so proud of me, you know?”

Looking back, I didn’t reallywantto go to Serenity Prep Academy. But—not for the first time either—it felt like everyone close to me was moving on without me. Of Bonnie’s children, Vivi’s the closest to my age, only two years older. From there, the age gaps just continue to grow. It never felt as noticeable when I was younger, except as we all moved into middle school and high school, two years started to feel like decades. And anything more than that, a century.

And when my parents, coach, and I got the news that the prestigious school wanted me, they were all soexcited. It felt like, if I wasn’t working toward something greater through swimming, then why was I even doing it?

Part of me felt like I didn’t have the choice to say no, and the other part of me didn’t want to lose the attention I was getting from everyone for once—my brother, the Davies siblings, everyone.

He nods again, giving me the silence, and space, to take this at my own pace.

“Anyway, I started in the second half of the year, and it just was… miserable. From the beginning. And three of those five girls from the gas station? They were the ringleaders.” I shrug helplessly. I wish I understood what I did—why the hell I was so unlikable from the moment I stepped into that school.

“What happened, Blake?” Adrian asks. His voice is rougher, rawer.

“What didn’t happen?” I laugh without humor. “The swim coach arranged a sleepover with one of the girl’s moms. They were just trying to help me in a new school, but Morgan, Marissa, and Becky had much different ideas for that night.” I’m too embarrassed to tell him the details. Like when I woke up to discover they were trying to do the old hand in warm waterprank to make me pee myself, only to discover they’d already drawn all over my face with permanent markers. Though all of that’snothingcompared to the rumors they started about me the following week—like how I allegedly did piss myself while I was fully awake and how I ate a moldy slice of cheese, ignoring the fact we were playing truth or dare. Instead they told everyone I was ‘poor and used to it.’

A small, watery smile plays at my lips. “The only good thing to come from it all was Margo and Meera—my best friends.”

Meera has her own torrid history with some of the girls on my team from when they were in elementary school. Margo, on the other hand, moved to Aurora Hills when she was ten. From the stories I’ve heard, she had no interest in being friends with the ‘mean girls,’ and after one school project together, she never let Meera go back to such horrible treatment.

I don’t think they ever questioned whether or not to take me under their wing when the rumors started. The two of them sat down next to me that same day at lunch and never left my side after that.

“Some things got worse, but they made it bearable, making sure I wasn’t ever alone.”

He squeezes my thigh gently. “I like those girls then.”

Chuckling under my breath, I nod in agreement. “Yeah, me too. A lot.”

“I—Blake,” he slowly starts, clearly thinking through his approach. “I don’t want to belittle what they did to you at that sleepover; it was malicious and wrong, and just plaincruel, but what do you mean that it got worse?”

Taking a deep breath, I try to sum it up the best I can. “There were more rumors. Then came taunting—just stupid nicknames likeBlake the FlakeorSnakeorRakeor something stupid along those lines. Then I…” I shrug, awkwardly, hating that I feel so embarrassed about something I have no control over. “I was anearly bloomer, if you get what I’m saying. And thingsbloomedwell into high school.

“After that, everything… escalated. Like Morgan ‘accidentally’ hip checking me over the pool’s ledge while walking into practice, or Marissa ‘accidentally’shoving my phone and goggles through the cracks in the bleacher. And let’s not forget, when Becky thought it’d be funny to try to catfish me as a new boy from the all-boys school.”

“No one did anything?” He sounds affronted, as if he’d go yell at the head mistress even two years later.

“I hid a lot of what was going on from my parents. And the only time they were brave enough to push the boundaries more was whenever Margo wasn’t around.” Meera’s a lover but Margo? She’s a fighter—especially when it’s to protect her friends. I tried arguing and fighting back a few times, but it’s a losing battle when it’s three against one, and a whole team that turns a blind eye in fear of being the next target.

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