Page 35 of The Obsession

As soon as the doors swung shut behind me, I let out my breath. The noise was sliced off, the smells of cooked meat and ripe fruit no longer as rich and cloying. Thank god. I could think clearly again. I sent Aisha a text:Hey can u come out? I need to talk to u.

I paced around for a bit outside, checking my phone every five seconds.Aisha, come on, I need to talk to u.

Still no reply. Argh. I shook my head and headed out of the building and toward Brenner Hall, where my next class was. Aisha was in world history with me, so if I got there early, I could try to ambush her before class. I passed by the track field, where the really dedicated athletes had chosen to spend their lunch hour jogging under the blazing California sun. In between the shadows of the trees, my scalp prickled with the heat. I sifted through the events from my weekend, discarding things I couldn’t share with Aisha. Which was all of the things. Literally all of them. Crap. Somehow, I had to explain to Aisha why I’d ditched her during lunch without actually telling her anything.

The minutes crawled by as I stood outside the classroom, shuffling my feet awkwardly, trying my best to look inconspicuous as more and more students filed into the building. I pretended to be interested in the bulletin boards and a poster about Earth Day and why honeybees were so important to the ecosystem, just what I wanted to read.

I heard a mutteredtskand turned to see Aisha heading my way.

I hurried up to her and tried to look as pathetic as I knew how, which was very pathetic indeed. “Aisha, I’m sorry I couldn’t sit with you all at lunch, I—”

“You couldn’t. Really.” She cocked an eyebrow at me.

“Yes, really. I wanted to, but—”

“That’s funny, because all I saw was you hanging on to Logan and ignoring me.”

The red rage inside me leapt up. This was all Logan’s fault.

“That’s not what happened. You don’t understand. Come on, don’t be so mad at me. It was just lunch…” That was weak. You don’t ditch your best friend at lunch to sit with some guy.

Aisha snorted. “It’s not just that, okay? You were all excited about your date with Logan, and I get it, he’s a hottie. I was super excited for you too. I mean, I helped pick out your outfit and everything. And then you had your date, and it’s like, boom! Later, Aish! You didn’t even care enough to update me on how it went. I sent you messages asking you about the date and you ignored all of them.” Aisha glared at me for a few more seconds then sighed. “We can talk later.”

Relief flooded me. “Okay. Yeah. After school?” Then I remembered that I had to work after school. “Or tomorrow?”

Disappointment crossed her face. “Yeah, I guess.”

Aisha whooshed into the classroom, leaving me alone in the corridor. I let my head fall against the wall and stayed there until a cough made me look up. Mr. Francis, the world history teacher, had arrived and was frowning at me.

“Everything okay, Delilah?”

“Yeah.” I skulked into the classroom. Aisha sat sullenly in her seat. I sank into mine and willed myself to become invisible, to melt into the air, to stop existing. I gripped my pencil so tight, my hand went numb, and still I couldn’t make my heart slow down, couldn’t stop the hole from opening up and swallowing me.

The rest of the day was more of the same. Everybody had seen me sitting with Logan and his posse. There were a few curious smiles thrown my way, one or two people—kids who would never otherwise give me a second glance—came up to me and said hi, tried to dig out more information about how I snagged Logan when he’d been so unattainable. There were even more sharp glances, lips curled into a sneer, snatched whispers like, “Why would he chooseher?” Every stare, every quiet comment, weighed heavily on my shoulders, until I found myself hunching once more, my hands cupping my elbows. The way I used to when Brandon was around.

The realization sliced through everything. The air around me thrummed. I’d gotten rid of Brandon just to replace him with Logan. And the rest of my time in high school would be spent playing by Logan’s rules, having to sit with his friends at lunch instead of Aisha, asking in a very sweet, very sad voice, could I please sit with Aisha today, him smiling indulgently at me. We’d go to school dances as a couple, and he’d decide that we should dance, and all the while what I had done would hang over me.

A hot kernel sat deep in my gut, getting hotter by the second, until my entire being was filled with its heat. I had to fight back. I’d call him out on his bluff. If he claimed to love me as much as he did, he wouldn’t want me behind bars. Probably not, anyway. It was worth a try.

My resolve lasted throughout my shift at the library, where I channeled some of my frustration into packaging orders.

“Wow, someone’s being really productive today,” Lisa said, from behind her laptop. She had a state-of-the-art computer from the school to keep up with the cataloging, but she chose to use her clunky laptop to keep all her records.

I made a noncommittal grunt and continued wrapping packages with a vengeance. There was a knock at the door, and my head snapped up. Lisa and I looked at each other, wide-eyed. Nobody ever came down here.

“Hello?” came a voice. Even though it was muffled, every hair on the back of my neck stood straight up. “I’m looking for Delilah? I was told she’d be down here.”

Oh. My. Fucking. God. It was Logan.

“Why are you taking visitors down here?” Lisa snapped, her cheeks red.

I could kill him. Thank god the door was locked.

“I’m not. Sorry,” I whispered to Lisa. “I’ll get rid of him.”

I swept my table clean and then unlocked the door and slipped out, closing it tight behind me.

“Ready to go?” he said, flashing me his trademark sweetheart smile. The smile that stole hearts. I wanted to scratch it off his face. “Your shift was over fifteen minutes ago. I was waiting outside, but—”

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