Page 101 of Overtime
“But I thought you were friends?” Kelsey asks, tilting her head. With a fake friendly voice, she says, “Friends don’t make out at the library. Or anywhere. Right, girls?”
“Right,” Tiff and Lori chorus.
“Trust me, I know Aran very well. Intimately,” Kelsey says with extra emphasis on the last word. “I’m just giving you a friendly warning that you shouldn’t fall in love with him just because he gives you a little attention. He’ll move right on the second he realizes you have feelings for him. Because you do, huh? It’s written all over your chubby little face.”
“She’s pathetic,” Lori adds. “Falls in love with the first guy who’s nice to her. Can you blame her?”
“So what if I’m in love with him? How’s that any of your business?” I snap, shaking in my boots but not out of fear. No, out of how hard it is to not drop my figurative gloves and slam my fist in their noses. “What are you trying to accomplish here? To intimidate me? Well, guess what.” I pause and push both Kelsey and Lori away from me with so much strength they stumble back. Lori trips on her heels and falls on her ass, and I glare down at her and at Kelsey. “Trying to bully me isn’t going to make him like either of you, because you’re both horrible people.
“And you,” I say to Rebs. “You’re turning into one of them, even if all you do is stand by and do nothing as they bully your former friend. I hope you have fun hanging out with people who will stab you in the back the second you try to think on your own again.
“And you,” I snarl at Tiff. “Being a vegetarian is not an insult, you damn airhead.”
Someone in the line starts clapping, and I wince. For a moment, I forgot there was an audience. And then the absolute worst thing happens.
There, at the top of the stairs, is Aran. And his expression tells me he heard some of that.
“Maddie.” It weirds me out that he’s not calling me by his nickname for me. The bad feeling in my stomach takes over as he rubs his head and asks, “Are you in love with me?”
I suck in air.
My mind rewinds through the past five minutes and stops right at the moment when, like an absolute fool, I admitted my feelings for Aran Rodriguez in front of a corridor packed with strangers and foes. And apparently him.
I hear laughter. Then someone else joins. A chorus ofoohs echoes across the hallway. The only exit is by Aran. I turn and rush through the open door of the bedroom the couple stumbled out of earlier. But before I close it, a big foot appears between the door and the frame, and Aran pushes his way in.
“No, I?—”
I jump away from him and knock my hip into the corner of some furniture. His hand grabs my arm, preventing me from falling. Or from pulling away again.
I don’t dare meet his eyes.
“Maddie…”
“Don’tMaddieme.” I shake my head, breathing hard. “I’m drunk and angry. I didn’t mean what I said.”
“So you didn’t mean to tell them to screw off to another planet?”
I jerk my arm away from his grip and hug myself tight. “No, that part I meant for sure.”
“And you did great. I was just about to send them packing myself, but—” He interrupts himself with a soft little grunt. “But that’s not the only part you meant.”
I bite my lips hard enough that the pain sobers me. Where are words when I need them the most? Why can’t I think of a combination of twenty-six letters that could get me out of this?
Because I meant it. And now everyone knows. Aran knows. Even though I’ve known all along that this was just a game for him. Reverse tutoring. Book research. Nothing special. One last chance at fun before college ends.
“We agreed no strings attached,” he says at last, with a soft voice. The confirmation cuts through me. “I can’t do relationships, Maddie. I just can’t. Not until—I need to focus on regionals. I wanted to tell you this even before I heard… Please, understand.”
I want to rage thatthisis when he finally learns to say please, when he’s breaking up with me even though we were not even together.
I find strength from somewhere to raise my head. “Don’t worry. I knew that. I tied the strings myself, and I can cut them too. I have plenty of experience to write a whole book series on that.”
Aran’s hand lifts toward me, and I flinch away. He squeezes it into a fist and drops it. The impassive mask on his face cracks just a bit. But I don’t care to decipher the look. This time I’m the iceberg. I push past him and walk out of the room with my head held high, even though inside, there’s nothing left to hold me up.
“Girl, where were you?” Christine asks from the middle of the hallway. “I know it was a very long dump but—what’s wrong, Maddie?”
“Can we go home?”
Worry twists her face at whatever she sees in mine, and she nods. “Let’s go get the others and blow this joint.” And with her arm around me, she steers me away from the witnesses to my biggest humiliation ever.
