Page 106 of Icing Hearts

“Okay.” I pinch the bridge of my nose and take a few steps away then double-back. “Okay. I’ll handle history. I’ll email the work from her student account. If she isn’t doing her work, she probably won’t notice emails getting sent from her account.”

“Thank you.”

“We should loop in Jack, too.”

“I’ve tried. I don’t know if it’s Stockholm Syndrome or what, but he’s not trying to help her get better, he’s just there. Wallowing.”

“That’s not what Stockholm Syndrome is.”

“Whatever. All I’m saying is—”

A voice cuts through our conversation from just behind Vince. “What are you two doing?”

Vince cusses low and quiet, shifting to reveal Clara’s crossed arms and red bulging forehead vein. I never noticed it before. Probably because I’ve only seen her this mad once before.

Clara walks up and stands between us, facing Vince. It’s another after-school study hall conversation. Since the season is over, we only have them once a week. It’s Coach’s way of keeping tabs on us.

“Come on, Clara.” Vince tosses a hand toward me. “He’s my teammate. And friend. You really think we aren’t gonna talk?”

“You really think he’s your friend? I thought he was my friend, too.”

Knife. To the heart. I actually look down expecting to see a protruding hilt and blood seeping into my gray shirt.

Vince looks down at the floor. “He’s not a great friend. I’ll admit that. But he cares. And he cares about you.”

Clara scoffs. Her arms are still crossed, left hip kicked to the side.

“You know it’s true,” Vince insists.

“Clara, I understand that you’re furious with me. That you hate me. But like it or not, I’m not going to let you self-destruct. What you seem to forget about me is that I have no problem breaking rules. Except for my own. Right now, I have one rule: manage the fallout from hurting you. That includes working with Vince to make sure you don’t do anything you regret.”

She doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t turn around or even give me the courtesy of tilting her ear. But I know she’s listening.

Her head tilts up to Vince. “Let’s go.” She takes his hand and leads him down the hallway. I hear the quiet din of his pleading voice as he attempts to convince her of something.

Chapter 65

Clara

The façade has officially crumbled. Finding out the truth about my mother’s death was the final blow that shattered everything. Getting angry, drinking, not caring. It all came so easily. But it just made me feel worse.

Vince is already at school. I woke up late, and his mom will drive me when I’m ready. Schoolwork hasn’t been a priority. In fact, it hasn’t even been on my to-do list. I’ve been avoiding checking my grades. I know what I’ll find and I know I may have ruined my chances of getting a full-ride to a decent school. Maybe I’ll be able to explain the dip to admissions counselors when I apply. Explain that I never properly mourned my mother, and it took me until now to start facing things.

My mom is dead. She’s never coming back. The way that she died or the reason she died isn’t going to change that. Nothing will. Tory didn’t kill her. His father did. And my father knew all along.

There are people who deserve my anger. People I don’t have to forgive for a long, long time. But Tory isn’t one of them.

He’s broken too.

None of that changes how I feel and how angry and devastated I am. But I need time to heal. I think I will be able to forgive Tory for hiding the truth from me. I just need time.

It will take time for me to grow, too. Time to get comfortable being vulnerable. To let someone in. Time to decide who I want to be, because it’s definitely not the girl I’ve become.

I roll over and grab my phone from Vince’s nightstand. There are text messages from Jack and Vince. Nothing from Clover, but if I don’t get in by lunch, I’m sure there will be one from her, too. When my grades load on my student portal app, it takes me a few long moments to process what I’m seeing.

My grades are…not that bad. Somehow, none of my averages have fallen below a B-. How is this possible? I’ve missed so much work. A couple tests, projects, and literally all of my homework since I learned the truth.

I open the itemized grade grid for math. There are grades for nearly all my homework assignments. Assignments I definitely didn’t do. Then, I check history. We had a big research paper assigned on the Roman Empire that I definitely didn’t hand in. Or did I? Sure enough, there’s a grade for the paper.

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