“Yeah. Why?”
I’m sure we were both thinking Duh!, but rather than saying anything, Summer just eyed me skeptically.
“You just don’t seem like yourself today, that’s all.” That was a nice way to put it.
“Nope, I’m fine,” I said, gluing a smile on my face.
“You’re not, but it’s alright if you don’t want to talk about it.”
“I’m fine. Really,” I said reassuringly. I knew she wanted me to talk to her about Trinity, but if she didn’t have the nerve to just come out and ask me, I wasn’t going to volunteer anything. Besides, she’d picked sides and, whether she would admit it or not, we were at odds.
She started to walk off, but then she turned back. “You know you can talk to me, right?” When I nodded, she continued. “I mean, it’s not like Trinity has to know everything.”
Ha! I felt like laughing right in her face. Although she wasn’t as bad as most of the other girls, she was certainly not a person to whom I’d tell anything important or confidential. In fact, I had no one in my life that I could talk to about things like that, serious things. I just held them inside until, like a cancer, they slowly ate away at me from the inside out.
“Well, there’s nothing to tell, but thanks anyway.”
“Do you want me to stay and help you clean up?” As she asked, she hoisted her duffel further up on her shoulder, as if a silent reminder that she was ready to go. Talk about your conflicting body language.
For the first time all day, I nearly laughed. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m almost done.”
“Alright. Well, see you tomorrow,” she promised, walking off the field toward the parking lot.
Five minutes later, I was still contemplating her behavior when Drew arrived. He leaned in to kiss me, but I put my hand on his chest to stay him.
“We need to talk,” I announced.
I hated the look that came over Drew’s face. It said that he knew what was coming and he didn’t like it one bit. I must’ve been more transparent that I’d thought.
“Alright,” he said slowly.
“Drew,” I began, resuming my task of packing pompoms away. “I don’t want you to think that this has anything to do with you or something you’ve done wrong, because it doesn’t.”
I put as much sincerity into my voice and my expression as I could manage. I had never wanted to hurt Drew.
He nodded, his face a tight, blank mask.
“Things are changing so fast this year, it’s crazy. It’s our senior year and things are probably only going to get crazier, not less crazy.”
Drew’s brows came together in a small frown of confusion. I was mucking this up and I knew it. I should’ve practiced what I was going to say, but I was too wrapped up in thinking about Bo to give it adequate attention.
I stopped what I was doing and stepped over to stand in front of him. “I don’t think we should see each other anymore. Not like this anyway,” I said, putting my hand on his arm. “You are a great guy and I don’t want this to sound cliché, but I really hope we can still be friends. Besides, I’m sure you won’t want to be associated with a social pariah for the rest of your senior year.”
Drew hadn’t said a word. He just stood there in silence, watching me. When he finally spoke, he surprised me.
“This is about that new guy, isn’t it?” Anger was evident in every hard line of his face.
“What? No,” I said halfheartedly. I was taken off guard and that was all the conviction I could muster.
“Don’t lie to me, Ridley,” Drew hissed through his gritted teeth, flinging my hand off his arm with a furious swipe.
“To be honest, Drew, I just don’t feel the same way about you anymore. I’m sorry. It’s not you, it’s me,” I proclaimed, regretting that last choice of words as soon as they were out of my mouth. They were sure to incite a reaction in almost anybody.
“It’s you, huh?” He grabbed my upper arms in a steely grip. “Well that much I know. It’s you screwing the new guy. That’s what it is,” he spat. “Look me in the eye and tell me you’re not.”
His fingers felt like they were digging all the way into my bones, he gripped me so tightly. “Drew, you’re hurting me.”
“You can’t, can you?” As he spoke, he pulled me up onto my toes and into his chest so that my nose was nearly touching his. “Admit it,” he shouted down at me.
“Drew, I told you—”
“Nothing but lies,” he interrupted, giving me a little shake. “You’re hot for the new guy, you just won’t admit it. You’re a whore just like Trinity.”
A little thread of fear was working its way around my jack-hammering heart.
“Drew—”
“Admit it,” he yelled again, shaking me harder.
Just as a real panic was about to set in, a voice sounded from the shadows.
“Let her go.”
I exhaled in relief, instantly recognizing it. It was Bo. Drew and I both turned to look back at the bleachers.
Bo stepped out into the thin beam of light that shone across the grass from the field house and he stopped there. To me, he looked intimidating. He stood, half in shadow, with his arms crossed over his chest, eyeing Drew steadily, silently.
“Well, well, well. Look who it is,” Drew sneered, pushing me away from him and turning his body to face Bo. “She’s nothing but a lying whore. You sure you want to lose some teeth over a girl like that?”
“I won’t be the one losing teeth,” Bo said, his tone matter-of-fact.
Physically they looked pretty evenly matched. Nonetheless, I was nervous for both of them. I didn’t want Drew to get hurt any more than he already was and I certainly didn’t want to see anything happen to Bo. As far as I was concerned it was a lose–lose situation all the way around.
Although Drew and I were at least twenty feet from Bo, I still felt like the situation needed more of a buffer, so I stepped over in front of Drew to face him. I wasn’t taking a stance in opposition to him, facing off against him with Bo, but that must’ve been how Drew perceived it.