I get myself dressed and ready for the day. I grab the bed sheets and rip them off the bed before throwing them in a pile in the corner of the room.
How could I have gone from feeling so impossibly alive last night to feeling absolutely nothing this morning?
With a sigh, I pack all my clothes back in my bag and check the time. It’s still early so I can slip out of here without anybody knowing. With my bags in my hands, I make my way downstairs and without a backward glance, I slip out the front door. I unlock my car and throw my bags on the passenger side before starting the engine and peeling out of the Ryder driveway.
Hopefully, I’ll never have to come back here again.
It’s still early when I get home so I focus on making a difference.
From now on, I’m not some pathetic girl. I’m independent. I don’t need Nate shoving food down my throat. I don’t need Jesse coming and checking up on me. I don’t need Nate constantly trying to save me. From now on, I’m done with him. Jesse though, he’s different. He’s managed to worm his way back in, and so far, he hasn’t done anything to tear me apart.
With the extra time before I head off to school, I jump online and set myself up an account with the grocery store. I put a whole heap of items in my shopping cart and work out a delivery time for this afternoon.
Next up. I need to work out how to change the code for the damn gate.
That takes me nearly an hour and before I know it, I’m running back out the door with my handbag tucked under my arm, desperate to get my ass to school before the warning bell.
I make it with all of two minutes to spare. I pull into a spot that’s not so far away this time and don’t bother looking around to see if he’s here yet. I don’t want to know.
“Hey,” Brooke laughs as she appears on the other side of my Audi. “You picked a better spot this morning.”
“Yeah, apparently, I don’t suck at driving as much now,” I say, trying my hardest to appear my usual happy self. “What’s going on? How was your night?”
A big grin comes over her face as she walks up to the school with me. “It was so good,” she says. “I was with Maxen for most of the afternoon until my mom demanded I come home.”
I roll my eyes. “Let me guess,” I say with a bit of a snap. “He screwed you up against the wall? Or maybe on the hood of his car?”
Her eyebrows pull down as she looks at me. “What’s up with you?” she questions. “You’re a bitch this morning.”
I let out a sigh. “I know,” I say. “I’m sorry. I’m just having a bad morning.”
“Why?” she asks. “What did the boof head brothers do now?”
“Nothing,” I say with a grunt as I choose not to tell her what had happened between us. “It’s just Nate up to his usual games.”
“Oh,” she says before putting her arm around my shoulder and giving me a tight squeeze. “Chin up. He’s probably done worse.”
If only she knew. “Yeah,” I grumble.
We get to our lockers and Brooke ducks across the hallway to throw her things in hers when Maxen grabs her around the waist and spins her around. He pushes her up against the locker and kisses her while she giggles and gives him everything she’s got.
I roll my eyes at the scene, hating that it reminds me of last night, so instead, I focus all my attention on jamming my things into my locker.
A hard body falls into the locker beside me and I look across to see Jesse grinning at me like an idiot. “What’s up?” he says.
I give him a hard glare, wondering if his grin is there because he was in on Nate’s little game as well. “If you’re here to be a jerk, then I don’t want to hear it,” I warn him.
He holds his hands up feigning innocence. “What did I do?” he questions. “I was just coming to see what’s going on. You weren’t at home this morning.”
I study him a little closer and realize that he doesn’t know, so I leave it that way. “It’s nothing,” I tell him. “I just needed my own space.”
The roles reverse and this time it’s him studying me. He leans in a little closer and glances around at the people in the hallway. “Is this about what happened at dinner last night?” he murmurs.
I press my lips together, unsure how to answer. I feel my eyes stinging with the need to shed a few more tears when the warning bell rings, saving me from another round of embarrassment. “I got to go,” I rush out before slipping out around him and taking off.