What shocked me more was that over the next few hours I found myself no longer afraid of him. He went out of his way to make Lucy laugh. Every time I picked up something heavy, he quickly took it away from me and carried it to the truck himself. Drake the rock star might be a total prick, but apparently Drake the man was a gentleman.
I felt as if there was an invisible force pushing me toward him. Normally, I would have put on the E-brake fast. Rock stars were bad news. I had grown up with one after another warming my mother’s bed. I had seen firsthand how they treated people, and it wasn’t pretty. But for some reason I felt like Drake and Jesse were different.
Just as I felt that Shane and Nik were different when I met them later that day as they helped us unload the moving truck. They were all really nice, and I felt comfortable around them all. And Emmie? She reminded me of Layla a little. Someone who didn’t let anyone walk all over her, who didn’t let the world pull her down.
By the end of the day, I found myself crushing on Drake. It was crazy. He was thirty one, and I was seventeen. Sure, rockers dated younger women all the time, but I wasn’t going to be some rocker’s Priscilla to his Elvis. Nope, not going to happen!
Sunday was my homework day. I normally didn’t mind doing homework. Layla was a hard-ass about getting good grades, and it came easy for me. I studied hard and took extra classes. Since I had been living with Layla and I no longer had to spend so much time taking care of Lucy—something I had done from the day she was born up until our loser mother had died—I started taking the extra credit classes my high school offered. The classes were basic general studies classes for college, and at the end of this term I would have enough college credits to qualify as a sophomore when I actually started college.
Monday, I drove to school by myself for the first time. Layla was awesome. She was letting me drive her old Corolla so I didn’t have to transfer schools. It wasn’t that I would miss my friends; I spent so much time at school either studying or participating in the mandatory sports program—I had chosen track because I sucked at team sports—I didn’t have any friends. Not one.
Of course not having friends made it hard at school sometimes. None of the girls liked me because they either: A- thought I was a stuck up bitch because I refused to let them suck me into the everyday drama that tended to be a teenage girls life; or B- they thought I wanted their man. My answer was always C. I didn’t have time for anyone’s drama but my own, and I wouldn’t touch their boyfriends if they paid me. Not having friends had given me time to observe the goings-on of others around me, and I had discovered that most of the boyfriends that I was accused of wanting were total tools and were getting more side action than their girlfriends realized.
The day before, Layla had bought two new phones. She had given Lucy her old one in case of emergencies, but I got my own, along with an unlimited text plan to go with the internet and call plan. Of course I had given my number to Drake. I wasn’t sure how it had happened, but we had ended up texting back and forward until after midnight last night. And today, even though I knew he was supposed to be in the studio working on new material with the other guys of Demon’s Wings, we had been texting regularly.
During English he sent me a funny picture of his brother goofing off at lunch. Because I hadn’t been expecting it, I didn’t think to control my snort of laughter while my teacher was giving a boring lecture on the importance of a strong introduction to an essay. I hadn’t been paying attention because I had already taken college English 101 and passed it with an A. The only reason I was even in the guy’s class was because I had to have it to graduate.
“Miss Daniels, is there something you would like to share with the class?” The jerk asked in a nasally voice that always grates down my spine. Mr. Mills was in his late twenties with a Justin Bieber haircut, and most of the girls in the school squealed like the little girls they were when they found out they would have him for English. I wasn’t one of his fans and hadn’t made a secret of it—ever. Of course I felt like he didn’t like me and was always trying to single me out in embarrassing ways.
I slipped my phone between my book and notebook to hide it from the teacher. “No, Mr. Mills,” I assured him.
“Then perhaps you would like to tell us the best way to start a Compare/Contrast introduction.” His smirk told me he thought I couldn’t give him a good enough answer to satisfy him.
He was a little more pissy toward me than usual by the end of the class, after my five minute explanation for his question. When the bell rang, I was more than happy to grab my things and get out of the way. I ducked into the girls’ room before heading to my last class of the day and texted Drake back.
You made me LOL in English! Prick teacher hates me.
Within seconds Drake texted me back. Fuck! Sorry, Angel!
Don’t worry about it. See you later.?
That evening when I got home, Layla was more quiet than usual. Last night she had asked me about Drake, and I had shrugged it all off. He was my friend—my only friend! I wasn’t about to let her step in and ruin it because she felt like I couldn’t handle myself; even if my feelings for the rocker were stronger than mere friendship. I brushed it off as just a silly infatuation.
After dinner, I texted Drake to ask if he wanted to come enjoy the night air with me. It was still warm out at night, and I was feeling suffocated inside the guest house. When he texted me back saying that he would be right out, I gathered up a sheet and all the little candles we had.
By the time he met me in the yard, which separated the guesthouse from the main house, I had it all set up. It looked romantic and I had to keep reminding myself that nothing about Drake and my relationship was romantic. He would run for the hills if he knew I was crushing on him, and really I couldn’t blame him. He must have had plenty of that drama in his life being a rocker.
Drake surprised me when he produced a sketch book and a set of charcoal sketching pencils. “Can I draw you?” he asked, sounding a little unsure.
“Sure. If you want to…I didn’t know you could draw.” I arranged myself on the sheet so I could watch him over the sketch pad while he worked.
His fingers moved fast and with obvious skill. I ached to see what he was drawing. The concentration on his face as he watched me made me ache for a different reason altogether.
“It’s something I do as a stress reliever,” he said after a few minutes. “Art was my favorite class in school. For my eighth birthday my dad got me a professional art kit. It had paint and charcoal and a million other things that an eight year old doesn’t understand how to use.” He smiled and I could see the little boy that he had been shining in those blue-gray eyes. “My mom argued that it was too expensive, that it would be destroyed by the end of the day, but I took care of it and found that I really liked using the charcoal to draw. When I was thirteen, I entered an art festival in town and actually won a hundred dollars by coming in second place in the art show.”