Hands shaking, I released his shirt and plopped down into my seat, rubbing my face with my hands, my tattooed, poser hands.
“Whoa, you sure Gabe needs more coffee?” Kiersten joked setting a cup of black liquid in front of me. “Maybe you do need sex.”
I groaned into my hands.
“Gabe.” A warm hand touched mine. I peeked through my fingers to see Kiersten’s warm smile. “Is everything okay? You know you can talk to me, right? Is that why you wanted to meet?”
Damn it, Wes. Lies. More lies. How many more before my soul was black as hell? “Yeah,” I croaked. “I um, wanted to talk to you guys about Lisa’s birthday. It’s coming up and I thought we could do something fun.”
“Oh yay! I totally forgot!” Kiersten clapped her hands together and began talking wildly about surprise party ideas while Wes met my gaze next to her, and mouthed, Thank you.
I nodded.
An hour later, Kiersten finally left for class. I’d consumed at least three cups of coffee and was exhausted. On a good note, the Home hadn’t called, so that meant Princess was alright — for now.
Wes leaned back in his chair and sighed. “Let’s walk.”
“I’d rather punch you in the face,” I sang. “But sure, walking’s a good alternative.”
Wes smirked. “You’re kind of an ass, you know that?”
“Part of my charm.”
“Maybe that’s it.” He snorted. “Haven’t been using much of that charm lately, hmm?”
“Shut it.”
We walked out of the coffee shop and slowly made our way back toward the dorms.
“So, Saylor’s cute.”
If this was his idea of small talk he had another thing coming.
“So are cats. Doesn’t mean I want to buy ten then die alone with my hand down my pants.”
“Dude.” Wes shook his head. “Worse visual ever.”
“What?” I kicked a pinecone and shoved my hands in my pockets. “Besides, she’s annoying as hell, and she’s not even cute.” Oh look, more lies. I should make a career out of it. Cool, so my future was that of a con artist, not a far mark from reality.
Wes dropped it, not saying anything while we made the trek all the way back to the girls’ dorms. Then finally said, “Are you sure you don’t think she’s cute?”
Irritated, I raised my voice. “Wes, Saylor is the most annoying, irritating, undesirable girl I’ve come across in the past four years since being here at school — and that’s saying a lot. Drop it, man. Besides, I thought we were going to talk.”
Someone gasped next to me.
I turned and came face to face with Saylor. Her eyes blurred with a mixture of tears and hostility as she pushed between us toward the door to the lobby.
The door slammed behind her
Wes winced. “Think she heard?”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I wanted to hit him, to hit something.
His eyes flashed. “Can I be honest?”
“I’d rather you just not talk for a while, but sure,” I grumbled, fingers itching to rearrange his smug face.
He shrugged. “If you can’t even be honest about who you’re attracted to — with your best friend, then we have no business talking about your past. You’re not ready. You want to tell me out of guilt. I want you to tell me because you want to. Because you want help — because you need it — not because it’s time you told me. Hell, I know most of it anyway.”