The last part was still off-limits to me. I didn’t think about my parents. I couldn’t. Every time I did, the same hysteria and rage bubbled inside of me, but that had also changed after that night. I’d been shut off from what they had done to me. I was angry with them. Duh. That was a no-brainer and I didn’t need a therapist to tell me that, but I’d been numb to their damage. Since Jesse’s house, I couldn’t do that anymore.
I felt my rage towards them, but it was banked. It was always there, in the bottom of my gut. It was simmering but manageable. Because of that, I snapped at people more. Beth got it a few times when we had dinner in the cafeteria. Jesse got it too. Hannah just snapped back at me. It didn’t seem to faze her. The only benefit was that Jamie watched how he talked to me. I knew most of it was because of that time in the cafeteria, when I let him really see the storm warring inside of me, but I lashed out at him a few more times when we finished our project.
Cord was quiet around me. Jesse told me that Cord blamed himself for my outburst. It happened after his dig at Jesse so he figured two plus two equaled him. It didn’t. The truth was that I didn’t know why I snapped, but I had and things hadn’t been the same since. For me.
“This blows. Let’s go.”
Jerked back from my wandering thoughts, I stared across the table. Hannah threw her leg up on it and leaned back. Stretching her arms up and wide, she arched her back and sent a wink at a table of guys behind us.
“Shhh!”
She flipped off the girl, at the table beside us.
“Do not get us banned from the library,” Beth warned her cousin, slumped down in her own chair as she peeked over the edge of her book. “I need this place to survive the midterms this week.”
“Whatever. Robbie’s having a party. Who wants to go?”
I became engrossed with my laptop while Beth jerked back down underneath her book cover.
Hannah sighed in disgust. “You guys suck.”
Beth smirked back. “We may suck right now, but we’re going to have passing grades next week. You won’t and you’ll be crying your misery to me over a beer.”
“At least I’ll be drinking.”
“Drinking and failing. Do you want Tiffany to have more ammunition over you?”
Hannah pointedly ignored that last curve thrown to her. She straightened in her chair, arched her neck out, and sent another flirty glance over her shoulder as the edge of her shirt slipped down to bare her arm. She didn’t pull it back up as she muttered to us, “I’m more in the mood for Club T.”
I glanced over. Beth was sitting next to me and she froze at the club’s name. I’d gone back a few more times with them to learn that someone was there, someone that Beth searched for and disappeared with for an hour each time. Hannah would go to the dance floor, grind against guys. I would hold down the base at a table nearby with our drinks on a tray, ready for Beth and Hannah to grab. When Beth was done with whatever she did, she’d return and keep me company. I had been told that Beth had an itch to scratch when she went there, but it was more than that. Beth was seeing a guy, who was always at Club T, who was only at Club T. I could imagine Hannah in my place as she’d pump her cousin for information, and when none was given, she’d smirk as she taunted, “Growing more and more curious. Who’s the dick you crave?”
But Beth didn’t rise to the bait. She slunk back in her seat and Hannah’s disappointment was noted. She snapped, “Jeesuz, you are pissing me off. I never took you guys for being nerds.”
Beth sent her cousin a dark look. “Do not start quoting your sister at me.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
So Tiffany called Beth a nerd? I wasn’t surprised.
“Alex.”
Hannah had turned her mission my way. I glared at Beth, who gave me a smug look back. “What?”
“Wanna go to Club T?”
“No.”
“You’re just like my cousin! Losers.” But the grin Hannah was sporting negated what she said. “Fine.” Standing up, she winked at the guys one more time. “I’m going to roam. See you two in a bit.”
As she left, one of the guys darted behind her. They disappeared around the corner to the restrooms.
“Great. I wanted to go to the bathroom.”
Beth had been watching too. She nodded in the opposite direction. “There’s a bathroom in the back section of the library. I use that one sometimes. No one goes back there so no one knows it’s there.”
“Yeah, all right.”
Our library had six stories with crooks and crannies all over. To be honest, it could be a scary place to walk around. People could hide for days if they wanted and I heard stories where people did. So after I found the bathrooms Beth had been referring, I shouldn’t have been surprised to hear Jesse’s voice behind a bookshelf in the very far section.
We hadn’t seen much of each other over the past week, both of us studying for midterms coming up. A thrill went through me as I started for him, but when I heard a soft feminine voice, I careened to a stop. There were two bookshelves between us and I hunched down. I was eavesdropping. I wasn’t ashamed.
I heard the girl saying, “I just saw my sister in the front section. And guess what she was doing?”
Jesse murmured, distracted, “Studying?”
She snorted. “I wish. She was flirting with an entire table of guys. Can you believe that?”
Oh. My stomach settled with a crash. Tiffany Chatsworth. And she was alone with Jesse, in a very private corner of the building. A rollercoaster started inside of me, but we weren’t exclusive. I had to keep reminding myself. But still. After Jamie had asked him not to touch her.