Two Roads (5 page)

I respond immediately, relieved to have something to distract myself with. This of course is not my first email conversation with Logan, or my second, or my third. Our email thread count is way more than is socially acceptable. We tend to have these very elaborate, insult-driven conversations about murdering each other nearly every day.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: RE: Miss me yet?

The feeling is mutual. I hope you get speared by a marlin.

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: RE: Miss me yet?

How would that even work? I don’t fish.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: RE: RE: RE: Miss me yet?

Then I will teach myself to fish and catch one just so I can bring it to your house and stab you with it.

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: Miss me yet?

In which case I will also learn to fish and catch a marlin so I can duel you with it. And I will win, obviously, so you will be dead on my kitchen floor.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: Cool

Okay, but how do you plan to hide my body?

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: Cool

The same way I plan to kill you.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: RE: RE: Cool

So you’re going to stuff my dead body into a marlin? How thoughtful. I should be flattered that you spend so much time thinking about killing me.

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: RE: RE: Cool

You really should be. It’s a very flattering thing to have me want to kill you. It’s how I show my appreciation.

BTW, I hope you liked my note earlier. It came straight from the heart.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: Cool

I did like the note. And as a thank you, I’ll ensure that you die a slow, painful death. Or better yet, I’ll get your math book to come alive and strangle you. I’m sure you’d love that.

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Cool

Of course. And you know me. I’d love it even more if the book told me equations and theorems and everything while it strangled me. Sounds like my kind of party.

Okay, I admit, that makes me smile. I glance up from my phone. The smell of chocolate syrup and whipped cream fills the air, and as I look around the room, I wonder what it would be like to be myself, to stop constantly lying about all the things I am and am not, to fall in love and make real friends and just be accepted for me. But I know, deep down, that I can’t. I like this mean girl exterior. I like this girl who can’t be fazed.

My phone beeps again, but this time it’s a text from Lindsay. I force myself to answer it.
did you hear??
she writes.

what?
I say, not really interested in the answer.

Marcy hooked up with Harrison!

NO. EFFING. WAY. what a slut,
I type, cringing as I say it.

I know, right? she’s pathetic.

totally.

poor Dex… she cheats on him the day after they get together!

I know. crazy.

agreed.

The other customers in the ice cream shop begin filing out at almost the exact same time, and I’m about to go back to emailing Logan when I catch a guy watching me as everyone else exits the store. He and I are the only ones left here. He smiles when I meet his gaze, one of those obnoxiously cocky smiles, so I give him my “not interested” glare and go back to typing a reply to Logan.

from: Cali Monroe

to: Logan Waters

subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Cool

This whole textbook strangling you business can be arranged. I’m glad we’ve finally overcome our impasse.

He responds immediately.

from: Logan Waters

to: Cali Monroe

subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: Cool

Me too, dickhead. Me too.

As soon as I finish reading the email, I look back over at the guy, hoping he took the hint and disappeared with his friends. He didn’t, though--not even close. This idiot does not let up. He keeps looking at me, his smile growing, and I have this sudden urge to walk right up there and punch that smug look off of his face. I am really not in the mood to be ogled at. The guy is brown-haired and green-eyed, with a face that is hot in a disgusting, way-too-arrogant kind of way. He still hasn’t stopped staring at me, his eyes full of pathetically shallow lust, and I do the only thing I can think to do: I give him the finger.

Immediately, I drop my gaze back to my ice cream, assuming I shut him up for good and he’ll stop leering at me like he’s a freaking creeper and I am a Barbie doll, but it has the opposite effect. He starts to get out his seat, those green eyes trained on me the entire damn time, and then he begins approaching me, looking even more amused than before. I glare right back at him to show my disinterest, but he either doesn’t catch the hint or doesn’t care.

I feel sick to my stomach by the time Creeper Boy slides into the chair in front of me, smiling that “I’m hot and I know it” smile that pisses me off so much. “Hey,” he says, parting his hair with his hands and stretching out his arms in front of me. I half-expect him to reach out and touch me, in which case let’s just say he will be hurting
all over
when he wakes up in the morning.

I set aside my phone. “Do you want something?” I hiss. A sense of dread creeps inside me.

“Actually, I do.” He leans forward and gives me a quick wink as if he seriously does not notice the disgust in my eyes. Then he says, “Rumor has it you’re great in bed and aren’t looking for a relationship. You sound like exactly what I want. I’d like a piece of that action.” A huge smile spreads across his lips as the words slip out of his mouth, and my heart rate immediately speeds up.
Shit
. This idiot probably heard my constant bragging about my nonexistent sex life, and now he thinks I’m perfect for screwing.

My toes curl. Shit shit shit. This is not happening. This is
so
not happening.

“Sorry,” I say, smiling sweetly, acting way calmer than I really feel. “The stripper alley is elsewhere.”

He licks his lips and moves his jaw in closer. “Too bad I didn’t come for the stripper alley,” he whispers, his breath reeking of alcohol.

I want to hit him so incredibly badly right now, but I decide to play along, biting down on my tongue and hoping he leaves. “Then what did you come for?” I say softly, innocently, and I see his smile grow. My heart sinks further.

“I came for you,” he whispers. “Naked, preferably. I saw the way you were looking at me, how you wanted me.”

No no no no.

Now it’s my turn to smile, but I make sure the total hatred behind it is evident. I lean in toward him, too, my heart pounding in fear, and now our lips are right in front of each other. His smell like alcohol and death, just like the rest of him. “You know what I want to do?”

“What?” he asks, all coy and horny and disgusting.

My insides tighten up. I need to get rid of him. Need to get out of here. Need to-- “I want you to go to your friends,” I whisper in my best seductive voice. It seems to work on him too, because I see the heat in his face, see his ears shrink back, see the cloudy desire in his eyes. My fists clench at my side, and I have to force myself to breathe evenly. “And I want you to tell them that you are a pathetic waste of space and that you got rejected.” At that, I shove him away from me and fall back into my chair, taking a slow bite of my ice cream.

At first, Creeper Boy looks completely pissed. He narrows his eyes and tightens his jaw, and I half expect him to lunge at me. But he doesn’t. A few seconds pass and he takes a deep breath. Just like that, the anger evaporates from his face and he
smiles
. Literally smiles. That same, disgustingly smug look.

Shit
.

“Feisty one, I see,” he says in what he seems to think is a sexy voice, even though it really just sounds like that of a drunk twenty-year-old boy--which, as luck would have it, is exactly what it is. “Good thing I like feisty.” He winks at me. Again.

Bile rises in my throat.

This is not happening.

This is not.

I start to retaliate in a similar passive-aggressive-sweet kind of way, but I’m really too scared to play along anymore so I just go right for the gold. I make a clicking sound with my tongue, lock eyes with him, and hiss, “Fuck you.”

Still, he doesn’t take the hint.

“You’d like to do that, wouldn’t you,” he says, and I clutch my ice cream cup tighter, resisting the urge to punch him right then and there. He starts leaning over the table, pursing his lips like he’s about to kiss me, and now I’m really freaking out. “I know a little place where we can get away.”

“You have one last chance to leave now,” I say through gritted teeth. My heart is racing now.
Someone get him away from me.
Desperately, I glance around the shop for help, for any sort of way out. But no one is here. The only other person is the old lady behind the cash register on the other end of the room, and she’s too preoccupied with her nails to notice me. Creeper Boy keeps reaching out over the table so that his hands are near my face, my chest, my whole body.

“We only need one chance, baby,” he whispers, shoving his lips at mine, his hand grabbing at my arm and squeezing hard and I’m sure leaving a bruise, and so I do the only thing I can think to do: I grab my ice cream that is way more ice than actual cream, and I shove it right into his face. Hard. He grunts a little, starts to stumble backwards, the ice cream completely covering his face, and I stand up and give him a good kick to the shins. He yelps and collapses to the ground with a thud, his hands immediately clutching at his foot. The cashier starts looking at us now, but still, she does nothing.

With the adrenaline pumping, I grab my phone off the table, pick up my now half-empty ice cream cup, and I bend down and whisper into his ear, “How’s that for a last chance?” Then, I shove the rest of the ice cream into his face. I abandon him there, relieved beyond belief to have escaped.

He is still gasping for breath as I race to the front door.

“Fuck you!” he grunts behind me, but I don’t pay any attention.

“Sure thing,” I say, and then I slam the front door shut behind me, leaving the room to silence.

As soon as I’m outside, a huge breath of relief escapes me. The blood in my head continues to pound, and I close my eyes, letting the fear slip out. After I catch my breath, I start walking along the sidewalk, hoping like hell that Creeper Boy doesn’t chase after me. The area is pretty much deserted aside from the blazing sun above and a few cars in the parking lot, and I walk along the buildings in town on my way back to the apartment, closing my eyes and sighing here and there. I try to let the fresh air clear my thoughts, but all I can see is Creeper Boy’s arrogant smile.

This is not the first time something like that has happened to me. My bragging about fake hookups has only led me to trouble, but I can’t bring myself to stop it, either--because it makes me forget about Ben. Because it makes me belong.

I’ve learned to deal with these guys, of course. I’ve stamped on a lot of feet, kicked a bunch of stomachs, flat-out punched more than I care to admit, and so on, but at the same time, the terror does not ever leave. I’m anything but a badass, but when it comes to fending off horny guys? Let’s just say that the only place those guys ended up was the ground--and not in the way they wanted.

It’s scary, though. To me, sex with these random strangers feels wrong--and not in the “so wrong, it’s right” kind of way. I’m talking just flat-out, disgusting-feeling kind of wrong. It’s like a part of me is holding out for someone, is waiting for the right person to trust with my heart like that, which is ridiculous because I doubt I can ever trust anyone with my heart again. Not when death just rips it right back out.

I lick some of the remaining chocolate ice cream off of my lips, trying to distract myself, as I jog past a grocery store, past a DVD store, and then turn the corner onto the road where my apartment is located. I slow, taking a breath, and start to speed up again when someone steps out of the shadows.

I almost jump--almost--half-thinking Creeper Boy has somehow returned, but then I recognize Logan standing there.

For one long instant, seeing him feels like the most comforting thing in the world. Everything stops when I look at Logan. The pounding of my heart, the fear, the worry--it all leaves--because when it comes to this bastard, it’s only our rivalry that matters. I hate him, I hate him so damn much, but he is different than most guys. He doesn’t look at me like Creeper Boy did with all that lust-filled arrogance. He smirks at me, sure, but there is a certain warmth to it, a welcomeness that is so freaking relieving and I just want to take four seconds away from everything else, to just sit down beside him and say nothing, do nothing, feel nothing but him.

Logan is safe.

But Logan also pisses me the hell off.

“Fancy meeting you here,” I say, narrowing my eyes. My face falls effortlessly into a sneer.

Logan leans against the side of a building, his dark falling over the tips of his forehead, his arms crossed over his “I’m not being obtuse, but you’re acute girl” math pick-up line t-shirt. I almost roll my eyes when I read it--so corny and exactly like Logan. He holds his phone in his hand, and he looks at me without emotion, his eyebrows furrowed.

“Yes,” he says slowly. “Fancy.”

“Your voice makes me sick,” I say and stop walking altogether. I decide to let myself sink into insulting him, because insulting Logan Waters feels good, feels safe and endearing.