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“Can we get going? If I’m late to class, I really will kill you both.”
“Told you,” Stephanie said. Nathan chuckled and drove off from the curb.
The conversation strayed from the teasing and turned into normal talk about classes and what they did last night. Things to fill the air but nothing with enough substance to remember later on. Just easy and simple and a little bit of pouting from Tully until she relaxed, likely attributed to the fact that they weren’t going to be late for class. When they did pull into the parking lot, they still had ten minutes before the first bell.
Stephanie was the first out of the car, less inclined to pay attention to the curious eyes of their peers. Nathan glanced towards Tully, who was more hesitant. He could see how much having the attention on her made her uncomfortable. He felt it in the hallway on Wednesday when she had tensed as others looked at them—so he had done what he could to distract her. She wasn’t like her sister, who would do just about anything to make sure that she was the center of attention. Compared to the destructive wildfire that was Joliet, Tully was a summer rain. Luckily for her, and perhaps unluckily for Joliet, he preferred the softness of water over the scorch of a wildfire. They were complete opposites, it seemed, in about every way.
“You ready?” he asked, and she turned to him. Despite the energy her body gave off, her face was exceptionally good at hiding whatever she felt behind it. A perfectly composed mask. She grabbed the handle and opened her door.
“Hurry up, Rondeau,” she said. “You’re graded on attendance too, you know?”
His mouth dropped open slightly as she left the car and shut the door. Was that a joke?
He couldn’t tell from her face, but it felt like a joke.
She and Stephanie were about to walk away by the time he got out of the car. Not on his watch. He had plans he had to keep to.
“Hold up,” he called out, and they stopped and turned. Tully raised a brow and crossed her arms. He shifted his Letterman jacket until it was off his shoulders as he approached. Her eyes narrowed.
“What are you doing?”
He answered by slinging the jacket over her shoulders and encouraging her to put her arms through the holes. She didn’t though. She just stared at him like he was crazy, with her lips twisted. He scoffed. “Come on, angel. You should know exactly what I’m doing by now.”
“And that is my cue to leave,” Stephanie announced, and left them standing there—him still holding the jacket around her and Tully still not putting it on.
She narrowed her eyes. He narrowed his. Silently, without words, they had a battle—both too determined to give in. Maybe it was the attention on them, but something broke down her will and Tully finally sighed and gave in, slipping her arms in the sleeves and adjusting it around her. It was slightly too big but turned out that purple was definitely her color. It worked well against her pale skin and chestnut curls.
“You teach me, and I’ll teach you,” Nathan said and jutted his chin down. “Pop quiz: What should you be doing right now?”
Tully gave a deep sigh, then, like a light switch turning on, she gave him that same bright grin with all the sarcastic undertones. Her brown eyes crinkled and her lovely dimples came out.
Nathan smiled, proud because no one else but him would know that the lovey-dovey smile was purely an act. “Fast learner,” he said.
“One of us has to be,” she snapped back, and Nathan chuckled.
“Okay, smartass. Let’s go.”
He slung his arm over her shoulder and led her towards the school. He walked her to class, just like he did before because even if he was graded on attendance he figured she would be more comfortable with the attention if she wasn’t completely alone.
eighteen
tully
Even if she cared very little about the actual basketball game, Tully liked game day. Mainly because they got to skip most of their third class to go to the pep rally before lunch. Not even Tully would turn down a free pass out of class.
She gathered her books, pulled on Nathan’s jacket, and followed the rest of her classmates out of the room and into the natural flow of movement toward the gym.
Nathan’s jacket was surprisingly comfortable, even though it didn’t look like it. Yes, it did draw a lot of attention, but she expected it. The girlfriends of basketball players always wear their boyfriends’ jackets on game day.
It was probably the clearest announcement in this school that a couple could make that they were official. Josie Meyers wore John Webber’s over her cheer uniform—Cynthia Lowe wore Patrick Hugh’s—and so forth. Tully was just another one now, even if it wasn’t real, even if people were a little more curious about who wore the purple jacket with ‘Rondeau’ embroidered on it than the other girlfriends’. Because no one had worn this one except for Nathan, and now her.
She was getting used to the eyes by now, including the glares. Weirdly enough, drowning in Nathan’s jacket made her feel a little better. She wasn’t sure why. It could be the surprising smell of cinnamon that lingered on it, which she realized now was similar to his house.
“I like him.”
Tully turned to look at her friend, startled by her sudden appearance. Stephanie was fully decked out in her color guard getup, adjusting her little white beret as she walked.
“Like who?”
