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“Shh!” She clamped a hand over my hand and shuddered violently. “I can figure it out without the finer details.”
“I don’t know why I let it happen,” I admitted when she dropped her hand from my mouth. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
“Why?” She stared at me like she didn’t know me. Like I was a stranger instead of the person she’d spent her whole life with. “Why would you be with her, Gerard?”
“I don’t know,” I offered, feeling helpless. “There’s something fucking wrong with me in the head.”
“Why?”
You know. “I don’t know, Claire.”
“You have to know.”
Tell her. “I don’t have an answer for you.”
She didn’t respond to that, but she didn’t run away, either. Instead, she sat in the middle of my bed, with the sheets wrapped around her and stared at her hands.
“What are you thinking?” I asked when I couldn’t take another minute of her silence.
“I’m thinking,” she began to say, only to pause. “I’m thinking…” Shaking her head, she balled her small hands into fists and glared at me. “I’m thinking she’s going to get into a hell of a lot of trouble for going anywhere near my boyfriend!”
“Whoa, Claire,” I quickly tried to reason with her, but I could tell by the way she bolted off my bed and started to dress that it wouldn’t be easy. “You can’t tell anyone.”
“Can’t tell anyone?” She looked at me like I had two heads. “Gerard, she’s a grown-up, in an authoritative role, who’s been making moves on a student!” Sounding furious, she quickly threw on her school uniform before searching my bedroom floor for her shoes. “She’s not getting away with this, Gerard.”
“Claire, I told you because I didn’t want secrets between us, not because I needed you to storm in and save me,” I snapped, feeling myself go on the defensive. “I don’t need you to do anything, okay?”
“Well, someone needs to.”
“Don’t do anything,” I warned shakily. “This is my business, not anyone else’s.”
“Gerard, she shouldn’t have laid a finger on you!”
“I know that,” I snapped back and then dragged a hand through my hair in frustration. “But it’s over and done with now, so let it go.”
“No, it’s not.” She shook her head. “Because if your mother knew—”
“Jesus Christ, Claire, I’m trying to talk to you here and you’re not listening to me! You’re not hearing me, dammit!”
“I am hearing you, Gerard.”
“Then keep your mouth shut,” I strangled out. “I don’t need action. I just needed you to know, okay? I thought I was doing the right thing by telling you, but clearly, I was wrong. Either way, I told you that in confidence, so don’t screw me over by telling anyone, Claire.”
“She screwed you over, Gerard,” Claire urged, throwing her hands up in despair. “Dee did that to you, not me!”
69
Payback’s a Biggs
CLAIRE
Beyond furious, I stormed into Tommen on the Friday morning of Christmas break, feeling none of my usual peppiness or good cheer. The school’s winter ball was happening later tonight, and usually, I cared deeply about social events, but I was too blown away by the bombshell Gerard dropped on me earlier to give a shit about dances.
Gerard thought I was overreacting massively.
I thought he was underreacting colossally.
This was sick.
