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Chapter Twenty-Nine
Candy
I sit down at the café with a heavy sigh, throwing my purse onto the chair beside me and rocking my head into my hands. With my elbows resting on the table, I can block out the rest of the world, try to pretend that everything is normal.
But it’s not normal. The photograph, and the surrounding scandal, were picked up by another local news outlet and another, and they even made it to the campus paper’s site as well. Which means that all day long, people have been recognizing me as they walk by, commenting about me behind their hands. Some people weren’t even that subtle. They laughed right in my face or proudly proclaimed to their friends that I was that girl from the paper.
Not that all of the attention has been bad. Yes, it’s horrible to have everyone staring at me, especially the ones who look at me with expressions of disgust or mockery. But there have been a few – a small few – who wanted to high five me or congratulate me on living my best life. Whether that was genuine or sarcastic, I had a hard time figuring out – but I decided to take it as genuine just for my own sanity.
Either way, I had to get out of there, at least for a while. I couldn’t bear to stand the scrutiny any longer, so after class was over, I headed out here. The café is only a short walk from the campus, but the important thing is that it’s off campus. And while there is a chance that I might see some students here, or that someone might actually recognize me from the local paper, it’s a lower chance. If they do, it’s even less likely that they will try to talk to me about it or laugh behind my back.
Which is why it’s so surprising when I hear the rattle of the chair opposite me moving back, and someone sitting down at the table with me, their hand lightly brushing the side of my arm to let me know that they are there.
I look up with a start, wondering who the hell has seen fit to bother me when I’m just trying to enjoy a coffee on my own. But it’s not a stranger or even a fellow student at all. Its Finn.
Its Finn.
I feel the heat rising up into my cheeks at the sight of him, my heart pounding in my chest. He’s the last person I expected to see, and even though I know I’m supposed to be trying to avoid him, I instantly feel so much better to know that he’s here with me. It’s like the day’s troubles melt away – even though he’s the cause of them, and it should only make me feel worse to be seen out in public with him again.
“Finn,” I blurt out. “What are you doing here?”
He winces, and I realize that I probably could have said that in a nicer way. But it’s my shock talking – and really, I shouldn’t be trying to be nice to him. I should be trying to put him off so that he can repair his relationship with his daughter. The relationship that really matters in all of this.
Even if it makes me feel sick to my stomach to attempt to convince myself that what we were starting to have between us doesn’t matter.
“I followed you,” he says. “Not in a creepy way. Well, not totally.”
“I’m going to need an explanation on that ‘not totally’,” I tell him, unconvinced.
“I was waiting for a chance to see you, off campus,” Finn says. “You haven’t been answering my calls, so I couldn’t ask you to come and see me.”
“I thought that was for the best,” I say, avoiding his eyes and looking down into my coffee cup.
“I really wanted to talk to you,” he says and pauses before continuing. “I knew what time your class was finishing – you’re in the same major as Lexie, so it wasn’t hard to figure out. I parked across the street and watched the front of the college campus, just waiting to see if you would walk by.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I tell him raising an eyebrow. “How could you even know that I was going to walk by that way?”
“I didn’t,” Finn admits. “I just had to take a chance. The only other way I could get to you would be by walking onto campus and going to your dorm, and after yesterday…”
“You didn’t want an audience?” I ask, feeling a little bitter at the thought.
“I didn’t want Lexie to see us together again,” Finn corrects me. “I thought there was a chance she might go back to your room, at least to collect something. I didn’t want to run into her at exactly that moment and make her angry all over again. I figured if there’s anything I’ve learned from sitcoms, it’s that she would absolutely turn up at the same time, and I couldn’t risk it.”
