“You fuckingsmiledat me.”
“Jason, I don’t—”
“Do you want everyone to know?” His voice has dropped low, and he’s in my face now. “Is that what you want? For the whole school to know I—”
“No,” I say quickly, my eyes going wide. “Of course, I don’t want that. I’m sorry if—”
His fist connects with the side of my face before I know what’s happening, hard enough that I fall to the ground. I clutch my cheek, throbbing in pain, while tears fall from my eyes. “J-Jason?” I stutter, scooting back on the gravel when he takes a step forward.
He runs a hand through his short hair. “Shit,” he says. “Alex—”
“You hit me.”
“I didn’t mean to.” He crouches down in front of me and pulls me in, and I press my face against his chest and try my best to ignore the throbbing in my cheek and tell myself it’s okay. It was an accident.
He loves me,see?
“I’m sorry,” he says into my hair. “You know I can’t have people thinking—”
“I know,” I say. “It won’t happen again.”
“I know it won’t.”
He presses his lips to the top of my head, holding me tighter, and I close my eyes, fighting against the tears.
Now
Making the grocery list has become my worst nightmare.
Chicken. Brown rice. Greek yogurt that tastes like nothing, but Nate says is good protein. I stare at the list and try not to cry.
Seriously.
You don’t realize what you had until it’s gone, and I am really missing eating whatever I wanted before I decided to become whateverthisis.
“Mike!” I call out. “You need anything from the store?”
“Poptarts!” comes his response from somewhere in the house.
“I already got that!”
“I’m good then!”
I’m debating whether I actually need the protein powder Nate recommended when he strolls into the kitchen. I look up, the way I always do when he enters a room, but pause when I see him. “Is that my hoodie?”
Mike looks down at himself like he’s only now noticing what he’s wearing, even though it swallows him whole. “What? This old thing?”
“It’s mine.”
He hops up onto the counter, landing directly on my grocery list. “Is it?”
“Mike. That’s my hoodie.”
He looks down at it again, then back up at me with crinkly eyes and the beginning of a smile. “Mm. Well. It’s mine now.”
“No, it’s not, give it back.”
“If you want it back, you’ll have to take it.”
