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“I know,” he says. “I’m just joking. I’d prefer a broken rib over my heart not beating.”
“You and me both,” I tell him. “Now, answer the question. What can I do for Puck?”
“Honestly, you probably don’t need to do anything,” he says. “He’d be happy just seeing you walking around making the most of life.”
“Lame. I want to give him something good.”
“Alright, fine. Let me think about it,” he says before groaning. “Mom’s back. I better go.”
“K.”
“Leave your window open,” he tells me “I’ll slip in tonight.”
“No,” I rush out before he ends the call. “You can’t, not with a broken rib.”
“See you tonight,” he says, ignoring my objections. The line quickly goes dead before I have a chance to fight him on it.
I put the phone down and enjoy the rest of my bath. When the water starts to run cold, I get myself out and pull the plug. I take my Kindle back to my room, unlock my door, and curl up in my bed like I’ve been dying to do for the past few days.
I get lost in a book before my tired eyes grow heavy and I fall into a well needed sleep.
An hour later, two strong arms curl around me and pull me in hard. “I love you,” Nate whispers before pressing a gentle kiss to my forehead.
A dreamy smile crosses my lips as everything finally feels perfectly right in the world. With a sigh, I nuzzle my face into his chest, being careful not to hurt him and tell him my absolute truth. “I love you too,” I say before instantly falling straight back to sleep.
Chapter 12
From the second I pull up at school on Tuesday morning, I have people I’ve never spoken to in my life hurrying up to me. “Tora,” some girl I’ve never met cries as she stops me in the parking lot. The strange girl with tears in her eyes throws her arms around. “Oh, my god. I’m so happy you’re ok. I thought that maybe… you know.”
“Well, I’m not,” I tell her, grabbing her by the shoulders and pushing her back off me. I don’t want to be dealing with this stuff all day, especially after I woke up to find Nate already gone this morning. I mean, that’s only ever happened once. I didn’t like it then, and I sure as hell didn’t like it now. But with my dad back… I guess things will be changing. I can’t believe I’m going to say this but, maybe it’s better if he goes back to London.
I step around the girl and dodge another before making my way up to the school. I get looks from every single person in the school. I mean, does everyone know about the fire? I guess most of the seniors and juniors were there and probably saw it, but all the younger kids?
This sucks.
I push my way through the door and walk down to my locker to find a candlelight massacre before it. There’s spray paint across it saying ‘R.I.P’, flowers taped to the metal, teddy bears on the ground with scented candles which only serves to give me a headache. “Oh, man,” I groan as I start grabbing candles and blowing them out. This is so damn embarrassing.
“Oh, Tora,” I hear cried over the sound of everything else happening in this hallway. I look up to find Mrs. Kingsley hurrying down the hall with a large trash bag. “I’m so sorry you had to see all this,” she says when she finally reaches me. “I thought I’d be able to get it cleaned up before you arrived.”
Clearly, you didn’t.
“It’s ok,” I tell her with a heavy sigh as I grab a teddy bear off the ground and dump it into the trash bag.
“How are you recovering?” she asks. “Your mom phoned the school to say you were doing ok, but I wanted to check in with you anyway. It must have been scary.”
“Scary doesn’t even begin to cover it,” I grunt as she tears flowers from the locker and throws them in. “Terrifying is more like it. I thought I was done for.”
“I can only imagine,” she tells me, giving me a look filled with sympathy. “I know it’s probably not your thing, but remember that we have a school counselor that you can talk to. I know she’s been very busy lately with students believing the worst.”
“I bet,” I grunt, dropping a candle in the bag with maybe a little too much force.
“What about Nate?” she questions. “I heard he suffered a broken rib.”
“Yeah,” I say. “He can handle it. It’s certainly not his first broken rib and I’m sure as hell it won’t be the last.”
“Oh, yes,” she chuckles as the designated goth student walks past. The girl gasps at me with wide, horrified eyes, before clutching a cross at her neck and holding it out towards me as though she’s going to fend me off with her beliefs.
