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Connor straightened his jacket, but the perfectly curated mask had already cracked.
“Because it’s okay to talk to me when no one else is around?” Mortifying, hot tears filled my eyes, ones that burned with anger more than sadness. I shoved at him again, but this time, he’d planted his feet firmly. He didn’t even knock back a step. “That’s why you don’t stand up for me when your girlfriend’s being a jerk. Why you pretend like I don’t exist. Why you wanteddiscretion. Because heaven forbid anyone connects you to Maisie Matthews. Well, guess what? I don’t want to talk to you, even when no one’s around to witness it.”
Connor’s hazel eyes grew hotter and hotter as I spoke, as if the fire burning my skin had transferred to him. “If I had said something at the diner, it would’ve been worse. Jade never would’ve let it go.”
“Oh,please,” I scoffed. “That’s just an excuse. Your way of letting yourself off the hook for being a jerk.”
Connor stared at the blinking taillights of his SUV, as if this time,hewas the one fighting for patience. “If you want to be angry, be angry at your idiotic boyfriend. What kind of guy would ditch his date to hang out with people he barely knows? Real winner, right there.”
His words were like a bucket of ice water. I tried to latch onto the anger that’d engulfed me mere seconds before, because anything was better than the sting of rejection, but it slipped through my fingers. “He wants his fifteen minutes of high school fame.”
“And he’s going to sacrifice you to get it?”
Earlier in the week when Alex had first broached the topic—do you ever just feel like we’re different?—I thought it’d be a subject brought up for us to move on from, to grow closer about. Tonight, though, the conversation seemed more and more like a nail in the coffin of our relationship.
The summer breeze coasted across my face, drying my eyes, its way of sayingthere, there.
“Come on.” Connor took a step backward, gesturing toward his car. He seemed to sense my wavering resolve, acting on it. “Let me drive you home. Or at least to Brentwood limits.”
I wanted to yell at him again and tell him that he needed to take no for an answer, but it required too much energy. My anger had been a sparkler, and now it was all burned out. “You’re going to risk being seen with me?”
“You can duck down when we see a car.”
I didn’t check to find out whether or not he was teasing. He probably wasn’t. Walking home alone with nothing but my thoughts in the dark became an unbearable idea. Standing before me, in a way I never saw coming, Connor Bray was my last resort.
So, I started toward the red headlights and beacon of escape, defeat and hypocrisy, two things that made my limbs almost too heavy to move.
Connor drove slowly through Jefferson’s residential district, tapping his fingers to the stream of music coming from the stereo. It wasn’t The Cars this time, but a band I didn’t recognize. Loud enough to make out the words, but soft enough to speak over if either of us wanted.
In our realm of quiet, I couldn’t help but imagine what a certain Wallflower’s booth looked like. Alex had sat next to Jade, but were they still there? Probably. What were they talking about?
I had to clear my throat a little before I spoke. “What’d you tell them?”
“Tell who?”
“Your girlfriend. What’d you tell her when you left?”
Connor caressed the steering wheel. “She didn’t ask.”
His expression matched his voice—even, neutral. “So you got up and left and no one said anything?”
“I’m sure I’ll get a text of her cussing me out later for bailing, but no, she didn’t ask where I went.” An oncoming car’s headlights swept over him, causing him to squint as it passed. “She’ll get a ride home with Kyle. She was more entertained by your boyfriend to focus on hers.”
Alex’s childlike excitement flashed across my mind again, weighing me down into the seat. Connor had to know that Jade wasn’t entertained by him—she was entertained by the idea of it hurting me. “Alex will feel bad about it later,” I told him as if he’d asked. “He wants to be in the in-crowd.”
“It’s overrated.”
“Of course it is to you. You’re in it.”
Connor propped his elbow on the car door, considering my response. “Did you ever want to be part of the in-crowd?”
“Never.”
He didn’t answer. I didn’t think he believed me.
The streetlights illuminated the roadway as we crossed from Jefferson into Brentwood, and I stared at the houses as we passed. There were families moving within some, TVs playing within view, and some houses had all of their lights turned off. I pictured myself in their shoes. Instead of sitting in the passenger seat of Connor’s car, I was on the couch watching TV. Having a late-night snack. Anywhere other than feeling sorry for myself.
Connor turned onto my road without prompting, tires popping over the loose gravel. He dodged the potholes as best he could, flicking on his brights. “You said you were neighbors with Madison. Which house is it?”
