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Who’s going to stop me?
“I thought you were going to spend your senior year in Europe,” JJ says, still confused.
Irritated, I start walking, and JJ falls into step right beside me. “You know how it goes. Parents weren’t down.”
“When are they ever?” JJ knows of what he speaks. His parents give him endless shit about everything he does. Good or bad. Wrong or right. The guy gets zero breaks.
My parents look like saints compared to his.
“If they’re going to force me to be here, then I’m going to make the best of it by doing things my way.” I spot my sister in the near distance, surrounded by a bunch of girls while she stands tall above them. Mom wants her to model, but I don’t get it. My sister isn’t what I would call conventionally attractive, though she photographs well, I’ll give her that.
Edie is all limbs and awkward angles. Big eyes and flat chested and a wide mouth that scowls just as often as it smiles. She doesn’t look like either of our parents. It’s almost as if she was an alien baby dropped off on the front stoop of our parents’ old brownstone back in the day.
“Your sister is getting hotter,” JJ observes.
I slap his chest, making him grunt. “Don’t talk about her like that.”
“Merely stating facts. You’ll need to put an electric fence around her to keep the guys away.”
“Don’t give me any ideas,” I mutter, as we make our way to the auditorium along with everyone else who attends this school. I glance around, noting that I’m the only one who’s not wearing a jacket, and I stand taller, proud of myself for not giving a damn.
“Where’s Cadence?” JJ asks as we draw closer to the auditorium’s open front doors.
“Don’t know.” I shrug.
JJ says nothing for a moment and I know he expects me to explain myself further, but I don’t.
What is there to say? I haven’t spoken to her since the night of my birthday party when she screamed at me for two hours and ruined everything. I blocked her from my contacts, knowing that would drive her out of her mind, and I haven’t responded to any of her DMs either. She deserves to sweat it out a bit.
Maybe even forever.
“She’s usually glued to your side,” JJ finally says.
“I haven’t talked to her since the birthday party.”
“Seriously?” JJ sounds shocked.
“Yeah.” I spot her right then, the crowd parting to reveal her familiar long, glossy auburn hair swinging as she walks ahead of us with her friends. She filmed a shampoo commercial over the summer, her hair is that good. Too bad she’s such a bitch. “We’re done.”
As if she can hear me talking, Cadence chooses that moment to glance over her shoulder, her eyes lighting up when she spots me. “Arch!”
“Does she know that you two are done?” JJ asks, his voice filled with amusement as I send him an irritated glare.
Cadence comes to a stop, her friends abandoning her with exaggerated groans and obvious scowls aimed in my direction, and I slow my steps, keeping the frown on my face as I draw closer and closer.
Cadence Calhoun is the epitome of a spoiled rich girl. With the gorgeous hair and the clear blue eyes, the perfect white teeth and the reconstructed—she had a deviated septum, don’t you know—nose, the lips already plumped with filler, she’s beautiful.
But all that beauty hides a dark, ugly soul.
She’s not a nice person. I know this. Even she knows this. But, somehow, we were drawn to each other last year and we sort of formed this power couple. She ate it up, while I merely tolerated it. It’s hard to resist the most beautiful girl on campus when she’s sending you nudes and willingly giving you blow jobs on the regular.
But she’s mean. Nothing makes her happy. She could have all the money in the world, own every Chanel bag in existence and be engaged to the hottest guy she’s ever seen, and she’d still find a way to complain.
That’s just her way.
I stop directly in front of Cadence, glad JJ keeps walking. He prefers to keep his distance when we’re together and I don’t blame him. Our conversations always end in an argument and JJ doesn’t want to deal.
The moment it’s just the two of us, Cadence steps closer, her hand landing on my chest, her gaze imploring. I shift back, her hand falling and her lips form the tiniest frown. “What’s wrong with you?”
