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Cole’s smirk is low. Curving into that arrogant and cocky gleam I used to despise. He knew exactly what he was doing, riling Finn up only to help ease my tension.
I shake my head, that cocksure expression of his so pompously smug and everything I didn’t know I wanted.Needed.
My toes curl because it’s like I’m seeing him all over again for the very first time. Only this round there isn’t an ounce of hate to be found.
“Good thing you managed to snag a girlfriend before that catastrophe,” Eli goads further.
Finn pouts. “It’s not that bad. Rory, it’s not that bad, right?”
Thick fat tears fall, and I do nothing to stop them. I’m sure I looked absolutely ridiculous laughingandcrying at the same time, but I embrace it.
“You better not be crying on my account,” Iceman mutters but it’s innocent.
“And how many times have I told you to stop being a dictator,” I rebuttal. Reminding him exactly who he’s trying to be and that it doesn’t work for me.
Cole rolls his eyes, and I blink double time. The action is so conducive to his usually harsh personality. An easy grin settles on his face that lights-up with pure bliss.
More laughter bubbles out. He’s found his way out; Iceman isn’t going to be like Lillian.
This wave of reality smacks me right across the stomach. Those loose batches of tears dry up as my shoes suddenly become fascinating. That moment of ease ruptured like a bubble to a dull poke.
Cole may be okay, but we broke up. It shouldn’t be like this. We’re over. Done.
The air thickens the longer it swirls with that one unresolved issue.
“Ya’ know, I think I could take a piss,” Finn says. “E, you coming?” He asks already climbing from his bed.
They bypass the bathroom that’s in the room as they step out, but not before Finn dips his head. It’s probably the least subtle gesture he could’ve chosen but it says everything. Making his intentions as clear as his fresh bald spot to Cole.
Don’t fuck this up, or I’ll end you, is what it says.
“You know, I always did wonder why girls use the restroom together,” I hear Eli start as they move down the hall.
“Guess we’re about to find out.”
I snort at their stupidity but it’s more out of my own anxiety at now being alone with him. They’re trying to give us space, but I’m not sure if I’m ready. My eyes are permanently planted on the floor.
After too long of stilled silence, Cole exhales down his nose and it sounds pained. Long and immensely drawn out is what it is.
The crumbled rocks of our relationship spread out between us, but each of us is too nervous to pick up the first stone to rebuild. Either we reform the mountain or end up with more rubble.
Like debris particles, it’s all so up in the air.
“I’m glad you came. Finn was starting to get worried you wouldn’t show. He wanted you here,” Cole starts and something inside me dies.
Did you not, Iceman?
“And you didn’t… want me here?” I clarify. My voice is as strangled as I am.
Any second now and I was going to combust. I doubt I looked anything but pitiful. That’s how I sounded at least.
Another beat, and then. “Would you lift your head for me, Princess?”
Stunned by his request, my body does as he asks, moving on autopilot. I regret it immediately. His face is a sheet of solid steel, with sharp lines and hollow cheekbones. A single vein in his neck pulsates.
He’s trying to keep his temper under control, and if I didn’t know him as well as I do now, he’d have had me convinced it was.
We’re too far past that though. He’s as on edge as I am.
