Strong hands gripped my thighs, pushing and spreading them open farther. I felt so full I thought I might combust. “Feel good?”
“Daisy!”
Shit. Startled, I shot straight up, making my head spin. I tried to work out where I was and what happened to all the good feelings that had engulfed me just moments ago.
I shoved my hair out of my face, then slapped at my nightstand until I gripped my glasses, shoving them on.
Pippa stared back at me from the end of my bed, smoothing her hair into a high ponytail with a smirk on her face. “Good dream?”
I groaned, my head dropping into my hands. “What gave me away?”
“Oh, not much. Just a little moaning,” she said, the bed shifting as she got up.
Well, that was a bit embarrassing. Peeking out between my spread fingers, I saw she was busy getting ready for class and relaxed somewhat. Until the events of last night resurfaced like a punch in the boob.
Looking up at the wall, I saw the paint was still there. It hadn’t magically disappeared. Unfortunately. “I guess I should do something about that.”
“I don’t know,” Pippa said. “It’s kind of growing on me.” Scowling, I grabbed my pillow and tossed it at her. She laughed, dodging it. “Joking, joking. We’ll figure out how to get it off.”
“It’s water-based acrylic. I’ll have to get my Google search on.” I yawned, tilting my head to take in the badly painted Daisy. I had to admit I kind of liked it. Not the words, but the flower. The sweeping, sharp, and uneven black edges of the petals.
Pippa tossed my pillow back to me, and I put it behind my head, flopping back down onto it with a groan. “Can I skip today?”
“Of course, you can. Should you, though?”
Mulling over it, I thought maybe I should. “I think so.”
The bed dipped as Pippa sat back down, swiping on some gloss as she stared at me. “You’re afraid of what people might say?”
Trying to swallow over the knot in my throat, I nodded.
“Daisy, this isn’t as bad as high school. Will people maybe talk about you?” She lifted her shoulders, capping her gloss. “Yeah, but you can’t control that. They’ll move onto something else in a matter of minutes.”
She left for class, and I picked up my phone. I had ten minutes until I needed to be in the art studio across campus. Blowing a loud raspberry, I heaved myself out of bed and rushed around the room to get ready.
It was true. I couldn’t control what anyone thought or said about me.
But I could damn well control what I did.
Putting the cap back on the bottle of acetone, I stepped back and looked at the wall.
Not perfect, some black and yellow specks remained in the dips and tiny bumps of the white paint that covered the brick, but it would do.
I tossed the dish sponges into the trash, put the acetone away in the top of our wardrobe, and went to wash my hands.
“Oh, is that the one who had her dorm trashed?” someone said when I passed an open door on my way back to my room. Closing my eyes briefly, I went back inside and shut the door, leaning back against it.
Today wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be. It helped that I only had two classes and only heard whispers in English lit. Besides feeling like everyone’s eyes were on me as I walked off campus to the little shopping village a few hours ago, nothing else had really happened.
Tugging on some sweatpants, I snapped the elastic around my waist and went to open the window so we didn’t suffocate from the fumy smell coming from my wall.
Something flew inside as soon as I opened it, landing on the carpet. Twisting, I frowned at a small white pebble, then jumped as a round of tap, tap, tapping ensued on the glass window.
Great, I’d spoken too soon. People were throwing rocks at me now? What the hell?
Wrenching it up higher, I tried to see who was throwing things at me and caught sight of Quinn, almost falling backward in the garden of small shrubs below.
Warm. My chest grew instantly warm, and a smile tried to take over my face.
I stopped it in its tracks, telling myself to get it together. He’d always been able to make me ignore everything else. But after two days of not seeing him, and all that had happened, I wouldn’t let him do that now.
I shut the window halfway, determined to ignore him, and shrugged on a baggy blue fuzzy sweater. The tapping didn’t stop, and I soon became worried he’d crack the damn window with that throwing arm of his.
Downstairs, the common rooms were quiet, and the lights dim as I approached the doors. Opening them, I stepped outside, wrapping my arms around my mid-section.
I heard rustling, then he came barreling out of the garden. “Dais, hey.”
I stopped on the top step, sitting down on the cold concrete. “Hi.”
He stopped in front of me, his eyes pinging back and forth between mine. “Sorry, I just didn’t know how to get you to come down.”
“I wasn’t going to, but I thought it best for the longevity of our window.”
He rubbed a hand over the back of his head, looking a little sheepish. “I need your number.”
“Yeah, that might help. Or staying long enough to get it in the first place,” I said sullenly.
Wincing, he bent down on the step in front of me. “I’m sorry, I’ll explain. But first, are you okay? I heard about …” He sniffed, his nose crinkling adorably. “Why do you smell like you might catch on fire at any second?”
“Because I’m too hot.” I couldn’t help it. It was right there, waiting for me to take the bait.
His head fell back, a loud laugh bellowing out of his mouth and sending breathy plumes into the night air. Looking back at me, he leaned forward, his smile slowly waning as he rubbed his palm against my cheek. “Seriously. Why?”
Grabbing his mammoth hand, I gently removed it from my face, ignoring his confused frown. “I had to clean some paint off my wall.”
It took a moment, but realization dawned, and he cursed gruffly. “No.”
Tilting a shoulder, I glanced down at the yellow and brown leaves sitting on the step beneath my legs. “Yeah.”
“W-what”—he cleared his throat, trying again—“what did it say?”
“Does it matter?”
He was between my legs then, on his knees on the step below, both his hands gripping my face and tilting it back to look at him. His eyes were wet, and his throat bobbed. “It does. Tell me.”
Breathing the same air, I kept my eyes on his thanks to his hands and whispered, “Daisy is a slut.”
Eyes shuttering, he breathed out raggedly, “You know that couldn’t be further from the truth, right?”
I did know that. “It still hurts, though.”
His throat rippled as he swallowed. “Did she really wreck your stuff?”
“Yeah, she did.” I averted my eyes from his, wanting to erase the anguish I saw there.
“I’m so sorry, Dais.”
“You didn’t make her do it. It’s not your fault.”
“But your art.” I sucked my lip into my mouth, biting down on it at the reminder. “I can’t believe she’d do that.”
Neither could I. But she did. We all did. “It shouldn’t be like this, Quinn. All this hurt. All this mess.”
“We’ll fix it. I’ll fix it.”
“I don’t know if we can.” My eyes squeezed closed.
His lips landed on my forehead, resting there. I could feel his hands shaking slightly. “I’m sorry, so fucking sorry.”
A tear escaped my shut eye, and I croaked out, “Where’ve you been?”
I opened my eyes, finding him sitting back on his haunches. “I told you. I had to make everything right first.”
“Why?”
“Because when I saw you again,” he said, “I knew I’d do something like this.” He leaned forward, his lips landing on mine and melding to them perfectly. One minute. I let myself get lost in them for one minute, then I pushed him away and rose to stand.
He looked so confused, so hurt, and I wanted nothing more than to climb into his lap and smooth the worry creases from his forehead. “What we did, Quinn …”
Standing up, he rushed to say, “We can’t regret it, Daisy. It’s us.”
“That’s not an excuse,” I said, backing toward the door.
“I know,” he said, his voice beseeching. “But it was inescapable. We’re inescapable. So it’s my fault. I should’ve known we couldn’t dance around what was meant to be. I should’ve ended things with Alexis weeks ago. Hell, I never should’ve let them begin.”
And that part had me opening the door. “But you did,” I whispered, my words thick as they rolled over my tongue. “And you even said you loved her.”
Hesitation and wariness were plastered all over his face. “Dais.”
Shaking my head with tears sliding down my cheeks, I stepped back inside and closed the door.