When I get out of my Sociology class, Max is leaning against the wall directly across from the door. I stop in my tracks and stare at him, prompting people to have to go around me. Mutters of displeasure reach my ears, and I move out of the way. Still upset with him, I duck my head and try to get lost in the crowd of bodies making their way through to either their next class, home, or the dining hall.

His hand grips my arm and I try to ignore the tingling feeling it leaves in its wake. I don’t want Max to affect me in any way after yesterday. Let him screw with some other girl like that. I jerk out of his grasp and turn to hiss, “Don’t touch me!”

Max looks at me like I’ve grown a second head, but he drops the hand that was reaching for me once more, eyes wide and panicked. Good. Let him feel those emotions for once. I have mine locked down, or at least I’m telling myself I do. “Kat,” he starts, putting his hands up like he wants to wrap his arms around me, but I take a step back. There isn’t enough hand sanitizer is Tennessee for me to let him wrap me up in an embrace. Not even if he’d bathed in it.

Once we’re out in the courtyard, I turn to face him, keeping enough distance he can’t easily touch me. “What do you want, Max?” Speaking to him this way physically hurts, but I’m tired of being his backup plan. That’s the way he makes me feel. He won’t come out and say he doesn’t have those feelings, but he doesn’t say he does either. I’m stuck in this limbo where I live in hope he’ll notice me one day, and it sucks. I deserve better than how he’s treating me, and I’m not going to sit back and take it anymore.

“I want to apologize,” he says softly, eyes on mine and giving me his patented you know you love me and want to forgive me face. His eyes are wide and innocent, smile soft and placating; even his body language screams forgive me, and I feel petty because it’s not like he actually did anything wrong. We’re not committed, we aren’t in any kind of relationship, he can have sex with anyone he wants. It just sucks because I want him to want to have sex with me, not the rest of the campus.

Like an idiot, I actually consider forgiving him. That is, until a girl with long cinnamon colored hair walks up to us and wraps her arms around his waist, pushing up on her toes to press a kiss to his mouth before she looks over at me smugly. Yeah, I get it; you’re staking your claim. This must be the moaner from last night. It doesn’t help that Max does nothing to brush her off. He drapes his arm over her shoulders and looks at me uncomfortably.

“Uh, Kat … this is Sophie. Soph, this is my best friend, Kat.” He looks like he’s waiting for us to shake hands and become besties, but I have news for him; that’s not going to happen. Not any time in the near future. I want to claw his eyes out and sob, all at the same time.

It takes everything in me to smile at her and hold out my hand. “Hi, Sophie. It’s nice to meet you.” I hope my voice doesn’t sound as strained to the two of them as it does to me, but based on the look she’s giving me that says ha bitch, the boy is mine. I hate being a jealous harpy, but that’s what he’s bringing out in me. Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I gasp like I’ve just realized I’m going to be late, then cringe inwardly at how fake it sounds. I won’t be getting an Oscar anytime soon for this performance. “Okay, well, it’s been fun, but I just remembered I have to be …” my mind goes blank. Oh God, where can I say I have to go? “Uh … I have a doctor’s appointment and I’m going to be late if I don’t get going.” Phew. That sounded plausible I think. I hope.

Max looks concerned. “Is everything all right?”

“Oh yeah,” I say, waving off his concern and acting like it’s nothing he needs to worry about. I’m not lying because he doesn’t need to worry about a fake doctor’s appointment. I’m going straight to that special place in hell they reserve for liars, I just know it. “I just have to,” I look over at Skanky McSkank who’s still clinging to him like a vine and blurt out the first thing that comes to mind, “go get birth control.” Oh. Em. Gee. It’s official. I’m an idiot. Birth Control? Seriously? That’s all I could come up with? I can feel the blush creeping up my cheeks, and Max looks equal parts embarrassed and curious.

He clears his throat, looking anywhere but me when he asks, “Why do you need birth control?”

“Oh, you know,” I wave a hand dismissively, “college, experimenting, that kinda thing. I just want to be prepared.” I don’t think I quite pulled off carefree.

His head jerks and I watch his jaw tighten before he pins me with a glare. “Experimenting? Just who, and how many, are you planning to experiment with?”

I don’t know why he’s flipping out considering he has the girl he’s having sexy time with practically straddling him while he stands here talking to me. It’s not like I’m a virgin, not technically anyway. I don’t know if you can count my prom date sticking it in exactly one time before he filled the condom losing it, but there you go. It’s a night I’ve regretted since senior year, but it’s not like I can go back and change it.

Narrowing my eyes at Max, the guy who’s supposed to be my closest friend, I grit my teeth and spit out, “It’s none of your business, Maxwell.” His head snaps back and the hand that’s not attached to the arm around Sophie’s shoulders becomes a fist. Before he can say anything else, I shake my head and turn to leave.

I don’t get very far before I hear him say something unintelligible to her and her snippy voice reply. Then, his hand is on my elbow again and he tugs me around to face him. This time, he doesn’t give me an option before he wraps his arms around me and rests his chin on the top of my head. I want nothing more than to close my eyes and sink into his embrace, but I’m still upset with him, and he was just wrapped around her. I’m not interested in smelling like skank du jour. In the past twenty-four hours, he’s shown me that I’m much farther down on his list of priorities than I thought. Much lower than he is on mine, that’s for sure.

I stand stiffly in his arms, letting him hug me without hugging him in return until he drops his arms and takes a step back. “Man, you’re really mad at me, aren’t you?” he asks sadly.

“What do you expect, Max?” I blow up at him and hold up a hand to count the ways he’s wronged me. “In less than one day you’ve forgotten about me, which you haven’t actually apologized for by the way. You’ve made me feel like I’m not important to you, and now you’ve basically insinuated I’m a whore, or I’m going to be.” He has the grace to look ashamed, but I’m beyond caring right now. “I need a break.” My words cause him to flinch before he looks back at me, panic in his eyes. Before I can quench the knee-jerk reaction, I reassure him. “I’m not saying I don’t want to be friends with you anymore, but I need to take a step back. You’ve hurt me, and I can’t just let that go or you’ll keep doing it.” I take a step back, proud of how mature I sound, but still kicking myself for trying to make him feel better. “I’ll text you when I’m ready to talk, okay?”

Realizing he can’t change my mind, Max nods. “Yeah, okay. I’ll wait for you to text.” He looks close to tears when he asks, “You know I love you though, right?” My heart seizes in my chest because God, I wish he was saying those words the same way I would to him. But, he’s not. He’s saying them like I love you, friend. The lump in my throat prevents me from speaking, so I only tip my chin in reply. I turn my back on him once again and walk away, trying not to cry. This time he lets me, and that actually breaks my heart a little bit more. I didn’t even realize I wanted him to come after me, to beg me to stay and tell me he’s realized that he feels for me the way I feel for him. I’m so pathetic.

I don’t stop moving until I get to my dorm room where I find my roommate for the year sitting on her bed with my other BFF, Peyton. As soon as the door shuts, they both look up at me. Peyton’s eyes go wide and she jumps up to come over to me.

“Kat? Oh my God, What’s wrong?” She hugs me, and as soon as she does, I lose the hold I had on my tears. They start to trail down my cheeks, and I let out a sob. I’m so mad at myself. I should have known this would happen. Eventually, Max was going to find someone; he was going to get a girlfriend, and I would be left out in the cold.

I guess that’s the way it should be, but it still hurts. And it’s not just that. It’s the fact that he sees me as this completely different person. I just want him to see me, not the girl I now know he thinks I am. And, by the way, what the hell is up with that? One lackluster post prom encounter and a comment about experimenting, and suddenly I’m a whore? My anger isn’t enough to overcome my hurt feelings, and I struggle to stop my tears. I’m so mad at myself for letting him do this to me over and over again.

Peyton leads me over to Becca’s bed and moves me so I’m sitting between them. She’s not normally a very touchy-feely person, so she’s quick to release me, but she keeps her hand on my back, rubbing it lightly. “Please talk to me,” she says softly. “Tell me whose ass I need to have Wyatt kick.”

The image of nice-guy Wyatt kicking Max’s ass makes me laugh. It’s watery, but it helps. Before I know it, the whole story has spilled out of me. The project I have to work on with Clay, Max not picking me up, Clay acting like a human being and giving me a ride, walking in on Max and Big Tits McGee—which is such a “Clay” thing to say—the subsequent breakdown and ending with the confrontation today. By the time I’m finished, I’m exhausted and Becca and Peyton are both staring at me in shock, mouths dropped open. Peyton is the first to recover and her anger is a little scary. She’s kind of a bitch on a good day, but hurt her friends and she’s a beast. She actually reminds me of those hunger commercials—the ones that say “you’re not yourself when you’re hungry.” I almost feel bad for Max, though it doesn’t last very long once I remember the girl.

“It wouldn’t be so bad,” I complain, resting my head on Peyton’s shoulder, “except she’s like the better, prettier, bustier version of me.” My voice is clogged with unshed tears and I could really use a tissue, but I don’t want to move.

Peyton snorts. “You have great boobs.”

“I guess. But, hers are bigger.”

This time, Becca is the one to chime in. “Bigger isn’t always better you know. I mean, maybe she’ll suffocate him with her chest. Wouldn’t that be sad? And, can you imagine the inscription Clay would have put on his grave?” She starts to laugh when she describes it. “Here lies Max, killed not by herpes, but by the motorboat of death.”

“Motorboat of death?” Peyton asks, trying desperately to hold in her laughter. “Ohmigod. I can’t even.”

Becca puts her hands in front of her face and makes motorboating sounds, not wanting us to see her duck lips, and prompting Peyton and I to stare at her in shock before we collapse back on the bad, laughing uncontrollably. Becca, like Peyton, has long blond hair and a trust fund. She’s a couple of inches shorter than me, but she’s also smaller. They’d look like sisters almost if it wasn’t for the color she had put in her hair when she was home on break. Now, she’s rocking hair that’s pale blond on top and looks like it’s been dipped in lavender paint at the ends. It’s a very cool look, and one I could never pull off.

“In all seriousness,” Becca says, her eyes locked to mine where I sit, my head still on Peyton’s shoulder with a hand clasping each of theirs. “Don’t sweat Max. He has no clue what he’s missing, and when he figures it out, he’s going to regret it. But, you need to move on. Date someone who isn’t Max.” She advises, then turns to Peyton. “Doesn’t Wyatt have any other hot friends you can set her up with?”

Peyton shrugs, “Yeah, I mean, he has some friends on the basketball team, but they aren’t very close. He mainly hangs out with Clay, Emmett and Max. Since Em has Livvie and Clay is a douchwaffle, options are limited.” She turns to me, “But, I’ll ask him if there’s anyone he trusts not to screw you over, Kat.”

I start to protest, but maybe Becca has a point. If I date someone else, maybe these feelings I have for Max will fade. At least, I can hope, right?