Chapter Fourteen
Jade
“You hiding from someone?” I asked Braylen as I walked toward where she leaned against a tree at the back of Lennon’s property. I struggled not to add a “too” at the end of the question. I’d gone inside the house for a moment, but one locked gaze with Lennon had sent me running for fresh air.
“Maybe,” she said, drawing her attention away from the lake and back to me. “Are you?” she asked when I leaned next to her.
“Oh yeah,” I said, and it felt good speaking the truth. I laughed awkwardly to cover up the real pain behind the statement. “I’m always beating the guys away with a stick, you know. Hiding in the woods is the only way I can get a break.”
“I don’t know why you’re so hard on yourself like that,” she said, and the words sounded so close to Lennon’s I had to resist the urge to clutch my side to hold myself together.
Why had he tried to build me up all night? Why had he acted like he knew me better than anyone, if only to brush off our night as nothing more than a means to an end?
Because he didn’t mean what he said.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said to Braylen, but also to the voice in my head that kept pleading Lennon’s case. Playing over and over all the ways in which he’d touched my heart tonight.
“Uh-huh.” She nudged me. “Did I hear you took Lennon somewhere?”
I straightened, wringing my hands as I looked at the ground. “Um, yeah.” I cleared my throat. This was my chance to tell her what happened. Have her tell me if I was completely crazy or not—if I’d read into tonight way more than I should have. “He needed to get another laptop from his dad’s house. For…music.”
There, that wasn’t so hard. Now tell her the rest.
“That took half the night?” she asked.
“My car.” I nodded quickly, encouraging myself to force the words out. “You know how old it is.”
“You got stranded lover’s lane style with Lennon Pryor? How the hell was that?”
Her use of the words I’d spoken earlier when we had, in fact, been stranded made the memory of his lips on mine rush back in a flurry of heat. The way he’d held me, drawn me closer as if he never wanted to let me go. The way he’d been gentle and yet strong with his kiss, teasing the breath from my lungs as if it had always belonged to him. How he’d looked at me—really looked at me like he was seeing into my heart—before the panic had settled over his eyes.
The raw hurt that followed such an amazing moment had my heart sinking all over again.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I finally admitted. The onslaught of emotions and doubt and hope was evidence enough that I wasn’t ready to share with anyone else what had happened. Not even Braylen.
“Noted,” she said, and I appreciated the hell out of her for not pushing me.
There was something nagging me from the inside out, that damned voice that kept rooting for Lennon, and it was hard as hell to ignore.
“Where’s Fynn?” I asked, desperate to think about literally anything else.
“Probably off worshipping the ground Katy’s five-inch heels walk on.”
“Fynn and Katy? No way!”
She shrugged. “Stranger things.”
“That doesn’t make sense. He’s nothing like Don.”
“Maybe that’s the point?”
Maybe. And even though Lennon and I were different, there was so much about us that was the same—the way we had passions that consumed us creatively, the way people expected us to live up to the stereotypical titles we donned and the way we fought desperately to break them. We shared a love for graphic novels and music and crazy aspirations for the future, and yet he’d casted all this aside for the sake of his show. His tour.
Nothing could ever be as important to him as his audience, and it was hard for me to really blame him in that regard.
What had I wanted from him?
More than an insane kiss and a quick cast-off, I suppose.
“Opposites sometimes attract,” I said, thinking about how much Lennon and I had connected over the years, and how this night had only multiplied the charge between us.
“Maybe,” Braylen said. “In this case I think it’s too forced to last long.”
I hadn’t forced a thing tonight. Being with Lennon had been easier than I’d ever imagined. Kissing him, melting into him, breathing him in, had been as effortless as if we’d done it a thousand times. But what was that? What was any of it if he didn’t care?
Noticing the hurt in Bray’s eyes, I reached out to touch her shoulder. I recognized the sting, the ache, the rejection. “Sorry.” It wasn’t much, and I knew firsthand that it didn’t help, but it was all I had.
She sighed. “Does everyone know?”
“No,” I said. “I’m sure no one at UCLA knows.” I cracked a grin, trying not to laugh as she face-palmed herself. She and Fynn had been perfect for each other since grade school, but he never noticed. I wasn’t sure how he could be oblivious to the love Bray had for him, but I guess sometimes boys needed to be hit over the head with the truth.
Lennon doesn’t know.
My chest tightened. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know how much I cared about him. He was going on tour and I was going to college. He’d made it perfectly clear that anything we might have wasn’t as important as that, and in the grand scheme of things, how could I tell him I’d fallen for him? It wouldn’t be fair to him. Not that he’d been fair to me, either, but part of me wondered if it would even change things if he knew.
“You should tell him,” I spoke to Bray but felt the words sink into my own heart.
“I did.”
I gasped. “And?”
“I’m out here, watching the pre-show fireworks by myself.”
My shoulders sank, as did the hope that her relationship could work out even when my fleeting attempt with Lennon didn’t. “Guys suck.”
She nodded. “In the moment, I have to agree with you. Though, after some perspective, I’m sure I’ll see that it’s not Fynn’s fault he didn’t know, and it definitely isn’t his fault that when he found out he still wanted Katy more. That’s just…”
“You’re too good for him,” I said when she hadn’t continued.
“Not true.”
“So true.” I shook my head. “You’re out here defending him even when his actions clearly hurt you. How can you do that?”
How can you? I scolded myself. A battle kept raging over whether Lennon deserved to know the truth before we gave up on whatever had happened between us tonight.
“Because I love him,” Braylen said.
“Whoa,” I said. “You like really, really love him.”
I had thought as much, but it was painfully clear with the way her eyes still lit up talking about Fynn even after what he’d done to her.
And how was I any different?
My heart still soared with thoughts of Lennon’s kiss, of the way he’d complimented me tonight, and the way we laughed and joked and talked.
“How could I not?” Her eyes glazed over with a faraway look. “I was a goner since the first day I met him,” she said after a few moments.
“I wish there was something I could do.” I squeezed her shoulder. I wanted to tell her I understood, but I knew the story would take far too long to explain just how it was possible that I could understand.
She laughed. “Well, if you could dig around in that genius brain of yours, build us a time machine, and transport us far enough back and make it where I don’t hear Fynn telling Katy how much he doesn’t think of me in that light, that would be fantastic.”
My mouth dropped open and I glared at the house, wishing I could shake both Fynn and Lennon for being so careless with our hearts tonight. After a few silent moments of me plotting to do just that, I stomped my foot.
“Screw him. Want to get out of here? We can go stuff ourselves with Oreos and ice cream and watch Deadpool on repeat.” We both needed to escape the party that had ultimately crushed us both.
“Can we put his naked—pre-mutation—scene on a loop?” Braylen grinned.
“Hell yeah we can!” I fist bumped her, feeling a sense of comradery that I’d desperately needed.
“Awesome.” She laughed. “I want to go tell Randy I’m leaving, though,” she said as we pushed away from the tree and started walking back to the house.
I hung back near the doorway of Lennon’s house as she talked to a blond guy I’d never seen before. I kept stealing glances out the window, wondering if Lennon was getting ready to go on stage. Wondering if he was thinking about me at all or if he was only concerned for the quickly approaching show.
Maybe you should stay for it.
It could be the last time I saw him play, and the idea sent a wave of twisting pain through my chest. I had relished the moments captured at his dad’s house, hearing him play like no one was listening. If I was being honest with myself, that was the Lennon I’d first started falling for, and I wished like hell he could’ve realized it.
I didn’t know.
Not until tonight, and I didn’t tell him.
I showed him.
I showed him with the secret I entrusted him with. With my willingness to help him when no one else would. To defend him to his father when he’d struggled to do it himself. I had showed Lennon I loved him with my kiss, with the way my body reacted to his.
And I knew he’d felt it. But he still chose to walk away.
Another sharp pain ripped through my chest, and I forced in a steadying breath.
Braylen and I walked the rest of the distance to the front door, but she stopped short when a pair of voices sounded from near the stairs.
“I can’t believe Zoey is taking it this far,” one girl said.
“I know!” screeched another. “Total insanity.”
“He absolutely deserves it, though,” the first girl said, and I had to hurry to follow Braylen who tailed the pair upstairs. “That speech he gave? Total humiliation. Poor Zoey. She had to do something.”
“Yeah, but this? I don’t know. It seems like it’s going way too far…”
She flashed me a confused glance over her shoulder before clearing her throat behind who I could now tell was Julie and Kennedy—Zoey’s friends—who had plopped onto the couch in the sitting area just off the landing of the stairs.
“What is Zoey doing?” Braylen asked.
“Damn,” Julie snapped, pulling out her cell and typing a fast text. “I told you we should’ve checked the floor first before we started talking.”
“What? Braylen knows.” Kennedy gestured to her. “You have to know, right?”
Dots started to connect in my head, and I thought back to the party at Gordon’s dad’s restaurant, the one Lennon and I had scoped out.
Kennedy gasped, her hands over her mouth. She glanced at Julie before returning her gaze to Braylen. “Maybe Zoey didn’t tell her for a reason?”
Julie popped the gum in her mouth. “Brilliant. Nice one, Kennedy.”
“Please, Kennedy, tell me what is going on.” The desperation in Braylen’s voice had me on edge.
“I’m sure Zoey would’ve filled you in on the plan…” Kennedy said before laying out the party at Gordon’s dad’s shop…and the fact that he didn’t know a thing about it.
“She can’t…she wouldn’t,” Braylen said, glancing from the girls to me. “Right?”
The breath stalled in my lungs as I realized the depths to which Zoey had gone to get back at Gordon. “When Lennon and I were out—”
“She’s already done it,” Julie cut me off. “It’s just a matter of him finding out.”
I hated that we hadn’t known. That Lennon and I had thought since Gordon’s cousin Jay was there and practically running the party, that it was okay with him. Now it was far too late to do a thing about it.
“Where is she?” Bray demanded.
“They already left…”
Braylen flew down the stairs, and I followed close behind.
“Braylen!” Kennedy called over the railing. “Please don’t tell her we told you!”
Bray had her cell out, texting and dialing like a madwoman.
“Braylen,” I said after we’d circled the dance floor searching for Zoey or Gordon. “They’re gone. This was her choice.” I wanted to calm her down. So much had happened to her tonight—feelings I knew all too well—and she didn’t need to take this on herself, too.
“Yeah, but it’s the wrong one,” she said, and sank onto a loveseat near the dance floor.
I perched on the armrest next to her. “True, but there’s nothing you can do about it now.”
And I hated that I knew that better than anyone. “Maybe they were over-dramatizing it,” I said, more hoping that myself than trying to appease Braylen’s panic. Maybe Gordon wouldn’t be as pissed as Zoey thought. Maybe the party was already coming to a close and they would be cleaning it up before any harm was done.
“Maybe you’re right,” she said as if she could read my mind. “They tend to do that. And Zoey is too smart to do something so stupid, right?” She peered up at me. “Jade?”
“Totes,” I said, hoping like hell we were both right.
Fifteen minutes later I wished Braylen luck as she sought out Fynn in the massive crowd gathered before the stage. I staggered away from them, unable to resist glancing up to where I could see the outline of Lennon’s body as he spoke to his drummer, his back toward the audience.
He was born to be on that stage.
On bigger stages.
And I couldn’t let a little thing like my heart get in the way of that.
I made my way down the line of cars, forcing myself to not continue glancing over my shoulder to steal the last glimpses of Lennon I could.
“Jade?” Fynn asked, slightly out of breath as he stopped his jog toward me. He had his camera around his neck, and I tilted my head at him.
“What are you doing?” Bray had said he asked to meet her in the crowd.
“I had to grab my camera from my truck. Lennon wants me to take shots of him and the band during the show tonight.”
I swallowed hard. Always about the show. It’s a good thing, realizing that now.
Like it makes a difference. You’re still crazy for him.
I ignored the truth blaring in my head.
“Have you seen Braylen?” he asked, eyeing the people behind us.
I crossed my arms over my chest and sealed my lips shut. It wasn’t my place to tell him she was waiting for him—especially if she changed her mind in the next few minutes, which was her right.
His shoulders sank. “So you have spoken to her.”
“Where is Katy?”
Pain flashed across his face. “I don’t know. With Don, I think. Look,” he said. “I know I messed up. That’s what I’m on my way to fix, now. Hopefully.”
I gave him a soft smile. “You want to let me in on your scheme?”
“No scheme,” he said. “I’m just a boy planning on standing in front of a girl to tell her he’s an idiot.”
“And you want to do that with the entire senior class surrounding you?”
“Something like that.”
He was getting it right, and I was so happy for Braylen. “I knew you were smart. Didn’t know you were brave.”
“When the right person is on the other end of it?” He eyed me.
I nodded. “Worth it.” I wished like hell I’d been worth it for Lennon. “Good luck,” I said and continued walking to my car.
“Wait,” he said. “You can’t leave!”
“Why not?”
“Because, you never told me if Bray was out there or not.”
“Still not going to.” I stopped walking when he bolted in front of me.
“Fine,” he said. “I think you should stay for Lennon’s show.”
“Why would I want to do that?” I swallowed hard.
“You have something better to do?”
No. But I could spare myself the pain.
“Please, Jade,” he said. “It’d mean a lot to me if you stayed at least past the opening song.”
There was a certain look in his eyes, like he knew something I didn’t. Maybe it had to do with his plan for Braylen. Or had Lennon told him about us when they’d been talking in the kitchen earlier? Did it even matter? I was tired of hoping.
“Fine,” I said after he’d been dangerously close to giving me puppy eyes. “I’ll hang toward the back. But I can’t promise I’ll stay all night.”
He nodded, and we turned to walk toward the crowd.
I waved to him as we parted ways and he proceeded to weave through the mass of people to get to the front of the stage. I glanced around, wondering if the record exec was here yet. I hung toward the edge of the crowd, wanting a quick escape. Because while I may indulge his peculiar request for a few songs, I knew my heart wouldn’t be able to hold together the entire show.