“Where are you taking me?” Mark asked as he followed Christy to the school gym.
“We’re gonna socialize with some dumbasses who might know stuff about Paige.”
Mark shook his head. “How do you know what they know?”
“I don’t, which is why we’re socializing with them. Play cool, alright?”
“But I don’t have time for this! I start work at the country club in an hour.”
“This is for your own good. You need to hear it from other people.” She rolled her eyes. “It’s sad that you won’t believe your own sister.”
“Hang on.” His hand landed on her shoulder to stop her. When she turned to him, he said, “I never said I didn’t believe you. I just think what you’re doing is a total waste of time. And you’re wasting my time too.”
“Come on, just stay for like a minute. And besides, it’s time for us to make new friends.”
“I’ve made a few friends.”
“You mean Sadie, your cousin? That’s almost as lame as the group of friends you had the last time we were here, and I didn’t think you were insecure enough to turn into one of those losers.”
He sighed. Her words didn’t hurt as much as they used to, but she was getting annoying. “Fine, a few minutes. Promise you’ll stop roasting me?”
“I live to roast you.” She grinned and took off his beanie to put it on her head. He didn’t bother to take it back as they continued walking.
They went around the gym, passing some P.E. equipment and the girls’ locker rooms. Then they reached the back to find a group of guys and girls sitting on the ground, and Mark wondered for a second whether he smelled alcohol.
The first person he recognized--and who made him glare instantly--was Andrew Chen, Paige’s scumbag of a date. He recognized Carter, who was eating potato chips, Kylie, and Mila, but the rest of the group he didn’t know.
“Hey, James!” Christy said as she almost ran to the guy next to Andrew.
“You made it,” James said as he moved to let her into the circle.
“Wait a sec, I know you,” a brown-haired girl said as she grabbed some potato chips from Carter. “Christy, right?”
“Yep. And that’s Mark, my dumbass brother.”
Mark raised his hand in a gesture that was hardly a wave. “Hey.”
“Oh, yeah!” Andrew said. “You work at Cucina Mia! Giving Paige that gelato was fucking hilarious. The pics went totally viral.” Everyone, including Christy, laughed.
Mark cringed as he recalled seeing the pictures last night. Even though he only got to know her for a night, he just knew she didn’t deserve his sister’s wrath. Now Christy had everyone laughing at Paige. But then he noticed one person--James--was only staring at the ground.
Carter yelled out, “I thought you were shitting me!” He turned to Mark. “Did you actually give the nut gelato to her?”
Mark looked at Christy, who tilted her head and squinted her eyes at him. She meant to tell him he was better off lying. Going along with it, he said without thinking, “It was an accident. I, uh, gave her the wrong one.” Why Christy wanted to keep it a secret, he didn’t know. It wasn’t like her plan of revenge was going to stay a secret, even after the photos spread on Twitter.
“The best thing you ever did,” Carter said. “I’ve never laughed so hard in my life.” He drank from a bottle in a paper brown bag.
“Hey, didn’t you date her?” a guy in a dark blue T-shirt asked.
Carter wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “Yeah, eighth grade. That bitch led me on so many times. How much sluttier can she be, even in eighth grade? You know, I exposed her ass, and she’s still fucking a lot of guys. I’m telling you, she hasn’t changed.” He turned to Andrew. “I dunno what the hell you were thinking, going out with her. The only good thing about dating her is getting laid.”
Andrew shrugged. “Too bad it didn’t happen to me.”
Everyone burst out laughing again, but Mark was at a loss. He wanted to punch Andrew in the face, but he also wanted to know more about Paige’s history of dating. Kylie turned to him and pointed her lollipop at a spot next to her, and he hesitantly took it.
“I heard she slept with you and some other guys on the same day,” the brown-haired girl said.
Carter nodded. “It got pretty bad in eighth grade. People said it was her mom’s boyfriend molesting her or something.”
“No wonder she’s so fucked up,” the guy with the blue T-shirt said.
“It’s not just that, Dave,” Carter said as he leaned closer. “I mean, her whole family’s weird. Her mom fucks a lot of guys and her brother is retarded. It’s not like she grew up normal.”
“Paige seems normal to me,” the brown-haired girl said.
“But you don’t know her, Becca,” Carter said. “I actually liked her, in the beginning. Then she turned out to be a lying whore. But we had a fun time too, so that sorta balanced out.”
Mark heard some footsteps approaching and turned to see a blond guy carrying a paper brown bag. “Hey guys.” He handed the bag to Dave. “I met him at the dollar store like you said.”
Dave rolled his eyes as he took the bag. “Don’t tell everyone, Gary. You suck at this.”
“Oh, sorry.” His eyes quickly darted to the ground.
“What took you so long?” Dave asked.
Gary kneeled by the group circle. “I was trying to look for the store. It took me a while.” He shrugged. “Am I too late?”
“You’re good,” James reassured him.
Mark checked his phone for the time and stood up. “I gotta head to work.”
“At the restaurant?” Carter asked.
Mark shook his head. “The country club.”
“That sounds boring,” Becca commented.
He shrugged. “I need money.”
“Two jobs?” Carter said. “How can you even do school?”
“Exactly what I was thinking,” Christy said, shaking her head. “Fucking workaholic over here.”
Backing away, Mark said, “At least I make more money than you, big sis.” As he turned around, the groups said long “oh’”s and “savage”’s, and he couldn’t help but smile. He enjoyed burning his sister whenever he could.
“Mark,” she hissed as her footsteps caught up with him.
With a grin still on his face, he turned around and said, “You know it’s tr--”
“Do you see now?”
“See what?”
“That Paige Connelly is a liar, a slut, and a bitch.”
Mark had to stop to think. How did he really think of her now? “Um…”
“You finally get it. Good for you.” She patted his shoulder. “And for the record, I wasn’t the one who wasted all my money on a cheating bitch. And no, I’m not gonna drop that. Ever.”
And like she always did, she left with the last laugh. He glared hard at the back of her head. He needed to prove her wrong, somehow.
Though, he had to admit, after what he just heard about Paige, he had second thoughts. He barely knew her, so what if he was wrong about her? Would she lead him on too? Echoing Carter’s words, did she never change?
But something in the back of Mark’s head just told him he needed to get to know her more. For all he knew, Carter could’ve been exaggerating, and she might’ve changed at least a little. Eighth grade was a long time ago.
He just hoped he wasn’t wrong about his gut feeling, again. He could only wait until he’d find a girl who didn’t lie or cheat.
It was just hard to separate the good ones from the bad.
“Is this it then?” Mark asked, trying to hide the hurt in his voice.
Ava didn’t respond, with her back still turned to him.
“What did I do?” he pleaded.
“You didn’t do anything. I just don’t love you anymore.”
“And you didn’t tell me before sleeping with him?”
She turned around just then, and all he saw in her green eyes was irritation. “Jeremy isn’t immature like you, okay? And it’s not just my fault we didn’t work out. We’re just not made for each other.”
“So… I’m not experienced like you are? I’m just not good enough?”
“No, Mark.” She held his face in her hands. “I bet you’re good enough for another girl out there. She just isn’t me.”
“But the only girl I want is you.” The tears finally came out before he could keep them in any longer.
“I’m sorry.” She combed his short curls with her fingers. “You’re smart, Mark. Maybe you’re better off with a girl who didn’t drop out of high school four years ago.” She headed toward the bedroom door. “Bye, Mark.”
After she closed the door behind her, he crawled onto his bed and cried on his pillow. The sobs wouldn’t stop the more he thought about her. Simply put, he wasn’t good enough for her, and he never would be. No matter how much love he gave her, she never felt the same way. She got bored of him enough to see someone else.
Everyone warned him about her, about how she was much older than him, about her past of playing with boys she could manipulate. But he had already fallen for her hard.
But now it was crystal clear to him that she was low enough to not even break it off before moving on to the next guy and the next. His hands curled into fists. Never again would he be with a girl that threw him away when she was done with him. Never again would he get his heart broken over someone who didn’t deserve it in the first place.
Never again.
As Mark walked to his first period, all he wanted to do was go back to bed. He hoped he at least remembered packing all of his school stuff since he was half-awake all morning. The manager at the country club made him stay really late last night, then he had to take the bus home which took around forty-five minutes. Fitting in dinner and homework for the rest of the night sounded impossible at first, but he managed to finish right before blacking out.
Just when he was about to enter his English class, Paige caught his eye. He stopped in his tracks. Her red hair was curled this time, with her lips a shiny pink and...she had freckles on her nose and cheeks? He remembered she didn’t have any the last time he saw her.
He approached her immediately, but she didn’t seem to be as surprised as he was by the fact that this was their first time seeing each other since her date with that scumbag.
“Hey, Paige,” he began as soon as he stopped in front of her. “I tried texting you but you didn’t--”
“Um, about that,” she said as she glanced down at the ground before looking back up at him. “It was fun meeting you, but I think you should stop texting me.”
He stared at her. She wasn’t kidding, was she? “If this is about my sister, I know she’s crazy. She thinks screwing up your life will solve all her problems.” He shook his head. “I tried telling her it’s stupid but she doesn’t get it.”
Paige looked confused. “Why are you on my side? You don’t even know me.”
“But I do wanna know you. Just give me a chance.”
She sighed. “Look, I’m just taking a break from dating right now.”
A small wave of sadness hit him, but he pressed on. “Paige, I just know I really like talking to you. You’re really funny and pretty and I just...wanna know you better.” He said the last part of his sentence slowly, hoping he didn’t reveal too much.
She stared at him for a moment, until she shook her head. “You seem really nice, but I don’t wanna start a thing between us when your sister’s already pissed at me, and I don’t think I’ll ever know why. I just don’t want any more drama. So, I’m sorry.” He watched as she walked past him and headed down the hall.
So she didn’t even see any potential in what they could have? Maybe he just let a small crush go out of control in the last few days, and even after hearing all the bad things about her, he still kept trying? Was he actually that stupid?
But there was no surprise in that. He was always a complete idiot, and he always would be. After all, there was an appeal to that gut feeling of knowing who was the one.
He was just too fucking unlucky.838Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSRQmS0BvBE
