Page 15 of The Bad Boyfriend Curse
I’m annoyed at his tone. He’s making assumptions about me again. “There are scholarships and loans if you need them. And I do… or did have a job before I came here.”
Suddenly the air around us goes cold. Noah glares at me with his brows knit together. That comment seems to have angered him. “Okay, and did your job pay for your AirPods?” he snaps. “Or those shiny shoes? Or did your daddy, the one with the Porsche, pay for them?” He scoffs, and the harshness of it makes me reel back a bit. “You don’t have a clue how people around here live.”
All the thoughts, all the feelings I’ve been keeping to myself are building behind my tongue like a wave. Why are people constantly pushing their assumptions onto me?
“You’re right, I don’t,” I say, my jaw tight. “But that’s only because I just moved to Cherrybridge, and if I’m honest, your town is weird. Everyone has a chip on their shoulder for one reason or another. But Idoknow about money struggles. My mom had me three days after she turned seventeen. The guy that got her pregnant moved to India literally the day after she told him, and she hasn’t had a cent of child support from him. We lived in one small room in my grandparents’ house while Mom got her nursing diploma, and then she worked long hours in hospitals and nursing homes so she could save for her own place.
“I was ten when I finally got a room of my own. I’ve had part-time jobs since I was fourteen, and I still managed to get some of the highest grades in my school because I knew I’d have to rely on scholarships for university.” I pull at my shirt. “These jeans and this T-shirt? They’re from a thrift store.” Ipull my new phone out of my pocket roughly and wave it in the air. “This is the first brand-new phone I’ve ever had in my life.” And now it’s my turn to scoff, and Noah jumps back at the sound, just like I did. “You think I’m some privileged princess, but you don’t know a thing about me.”
My heart is racing by the time I’m done with my rant, but it felt good letting it out. I immediately start to relax. My fists uncurl, my shoulders drop, and my thoughts aren’t racing a mile a minute anymore.
Noah doesn’t say anything for a while, just blinks at me. But because he can’t seem to hide his expressions, I can see that he’s actually kind of impressed that I stood up for myself. And maybe surprised at my life story too.
He finally smiles. “Props to you, Noorani. I was wrong about you. I’m sorry.”
I don’t want to think about my skin erupting in goose bumps at the sound of my last name on his lips. I take a deep breath, willing my heart to slow to normal.
“Want to switch roles?” he asks, holding the shears up. “Unless you don’t want to lose your view.”
I have no idea what he means, but my back was starting to get sore from picking branches up off the ground. “Sure, let’s switch.” I start taking off my gloves.
“Keep your gloves on,” Noah says. “These clippers are tight. They’ll probably give you blisters. My callused hands can handle branches.”
I raise one brow. “Do a lot of garden work?”
He laughs at that. “Hardly. It’s from my guitar.”
I put my gloves back on and take the clippers from him.Despite his flirting yesterday, and his assumptions about me, Noah is… nice. Considerate. And kind of wise, too. Which, I mean, I totally get that because he’s got ripped jeans, an old band shirt, tattoos, and piercings, that doesn’t mean he has to be an unintelligent asshole. But there’s such a disconnect between the things that Sadie said about him and the person I’ve been working with for the last two days.
I wish I knew why he’s here. Did he do something illegal? But that doesn’t make him a bad person. I mean, I broke the law, and I’m not a bad person. In fact, I don’t know if any of the people in CROP are actually bad or just made one stupid mistake like I did that also got them here. I need to remember not to judge people—maybe I just have to get to know them. Except Kennedy—I think the earbud stealer actuallyisa bad person.
“So how did you end up in Cherrybridge anyway?” Noah asks after we’ve been working silently for a while. Has he been trying to figure me out the same way I’ve been trying to figure him out?
“My mom married a man from here,” I say. I don’t mention that the man is a LeClair, because I suspect that Noah wouldn’t like me if he knew who my stepfather is.
Not that I want Noah to like me.
Maybe.
“Ah,” he says, nodding. “The age-oldimprove your financial situation by marriagestrategy. Good for her. Can’t say I blame her.”
Is he saying my mom is a gold digger? I’ve heard people call her that before—mostly Nanabapa’s friends, and some people at the hospital where Mom worked—but I really don’tthink it’s true. Mom’s never been the kind of person who cares about how much money someone has, nor does she care about designer labels or expensive things. But she did say she was happy she could finally spoil me.
I cut another branch and watch as he picks it up. Just like yesterday, Noah’s working diligently. I glance down the line of trees, and Kennedy and her partner are nowhere to be seen. “I was supposed to stay in Toronto with my grandparents this summer,” I say, “but plans changed. I’m going back in September, though.”
“Not interested in finishing school here?”
“No. No offense, but your town kind of sucks. And there’s this program for future architects of color at the University of Toronto that Ihaveto be in next year.”
He chuckles. “Can’t say I disagree that Cherrybridge sucks, but considering the Porsche you keep getting dropped off in, I think your experience of Cherrybridge isn’t the same as mine.”
He’s right, and I don’t know what to say about that.
We work quietly for a few more minutes before I think of something else I want to ask him. “Before, when you asked me to switch roles, you said,Unless you don’t want to lose your view. What did you mean?”
Noah’s face does the most fascinating transformation then. Like, it goes from a neutral boredom, to frowning, to confused, to smiling all in a few seconds. But it’s not a normal smile. It’s the one he flashed yesterday when he asked if I wanted to piss off my parents by going out with him. When he called me pretty. It’s his flirty smile.
And I hate what it does to me.
