Page 21 of Hateful
“Shut up.” I breeze past him toward the door, making sure to waft my scent toward him on the way. He pretends to gag.
I pause right outside the door. “Um … can I talk to you about something?”
“Take your shower first.”
But I can’t wait that long. “A few days ago, Heath made a pass at me,” I say.
He immediately jerks his head up from his phone. “He what?”
Now I’ve got his attention. I can’t believe I didn’t at least tell Rafaelthis.This is the kind of stuff he lives for.
“Yeah. That’s why he followed me on the hiking trail. To tell me he wasn’t trying any ‘gay shit’.”
Rafael snorts. “Straight boys.”
“But that’s the thing,” I say, setting my shower basket on Rafael’s dresser, ignoring his irritated expression. “Now all three of them have made a pass at me somehow.”
For a second, I almost stop myself from saying what I do next. But I can’t help it. I have a problem holding in my thoughts today, apparently.
“Do you … do think they actually like me?”
For once, Rafael doesn’t make a joke of it. In fact, he just sits up a little straighter and looks at me like he’s trying to size me up. What might surprise me more, however, is that he doesn’t immediately tell me I’m wrong.
“Uh—I don’t know?”
I start to sit on the end of his bed, but he waves me away with one hand still clamped across the bridge of his nose. I have to settle on pacing across the floor instead.
“And they think I’m a boy,” I press on. “Doesn’t that mean they’renotstraight? And if they find out I’m a girl, will they not like girl-me anymore? Would they only like boy me?”
“Maybe they’re bi, I don’t know, butlook.” Rafael holds up a hand for me to be quiet. “I’m already your shaman for acting like a boy. I can’t be your sexual shaman too. It’s too weird.” He wrinkles his nose as he grabs his phone again. “Plus, straight people freak me out.”
I rock back and forth on the balls of my feet, waiting, but Rafael stares determinedly down at his phone.
“Please, Alex,” he says, glancing up only for a moment before looking back down, “don’t make me explain to you how wrong this is.”
It’s clear he’s done talking about this, so all I can do is purse my lips and grab my shower stuff off his dresser and slip into the bathroom, shutting the door behind me.
I just wish I didn’t know exactly what he means by that.
I also wish I didn’t know that he’s right.
Chapter Nine
Whatever Jasper’s intentions—orthe rest of their intentions are for that matter—I don’t find out right away.
In fact, soon my conversation with Heath fades away into the passing weeks until it’s almost as if it didn’t happen at all. I don’t run into him in the forest trails again.
In fact, I rarely run into any of them anywhere.
The next couple weeks are a blur of acing tests and running on the hiking trails. I’m feeling incredibly confident in my grades now that I’ve been studying my ass off when I’m not running it off. I’m almost at the top of my class.
And I’m going to need it. I’m going to need every advantage I can get if I’m going to have any leverage once I get found out. Because I’m going to be found out, right?
Between Jasper and Headmistress Robin, it’s only a matter of time before one of them lets it slip out.
So, I’m not exactly happy about the first leg of the competition against the girls’ school. To me, it’s just another distraction. Just another opportunity to run intothem.
All, or any, of the four of them.
