Page 52 of Hateful
“Shh.” I unfold the paper. In Heath’s hasty scrawl, it just reads,First practice today. Meet at dining hall at usual time. I’ll walk you.
“He’ll walk you, huh?” Rafael makes a face as I fold the paper back up. “It’s getting pretty serious, then?”
“I guess it’s just so I don’t show up at the practice unexpected and piss off Beck and Jasper.”
“Have you asked why he hasn’t told them?” Rafael turns back to his notes. He’s all filled in; I told him a few days ago what I was planning.
“It’s probably better if Beck doesn’t know until I get there. That way he can’t do something horrible to me at the first practice.”
“At thefirstpractice,” he mutters in response. I choose to pretend not to hear that.
I also know it’s kind of a pointless gesture, if it is well meaning. I’m sure Beck doesn’t need much time to plan out just when and how he’s going to bully me.
I’m pretty sure he comes up with most of his shit on the fly. Especially since the new year started.
Maybe that girl he was with before break tempered him. Or maybe Jasper’s aggression has simply passed on to him like some sort of virus. Now that Jasper has gotten over it, Beck’s only gotten it worse.
After classes are done for the day, I grab dinner and take it back to my dorm to eat while I get some homework done. I’ve fallen into a routine for the past couple months and hadn’t even recognized it. Even now that Beck is back to his usual antics, or maybebecausehe’s back to his usual antics, I’m almost … comfortable now.
Or maybe comfortable isn’t the right word to use when it comes to my run-ins with Beck. Just last week he grabbed me by my backpack and shoved me down the entrance steps into the courtyard. It’s only a few steps, thankfully, but I was scratched up pretty badly.
Nothing compared to the last time I faced a set of stairs facing the wrong way up.
I keep one eye on my clock nervously. Rafael has been spending a lot of time with Neville recently—they often stay in the dining hall long past when they’re done eating, just chatting about whatever—so I’m alone while I eat. Iwasfeeling just fine about all this, but now I’m not so sure. What Rafael said earlier has me rattled.
I’ve grown comfortable in other ways too. I’ve never been jealous of a friend’s time before, but now … now I keep finding myself wondering what Rafael would say if I told him everything going on inside my head.
He might be an asshole, but he’s nothing like the rest of the assholes here I have to deal with on a daily basis.
I keep worrying about what Beck will do when he sees me and Heath on the field? Will he react badly? Will Heath and Jasper be able to stop him if he does? Will theywantto?
There’s also the possibility that this is all a setup, but I don’t find it likely. It would be an incredibly long con for Heath to pull off.
And something about him lately … it just doesn’t seem like he’d go and do this next.
Just do it,I think to myself.Stop being a coward.
I push aside my homework, toss my trash in the bin by the door, and start getting dressed for a run.
I pass Rafael and Neville on the way back to the dining hall, and Rafael gives me a concerned look while Neville waves obliviously. I just nod at them and try to push the nervous feeling out of my chest.
If even Rafael is worried …
No. No more of that. I’ve made up my mind.
I’m doing this for Heath.Somehow, that thought calms me a bit. It’s been a while since someone wanted me to do something for them that I actually had a choice in. Not that I really had a choice with the way Heath kept looking at me with those big puppy-dog eyes every time he asked.
There are a few stragglers in the gymnasium and even a few latecomers that push in past me when I arrive. I don’t need to go inside. Heath waits for me just outside the door. He breaks into a huge grin when he sees me and bounds toward me just like a golden retriever that caught sight of a stick.
I’m the stick, even if I haven’t been exactly looking like one lately. Pretty soon I’m going to have to ask for a size up in uniforms just to keep my ass under wraps.
“Ready?” Heath asks cheerfully as soon as he’s by my side. “I told Beck and Jasper that I’m bringing someone for the third leg of the race, but they don’t know who it is.”
On the opposite end of the spectrum from me, he’s wearing tight running shorts and a T-shirt that shows off every muscle of his body. It’s everything I can do to try not to stare down between his legs, though my eyes keep drifting there without me telling them to. I focus, instead, on his biceps, on the shape of his chest and shoulders beneath his shirt … but it’s not much better.
I feel my thighs tighten and I have to look away, find something else to focus on to make my body forget even when my mind doesn’t.
“Uh—okay,” I stammer out, trailing behind him. He grabs me by the elbow and pulls me up to walk level with him. He doesn’t let go as we walk through the hallways toward the track out behind the school. “So, you guys didn’t want to do tryouts?”
