Page 8 of Hateful
“Rafael!” I gasp, and he laughs at me.
“Don’t be such a prude. How was your Christmas?”
I shrug. “It was fine. Nothing like yours. I think the highlight of my vacation was when I stabbed my brother with a fork.”
He doesn’t even balk.
“Ah, the struggles of the middle class.” He rolls over onto his stomach and reaches over to his nightstand. “I see you ate quite a bit, too.”
Heat rises to my cheeks, and I fold my arms over my stomach. I’ve just taken off my oversized hoodie, and the T-shirt I’m wearing underneath is a little form-fitting than I remember.
At leastthisis the Rafael I remember.
He’s eying me with an intensity that makes me want to wriggle out of my skin entirely and just leave it here on the floor behind me.
“You didn’t gain weight there. Look at your hips.”
I position myself in front of the full-length mirror and gasp. Idohave hips. If my breasts were larger, I’d almost have an hourglass figure.
“Oh no,” I say quietly, running a hand over the tops of my thighs. I knew something like this might happen eventually, but I’dreallybeen hoping the bean-pole figure I thought I inherited from my father would hold out just a while longer.
“Those are somebirthinghips.”
I pat them. Is this something dieting and exercise will help? What happened to my straight-as-a-stick figure from last semester? I thought I hadn’t been blessed by puberty at all; now it’s kicking in with curvy hips seemingly overnight?
“And your ass, too,” Rafael says, helpful as ever.
“Ah, shit.” One quick turn and I know he’s not wrong. “Maybe I can just be a boy with a nice ass?”
The hopefulness in my voice just sounds pathetic.
Rafael snorts. “Never seen a boy with an ass that nice.”
“Not even your Fiji boyfriend?”
“Boyfriend is a strong word.”
I don’t want to talk about Rafael’s sex life anymore, so I turn toward him to change the subject, pushing my butt out of his view. “So, what do I do?”
“Eat less Christmas cookies.” He tips his face up toward me and shrugs. “But you should be careful. Boys forget themselves in locker rooms.”
My throat goes dry as the memory of Beck pushing me up against the wall and kissing me comes to mind. Compared to what Jasper tried to do to me, that was positively tame … and it still scared me.
It’s not so much that I was scared of Beck, but that I was scared of myself. Scared of what that kiss meant, how it made me feel … how … how …
No.I can’t think thoughts like that. I need to keep a clear head this semester.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask, narrowing my eyes at Rafael.
“One wayward grope and your secret’s out.”
“Grope?”
Rafael laughs bitterly and rolls over onto his back, tucking his hands behind his head. “Just because none of these boys have proclaimed they’re gay doesn’t mean they’re not curious. They make up all sorts of excuses for it. They grab each other in the locker rooms and pretend it’s all in good fun.”
I turn back to the mirror. “You’d think they’d do that?”
“Think?” he snorts derisively. “Iknow. I’ve had my ass squeezed a time or two.”
