Right when Toni's finally beginning to sort through her own feelings about it, this whole thing with Shelby starts coming apart at the seams.
Shelby starts actively avoiding Toni the day after the phone call with a determination she's never had before—she even skips the class they share—and Toni assumes right away that it's because of Toni's non-confession: the one that Shelby had pressed her to make. Through the bitterness and resentment caused by that assumption, Toni wonders if maybe it's finally sank in for Shelby that there's something deeper going on here like it's finally sank in for Toni, and she's decided she wants nothing to do with any of it after all. There are no notes in Toni's locker apologizing this time, but every time Toni catches a glimpse of Shelby there's so much less brightness in her green eyes than there used to be, and Toni has no idea what to make of that.
It all hurts more than Toni wants or expects it to—she spends some time crying in her room about it one afternoon while Martha stands outside her door asking what's wrong; Toni makes something up about hardcore PMS—but she's also barely surprised. Aside from Martha and her mom everyone always leaves her eventually, and Shelby Goodkind is certainly the last person Toni would ever bank on to stick around.
She corners Fatin by her locker after a week of getting the cold shoulder from Shelby and tells her, "You should come over today," and Fatin raises both eyebrows.
"I would, but this whore's got cello practice." It sounds like an excuse and Toni isn't convinced. Fatin tries to leave but Toni presses a hand to the wall beside her and stops her, and Fatin looks surprised and a little intimidated, but also like she thinks Toni's aggression is kind of sexy, too.
"You don't have to do anything," Toni promises. "For hours."
Fatin looks intrigued by the idea for a moment, but then she bites her lip and shrugs her shoulders. "I don't know, Toni. There's someone I'm kind of into."
"Really?" Toni asks, genuinely taken aback, because it hasn't been that long since Fatin was the one offering or since she was flirting with a random janitor, and Fatin rolls her eyes.
"Yeah, it's not exclusive, but I'm hoping it will be eventually, so I'm trying to curb some bad habits. And no, I won't tell you who it is."
"Why not?" Toni knee-jerks.
"Because it's none of your business. I don't know who it is you're sneaking around with all the time."
Toni pulls back and then blinks at her. "What?"
"We've had sex twice since junior year started," Fatin reminds her like it's no big deal. "And you turned me down the other day, which you literally never used to do unless you were seeing Regan. You're obviously getting it somewhere else; I'm not an idiot. What, is she currently unavailable so suddenly I'm hot shit again?" Toni averts her gaze and Fatin laughs at her, beaming. "You sneaky bitch. Do I know her?" She gasps. "Is it Dot? She says she's into this really hot older guy and swears she'd tell me if she was into girls, but I don't know, man, those cargo shorts—"
"It's not Dot, and we're not doing this," Toni insists, wondering when the hell her booty call request had turned into an interrogation.
"Are you in love?" Fatin teases, giving her puppy dog eyes and clasping her hands under her chin, and Toni's fists clench.
"No," she snaps, storming off, and Fatin looks after her with alarm.
"Toni, c'mon," she calls out, "I was kidding!" Toni hears her pause, and then add, evidently shameless, "You can go down on me!"
Toni pauses and waits for Fatin to catch up to her, suppressing an eye roll when every boy in the hallway looks at them and a few of them hoot and holler. It's her least favorite thing about Fatin, how much she seems to crave male attention, but at least she hasn't asked for a threesome with a guy yet, and Fatin's also pretty liberal so at least the guy she's into won't be one of the psychos Shelby's always hanging around with.
