A Rose as Black as your Heart

(38) Finished Getting In Trouble?

Chapter 38

Ten minutes later, Matt’s battered car drew up in the parking lot. I stood up and dragged myself wearily to over, letting drops of rainwater slide down my cheeks without batting them out the way.

“Hey, sis. How was your day?” Matt asked distractedly as I slid in the passenger seat. Then he caught sight of my face. “Oh. That bad, huh?”

“Yeah,” I said numbly.

“What happened?” Matt asked sympathetically. I turned to him.

“Did you know Travis liked me?”

For a second, surprise flickered across Matt’s face, but then he grinned. “So he finally admitted it, then? Or did you work it out yourself?”

I stared at him in horror. “You knew?”

“Hmm. I guess he told you himself then,” Matt mused. He started out the parking lot. “Yeah, I knew. Everyone knew. Being subtle isn’t his strong point.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Matt shook his head. “I couldn’t sell the poor kid out like that. Had to wait for him to man up and do it himself.”

“But couldn’t you have given me a warning?” I said desperately.

Matt glanced at me, measuring me with his gaze. “I guess you didn’t feel the same?”

“Of course I didn’t! I had no idea!” I raked a hand through my hair. “And up until yesterday, I had a boyfriend.”

“Poor guy,” Matt mused. “So why d’you look like someone has run over your cat?”

“Because now my best friend hates me,” I snapped. “And I don’t have a cat.”

Matt looked startled. “He hates you? Why?”

“Take a guess, Matthew,” I retorted angrily, and turned to glare out the window for the rest of the ride home.

I tried to attempt my homework that night, but thoughts kept fluttering through my head like fat moths, bumbling around and distracting me from my surroundings.

How had I not noticed Travis’ feelings for me? It seemed so completely obvious now. The day Daniel and I had got together, he had come into school for half an hour and then left; half an hour would probably be enough time for the Bridgewood rumour mill to reach him. I’d thought he hadn’t seemed that sick the next day; had it really been me and Daniel getting together that made him feel like he couldn’t cope with school for a day?

And then that day when Daniel had sat with us at lunch. My feelings for Daniel must’ve been pretty obvious, and if Travis was in love with me... well, no wonder he’d treated Daniel like some kind of arch nemesis.

Suddenly, a conversation with Rose came swimming back to me: “Maybe Harrison’s fancied you for ages, and you’ve never noticed, and now the poor guy’s stuck in the friend zone...” Oh, God... and then the look on Travis’ face when I’d turned to him for his opinion. I’d thought it was because Rose and I were being weird, but thinking back, his expression had seemed a lot more like... sadness.

Rose had known, too. Just today, when Travis had been mad about Daniel upsetting me, what was it she’d said? “Should I ask him if he can ask her back out then, Travis? Would that make you feel better?” Because she knew how much Travis had hated it when Daniel and I had been together. No wonder he’d been so happy this morning, after I’d told him.

Great. So, because I’d loved one guy to much, and didn’t love the other enough, I’d now lost my best friend and boyfriend in just two days. Nice going, Alexis.