My Ex-Best Friend: The Bad Boy (Smythe #1)

Chapter 22

Chapter 22

       I hurried over to my locker since the first bell rang, meaning I had five minutes to get to AP chemistry. My dad was taking way too long to get ready to drive me to school, which was odd because he wasn't working today. He just had to drive me, that was it.

       I had a feeling he was doing it on purpose.

       "Artemis Novak, is that you?" a familiar voice said from behind me while I was about to grab my AP chemistry notebook from my locker.

       I turned around, my eyes almost widening at who I saw. Kali. Also known as my so-called best friend before I moved back here who stole my boyfriend. "What are you doing here?" I asked. I was not happy to see her.

       Kali gave me a smile, one that was mixed between happy and smug. "My dad got transferred here," she said. "Isn't that great?"

       "Great?" I repeated. "Well, your definition of great is definitely different from mine."

       "Oh, come on, you're not so mad about the Craig thing, are you?" she asked.

       "I don't have time for this," I said, taking my notebook from my locker and closing it behind me before walking off to my first class. I was dating Craig for so long, and he decided to cheat on me with Kali. To make things worse, Kali went along with it. If she really was my friend, she wouldn't have done it.

       I got to my class just in time, quickly sitting down in my spot beside Seb. "Are you okay, Artie?" he asked. "You seem upset."

       "I'll tell you later. I promise."

       Seb, thankfully, didn't push me into telling him. I really didn't want to get into it during the middle of class, even if we did have time to talk about it.

       For all of the class, we just had to work on a worksheet. No experiments, thankfully, because I was barely concentrating on the worksheet as it was. Seb ended up doing all the work and I knew he wanted to ask me about what was going on, but he didn't.

       When first period ended, Seb waited until after I had all my stuff packed up before grabbing my hand and pulling me out of the class. He pulled me away from the crowd and stood in front of me. "What's wrong?" he asked.

       I sighed. "Remember my ex-friend, Kali, that Craig cheated on me with?" Seb nodded. "Well, apparently, her dad got transferred her. She's at the school."

       "That's it?" Seb asked.

       "Seb, she hurt me," I reminded.

       "I know," Seb said. "But it's not like you have to talk to her or that Craig guy is here as well." One of his hands rested gently on my cheek. "And if he was, I'd have to kick his ass."

       I gave Seb a smile. "Your violence is oddly comforting."

       Seb smiled back, leaning down and pressing a short kiss on to my lips. When he pulled away, he intertwined his hand in mine before we made our way to English, after stopping off at our lockers. 

       We got to the English class a few seconds before the tardy bell rang, and as soon as we were sitting in our seats, Kali walked in. Great, so she was in at least one of my classes. This better be the only class we shared.

       Kali talked to Mr. Garner for a bit before she took the seat behind Seb. Mr. Garner then got to the front of the class and talked a bit about the presentation that we prepared the day before. 

       We had to make a conversation with our partner, each having three lines. However, if we were saying something positive, we had to say it in a negative tone. And if we were saying something negative, we had to say it in a positive tone.