After the Ink [PUBLISHED]

Chapter Twenty-One

While Casey and Lauren are talking, I stand up to throw my trash. While walking over to the trash cans, Jacob appears by my side with a tray of trash himself.

"Is this trash a metaphor?" Jacob asks me. "Maybe trash means something different to everyone. Do you think that would make a good article?"

I roll my eyes. "You don't have to write about everything you think about."

He takes my trash and throws it away for me. "But I do. Journalism has changed my life," he says in his dramatic voice, like he's in a Greek theater. "What are we going to do in class now that the paper is being printed?"

"Probably just have free days until the break," I shrug. Mrs. Thomas always makes the newspaper our final, so we're practically done with that class.

"Speaking of the break," he says, leaning against the wall. "I need to talk to you."

"You aren't already talking to me?"

"Ha-ha," he says sarcastically. "My mom wants me to invite you and your aunt over for a Christmas dinner."

If this is some scheme by Jacob's mom to get us back together, she can forget it. And my aunt doesn't like Jacob. It would be a disaster dinner. "I'll let my aunt know," I tell him, even though I can already see her reaction.

"Cool," he nods. "See you in class."

When I walk back over to the girls, it's quiet. I look at them strangely. "What?"

"You're talking to Jacob again?" Casey asks me.

I look between them and realize they've assumed the worst. "We're friends, I guess."

"I thought we agreed that isn't healthy?" Casey points out. "Plus, you have all this drama with Dylan now."

Lauren speaks up. "Casey kind of filled me in about Dylan."

They have to be on some kind of drug. "You guys know I would never get back together with Jacob, right?"

They don't look convinced.

I can't believe I have to sit here and explain myself. "I have zero feelings towards Jacob, and he has no feelings for me," I say. "We're talking like old friends right now." I can't help but steal a glance in Dylan's direction.

The root of it all, admittedly, is because Jacob is just more accessible than Dylan right now. It doesn't mean that I care less for Dylan and care more for Jacob. I need more people in my life to talk to and regardless of what he's done to me, he was my friend before we even dated.

"Well, I just don't want you to get all mixed up in your head again," Casey says, thoughtfully.

It's different. I never imagined my life coming to this stage, what with being friends with Lauren and Jacob, and pining over Dylan who I can't have. It's not how I imagined my senior year to go.

English is agony. Dylan walks into class after me, and doesn't look at me as he passes by. Feeling his presence behind me has my heart racing as I try to keep it together. Part of me wants the semester to be over already so I won't have to see him in class.

Journalism is as I expect it to be. Mrs. Thomas gives us a free day to study for other finals or to just keep ourselves busy. I help Vicky study for her English final and it makes me giddy that she asked me to help in the first place. It only took the whole semester, but she's finally said more than four words to me.

Once she's happy, we sit there and wait for class to be over. Will has his head on the desk, and I assume he's asleep.

Ultra-bored, I get up and walk over to Sophie and Seth, who are sitting near the front of the class.