Cliché with a player

Chapter 31 - Can't sleep, darling?

A/N: This chapter is a bit longer, probably the longest I have ever written here, so I hope it won't get boring.

"Matt!"

And there it is, that squeaky voice of none other than Marley. She runs up to Matt and basically jumps in his arms, hugging him around his neck. He looks surprised but hugs her back.

Just when I thought I was saved from this...not going to say it.

"I heard you stepped up your whole grades game. I'm soooo proud of you."

I truly and deeply hate this girl. Well, hate is a strong word which I don't like to use, so maybe more like I don't digest her? Nessa would have no problems saying that Marley is a bitch who deserves getting bad karma in her life. She's not wrong though.

Marley is about to say something else and suck up to Matt, while seductively waving her eyelashes, when Nessa and Dan come around the corner. She is talking on her phone to her family, if I can assume based on the fact, that she is speaking another language.

"Ne, mama! Ne slušaš me!"

Dan is looking at her like a lovesick puppy, patiently waiting for her to end the conversations.

When they get closer, he shoots a bright smile my way, does some lame-cool guy handshake with Matt, and just nods in Marley's way.

"How are you, Laken?"

"Okay, thanks."

Marley turns to me with a fake sympathetic expression.

"Oh, right. You fell and hit your head. I'm so sorry I forgot to ask you. How are you doing?"

That was some time ago, why didn't you bother sooner? I want to say something like that to her face. I truly cannot stand fake people. Besides, Dan didn't mean that. He was asking about our current situation with my parents and us having to live with the Taylors. 

"Do you really care or do you just want to look good?"

Nessa moves her phone a bit away from her ear and mouths a damn in my way.

"Ja, ja, tu sam."

"Is Nessa foreign?" Marley asks and scrunches her eyebrows.

"Yes."

"What language is that?" She scoffs, folding her arms across her chest.

"Croatian." And that answer came from Dan and not me.

Nessa ends the call and rubs her temples while muttering something under her breath. Dan shots her a worried look but she brushes him off with a wave of her hand. "Never mind." 

"Croatian? That sounded Russian to me," Marley squints her eyes at Nessa. She looks at Marley in awe, like she can't believe her. And then she bursts out laughing.

"Wow, thanks, Marley, I haven't had a laugh like that in some time."

The other girl looks as tho she is about to explode, all red in her face and neck. She realises she's not welcome here anymore and takes off.

~~~

Matt and I are in his room, studying again. He has to keep the grades now. I'm trying to explain something to him — I've tried explaining many things — but he's looking at me not the book

"Matt, focus, please."

He laughs with a rumble to it, and pulls me off my chair and in his lap in one swift motion.

"Matt!"

"What?"

I try to look stern when I shoot him a serious stare. "Let me go."