Love to Hate You

Chapter Thirteen

I bite my lip and turn to Sean who sighs and throws his fork down onto his tray noisily.

“I don’t want to talk about this.” He says exasperatedly while standing up and taking his tray with him.

My eyes follow him, watching him spill the uneaten food into the trash and throw the plastic tray on the stack. I glance back at my own tray, still biting my lip.

“How would we do it?” I ask in a barely audible whisper.

Austin’s turns to look at me, my eyes stay trained on the tray, though. For some reason I feel like looking at him would give him too much hope. Sean is taking his decision to leave the band quite hard. I know this isn’t what he wanted. He expected Justin to come crawling back instantly, and he didn’t. Justin’s too difficult, too prideful to ever admit defeat. Now, with this mentioning of a rival band, Sean feels overwhelmed. So am I. How could we ever make this work?

“We do it as though we’ve never broke up. We’ll practice like we used to minus the others, we can do this.” He answers firmly and even though I’m not looking at him I know his eyes are pleading, “We can’t go down without a fight. Justin kicked you out after annoying you for days to join. Aren’t you mad? Don’t you want to do something?”

I chew on my lip nervously. He’s right. I’m not one to just give up. I won’t go down without a fight, not after what he’s been putting me through. Now, after Austin’s said this, it’s made me realize that the Heartbreakers won’t be the same without us. So, why not show them what they’re missing? What do we have to lose?

“Yes.” Is my one word answer and I know Austin is beaming at me right now.

I sneak a glance at him and give him a small smile before standing up right as Sean sits down again. I lift my tray up and take it over to dump the remaining food with Austin following me. While we are walking back I remember something.

“Austin, how are we going to convince Sean to do this?” I say suddenly.

Austin tenses up beside me but then shrugs.

“He’s mad a Justin too, I don’t think it will take much convincing.”

But it does. I spend the remainder of my day whining and pleading for him to say yes, yet he refuses. He’s trying to be rational, saying that fighting won’t solve anything. Maybe he’s right but that’s not the point. Maybe I don’t want to solve anything, maybe I just want to add fuel to the fire. There is this voice inside my head taunting me to do this. I want to fight.

“For the last time, Reese, no!” he grumbles while I jog beside him as he speed walks out of the building after school.

I carry my skateboard roughly with it banging against my leg as I walk. My backpack is painfully full and sinks down my back with unusual heaviness. I push the fringe from my eyes with my free hand and look up into his face which is hidden by his glasses. He frowns as he gives me a light shove. It’s not hard enough to sway me, but hard enough to tell me to back off. I ignore this, though.

“Please, Sean! This would mean everything to me. I just want to sing, please!” I beg desperately.

“Oh, come on. I’m not dumb, Reese. I don’t know you well, but I know you well enough to know this is not just about singing.” He scoffs while pushing the door open. A gust of warm air blows my hair back and feels refreshing compared to the stuffy school building.

I growl and stand in front of him when he throws his skateboard down and prepares to ride off.

“Fine, it’s not just about singing! It’s about me not wanting to go down without a fight! I’m not weak!” I tell him, panting from half screaming and the jog.