Why You Shouldn't Lend A Bad Boy Your Clothes

Chapter 38

Alexis was grinning widely as I winked at her and followed Nate into his room in the attic.

He was just pulling a tank top over his head as we entered.

"Didn't need to put that on," Alex said innocently, studying her nails as she perched on his desk.

Nate looked like he was about to faint where he was leaning against the door, so I cut in with: "Sometimes I forget that you and Hunter have been friends forever and wonder where these phrases are coming from. Then I remember and I'm not surprised at all."

"You don't even know half of it," Nate snorted. "Sometimes I'm one hundred percent convinced she's trying to give me a heart attack."

"I have no idea what you're talking about. I'd never do that," Alexis said. After a second she added: "Not before prom. I need a date."

"Please. You could have anyone," Nate replied, not looking happy about this fact in the slightest.

The mocking look on her face slowly morphed into a genuinely sincere one. "And what makes you think I want anyone else when I can have an adorable, song writing, hilarious, mix-tape making, gorgeous, clever guitarist?" she asked.

Nate stared at her like she had just grown a second head. Then he suddenly crossed the room at lightning speed and the next thing I knew was that he was kissing Alexis like his life depended on it.

I grimaced and flopped onto his bed face first.

After what felt like hours, I felt the mattress dip and dared to look up at Alex and Nate sitting down on each side of me, looking more than a little dishevelled.

"Speaking of prom," Alexis said as if nothing had happened, while simultaneously smoothing her hair down with one hand. "Jules might be able to be there tomorrow."

Nate looked at me in surprise, so I quickly recounted everything that had happened today to him. Afterwards we talked and talked and talked. About my parents, about tomorrow, about next year, everything.

The longer we talked, the stranger the atmosphere around us got. It was full of anticipation and anxiety, hope and nervousness, yet no one dared to say it out loud.

The quiet before the storm.

+++

I returned home alone the next day. Alexis, Nate and I had gone to school together after spending half the night sitting together on Nate's bed, so I only returned late in the afternoon.

Anxiety was making my heart race as I stepped through the front door, curious to know what my mother had decided to do in my absence. Turned out, she hadn't done anything at all.

I shouldn't have been as surprised as I was when she told me: "I don't know what to do, Jules. He hasn't been home all night. I know that he'll return this evening though, he called and said I better decide what to do until then."

"Don't tell me you consider forgiving him. Mom, he lied to you. He lied to all of us. Hell, who knows for how long he has been cheating? Maybe this isn't even the first time," I said, leaning against the kitchen table and looking down at her sitting in her chair.

She took her glasses off slowly and placed them onto the table in front of her with shaking hands. Her eyes were red and swollen, her face pale. "Juley, I know that you're angry at him-"

"Aren't you?" I interrupted her harshly. "Mom, what he did, it wasn't... It wasn't okay. Are you just going to completely disregard that and pretend nothing happened so you can stay with him? So you have someone to make decisions for you and tell you what to do? Are you really that much of a child?"