Accidentally on Purpose

Chapter Forty-Three

"What is it, Jonah?" I asked tiredly, not in the mood to deal with his sudden grumpy cat mode. It'd been so long since I'd met this side of him, but unfortunately, I wasn't in the mood to deal with it.

"Is there anything you're not telling me?" he asked quietly, and my fingers froze on the lock. What was it that he was talking about?

After a pause that dragged out too long, I asked, "What do you mean?"

His jaw clenched and unclenched, as if he wasn't too sure how to approach the subject. Then, he sighed. "Someone put this inside my locker this morning," he finally said, and I peered over to look at what he was holding. I couldn't help but roll my eyes once I saw the picture in his hand, inwardly slapping myself silly for thinking about the worst. That I could deal.

"And?" I said calmly.

He gave me a frown. "I just... what's going on, Hannah?"

I laughed bitterly, "Well, I'm definitely not a porn star, if that's what you're wondering."

Jonah's jaw ticked; he was irritated by my flippant tone. But when I looked up at his eyes, I saw a mix of sadness and anger. "Hannah."

"Geez, this is too early for this kind of shit," I muttered to myself and banged my fist on my aching forehead. It only made the pain doubled up, but whatever.

"Hannah," Jonah sighed and tried to stop me from bruising my own forehead. "Everyone's talking about it. I'm not the only one who got the picture. I just... what do I do?"

I stopped and finally opened my locker wide, my teeth gritting when I saw something flying out onto the floor. "Stupid fucking asshole," I cursed, slamming my locker shut and turning around. "You picked the worst day to piss me off."

Daniel's locker wasn't too far away from mine, so it wasn't too long until I spotted his dumb head. He didn't seem fazed when he saw me approaching, with Jonah hot on my heels, but it was about to change. I swung my fist into his jaw, feeling my own knuckles crying out in pain. I didn't know if the punch actually hurt him or not, but he looked like he was stunned in silence.

My hand hurt like a fucking bitch, though. Fucking ow.

Once I had done that, all the anger I'd felt for him instantly evaporated. "God, you don't know how long I've wanted to do that," I sighed in relief.

"Hannah!" Jonah put a hand on my shoulder and spun me around. "What the fuck?"

He carefully took my hand and examined my slowly bruising knuckle. "It hurts," I whined, trying to move my fingers but ended up wincing in pain.

"It should be," he murmured before looking up. The anger in his eyes had intensified, and he looked like he wanted to kill someone he was so scary. "Did he do it? The pictures? Did he take them?"

I turned and saw Daniel rubbing his jaw with a grimace on his face. A part of me was highly satisfied by the fact that I really did hurt his face.

I pulled away from Jonah and slowly walked toward Daniel, who took a step backward, only to bump into the locker behind him. "I know exactly what you're trying to do," I started, pointing my good finger at his chest. "And guess what, asshole? I'm not gonna take the bait."

Daniel let go of his jaw to glare at me, but I held his gaze firmly. Unafraid. I wasn't scared of him, or what he could do to me. Because the truth was, he got nothing on me. I was the one who had the upper hand, the one who was holding the cards. And I knew he wanted me to become the asshole who spilled his secret, so he could put all the blame on me while he got away as the victim of my crimes.