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Amber Blake is having dreams, and they just might be the key to saving her best friend, Mark.
Unfortunately, she's too preoccupied pretending to hate the boy next door, Carter Hayes. Secretly hoping to rekindle what once was, Amber atte...
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I don't see Carter for the rest of the day.
Whether it's because of our schedules or because he got sent home, I don't know. I try not to think about it and fail miserably.
On a positive note, Mark and I have the same free period at the end of the day, a perk usually reserved for student athletes. I don't question the blessing and send him a short text to meet me at the log.
I'm not there long before he shuffles through the trees, his hair getting caught in the low hanging branches. His demeanor is back to normal after this morning. There's no residual tension in his smile, only the gap between his two front teeth that was never fixed with braces.
"The scheduling staff was kind to us for once, huh?" he asks, reaching around in his bag. He pulls out a flask I gave him for Christmas last year and takes a large swig before handing it over.
"We didn't even have to use bribes this time." I can tell the vodka is cheap stuff from the way it burns on the way down, but I don't show my disdain. It's not like I could've bought a better bottle.
I pass the flask back and Mark takes two more big sips. He drinks it like water, causing nerves to flutter in my chest. I can't ignore the correlation between his behavior this morning and his thirst for vodka now.
"So what were you and Darren talking about?" I try to keep my voice as light as possible, but his grip on the flask tightens anyway.
Blowing out a frustrated breath, he leans forward over his knees. "Just finalizing some things. I'm gonna start tutoring him for the SATs. Guess I was tired of being underappreciated by my current student," he shoots me a pointed look before refocusing on the flask.
"Like Darren has ever appreciated anything. Why would you want to tutor that asshole?" I know I'm not the only person he's been helping over the summer, but the idea of running practice tests with Darren sounds like pure torture to me.
Mark pauses, the lip of the flask only inches away from his mouth. "Because all money is good money. Even from assholes."
The way his tongue sticks on the word money doesn't go unnoticed. It's something we don't talk about often, but by the way he's clenching his jaw, I feel like I have to ask.
