[Excerpt] the Trouble with Hate is...

Chapter Four

Bec snorted and spat water down her front. "Jesus, warn a girl next time."

I shrugged.

I'd never known what was up Hannah's butt. We used to be close; her, Emma, Bec, a few others and me. But, since Jonny, I'd found it just too much energy to try to keep up with epic teenage girl bullshit – the make-up, the clothes, the boys; it was all too much and so trivial. Bec had been the only one to understand and the only one to follow when I pulled away. We'd both sort of become the school's wayward freaks, the weird girls who no one really hated, but no one really liked and who just didn't really fit in. Not that we went to great lengths to try.

I was fine with that plan, to be honest. It meant I didn't have to pretend to be something I wasn't, pretend to like things I didn't, or people I didn't.

Sometimes, I worried that Bec wasn't happy with her life and where I'd inadvertently led her. But, then I'd see her grimace at something Hannah – or her other year level equivalents – would do and I'd be reassured that my best friend liked our place in life.

Actually, I think Bec would have been happy as long as wherever our place was didn't interfere with her hook up capability. In many respects, Bec was the female equivalent of Casper – hence why I say I'm surprised they never hooked up. But, she at least had some respect for the guys she left behind. Well...she had the same amount of respect for them as they did for her.

"You getting changed?" Bec broke into my reverie and I blinked.

"Uh, yeah. Good idea."

We veered into the locker rooms and wandered through the loud, meaningless blather of girls getting changed or just hanging out. Rain beat steadily on the tin roof above us, which explained why there were so many bodies we had to pick our way through to get to my sports' locker.

Not that I did sport, but every girl who had to change at some point during the week got a locker in the locker room as well as one for books in the corridors. Overkill much? Probably. But, useful.

"Well, look who we have here," Bec said with a smile and I looked up to see Emma jump.

"Oh, hey." She gave us a warm smile.

"Got sport this afternoon?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Training tonight?"

She nodded again. "How was dance? Latin getting any better?"

I snorted as I started getting changed. "Thankfully, no Latin today. We worked on our group piece for the showcase. But, we stuck that move."

Emma's face brightened. "Oh, hey, nice!"

"Nice is having Luke Holt's hands all over her," Bec commented and the three of us grinned.

"Well, if someone has to touch me, it may as well be him."

It hadn't escaped my notice that I didn't do physical contact well anymore, but there wasn't a lot I could do about it.

When I was younger, I was hugging everyone, holding people's hands, hell I'd even share drinks and risk Brett- or Casper-cooties. But, I couldn't do it anymore. I didn't know exactly when it had started or how it had happened, only that it did.

I could suffer human contact during dance for longer than any other time. But, Latin was still proving difficult. It was close and it was intimate and there was a damn lot of touching. Needless to say, I had relaxing issues and that led to Latin being one of the styles I was God awful at.

"I could hug you again," Bec offered and I laughed.

"Thanks, I think I'm good for now. Em, how you getting home?"