Series: Like Us Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
I liked her then, but she still seemed tentative, like I might shatter if she says the wrong thing.
Don’t put too much emphasis on recreating lost relationships. Let things play out naturally. It’s been a helpful tip from my therapist—even if she’s implied that Donnelly forced the restoration of our love.
“Huh?” I mumble to Frog.
“Need help?”
“Isn’t that cheating?” I ask her. “Normal students don’t have security to help them find Stiteler Hall.”
“Well, you’re not normal,” Frog says bluntly. “So you get to use all your tools in your arsenal. Like me.” She puts a hand to her heart. “Your sharpest tool.”
Quinn snorts behind her.
She ignores him, her focus pinned to something past me. “Plus, lingering is not the best for someone who gets recognized.”
Oh. I wonder if someone behind me did a doubletake. It sends a wave of urgency through me. “Lead the way,” I tell her.
“On it.” She practically hop-skips back to Quinn’s side and they swerve to the right. Clearly, I was on the wrong path. As we walk towards Stiteler Hall, I peek at my phone. No new texts. No updates from Donnelly.
Not that there would be anything to update me on.
He’s at work (well, technically at Dalton Academy protecting my brother).
I’m at college.
We’re settling into our relationship routine, which should feel comfortable and easy but too many unknown variables hang in the air like ominous windchimes.
Like Fizzle.
Like his place within Epsilon.
Like my mom.
It’s the first week of January. And I still haven’t hashed out the “kitchen table” incident with her. I’ve had one-on-one chitchats about movies, her physical therapy, and my fics since I’m writing the Thebulan saga for myself. Just for fun. But she never surfaces Donnelly. Or the kitchen table.
That big elephant in the room has yet to be acknowledged. Maybe it never will be. Maybe she just needs more time. Like months?
Or years?
I hope not that long.
I didn’t want her perception of Donnelly to warp into a negative picture. To where she wouldn’t root for us like she’s rooted for Moffy and Farrow. I know things are just complicated and awkward because she caught us in the act, but I can’t see how much damage really exists and what’s just anxiety-fueled.
It hurts to think about.
I try and fling that guilt off my shoulders. Entering a brick building, my bodyguards locate the classroom in a snap, as if they’ve charted the classes on my schedule weeks ago and mapped out everything.
They likely did.
Prepared, they are.
As I broach the doorway, I come to an immediate halt. When I picked out my courses, I was sure to check the info about class size. Twenty students sounded big on paper. Twenty could fill a room in high school.
Standing here now, I can confidently say a twenty-person class is tiny.
There is no giant lecture hall.
No stadium of seats.
Just rolling office chairs pushed into a single U-shaped table. I’m early (thank you, Frog and Quinn) but the five students that are also punctual all rotate in unison to spot the newcomer.
Yes, it’s me Luna Hale. Hi. Howdy.
They mutter to one another, eyes darting back to me. Heat crawls up my neck, but quickly, I sink into the nearest chair—the faster I’m off my feet the faster they’ll stop staring.
Inaccurate.
And I don’t love already starting off this class being wrong.
Across from my end of the U, two brunette girls stare straight at me, then whisper to one another with cupped hands to ears. It’s such a comically eighties-movie mean girl move that I squint to ensure I’m seeing this right.
I feel someone sink down on my left. Then my right. My bodyguards, I realize. Quinn and Frog have taken their respective seats on either side of me. I’ve never had security walk the hallways of Dalton to protect me. They always stayed in the parking lot, and so the newness of having reinforcements at college is like sucking down pure oxygen too quickly.
I’m lightheaded.
Which is why I think I’m seeing things when the two girls start hissing at me. Hissing! Like lizards. I blink a couple times and they’re still doing it. Is this a new insult that gained popularity sometime in the last three years?
The girls’ hisses turn into a fit of laughter.
A dirty-blond preppy guy lets out a low groan. He’s facing the whiteboard, and I’m shocked when he glares at the girls. “Shut up, Stassi. That’s not even funny.”
“It’s hilarious,” Stassi, I take it, replies, tucking a strand of glossy hair behind an ear, showing off a pearl earring. “And sticking up for her isn’t going to get you laid, Carson. Luna Hale is taken.”
My smile is traitorous. I shouldn’t brighten at her words since she’s obviously trying to make fun of me, but this is the first public acknowledgement of my relationship that I’ve heard in person.