Maybe it wasn’t a memory at all. Maybe it was a dream.
That would make this whole mess at least a little less … complicated.
“Still wanna go to class?” Rafael asks.
I turn my head. He’s fully dressed and sitting on the edge of his bed, sticking textbooks into his backpack.
“No,” I mumble, “but I have to.”
“Stubborn jackass,” he says conversationally.
“Loud douchebag.”
He chuckles as he zips up his backpack. “You want me to wait for you?”
“Please. I … feel weird about being around The Brotherhood today.”
He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, going out drinking with them seems like it was a bad idea.”
You have no idea, I think as I start getting ready. My movements are sluggish. I smell a little bit like beer, but Rafael is patient enough to wait for me to shower. Getting dressed is easy at least, since I basically just wear oversized hoodies over my uniform whenever I’m outside of class, so we’re out the door in less than an hour.
Even though I don’t need to smoke for my voice today, Rafael claims he needs one for the trouble I caused him last night. My voice might be hoarse enough, but I don’t want to leave his side, so I follow him outside.
I’m not sure what exactly happened last night, but I keep getting little flashbacks. I remember someone’s hands on me, and my hands on them, too. What did I do?
“You look so much like a girl,” says the voice in my ear, slurred beyond recognition. His hands tighten on my hips. “You’re so small.”
“Scrawny,” I say, laughing, enjoying the feeling of my back against his chest, feeling something pressing against my backside.
Oh, boy. Something definitely happened. Did we make out? Or … more?
I touch my lips as we head out into the courtyard. Would I feel differently if we had?
Rafael and I hang out with his friends while we smoke. The boy called Fox—I’m still not sure if that’s his real name—graciously offers me his aviator sunglasses, and I gratefully shove them onto my face to block out the sun.
He and the others laugh at how small my head is, how much room the sunglasses take up on my face. I grin back at them. Without The Brotherhood kicking me around, school life has become … sort of normal. I hadn’t realized it until now, the change was so gradual. Maybe I?
??ll hang out with them more.
I only smoke one cigarette, but I’m slower than Rafael, who smokes two. We walk back into the school together, and I’m grateful to have him by my side when we finally see them.
Down the hall, all three of The Brotherhood stand clustered together near the closed door of a classroom. Probably their next class. They all spot me all at once—and all at once, their faces go blank and they turn away.
Shit.
Something must have happened.
I try to hide my confusion as we walk by them, but they don’t turn around or acknowledge my presence. But they also don’t speak until they’re sure I’ve walked by, a sure sign that they’ve definitely noticed me.
I glance over my shoulder and meet Jasper’s eyes. He stares, his face blank, and then looks away before I do.
“What the fuck?” Rafael asks as we head toward our own class.
“I’m thinking something happened last night,” I reply.
“Well, obviously. But what kind of thing?”
I hesitate. I’m not sure what to tell Rafael, honestly. I’m still piecing the events together myself. “I don’t remember the whole thing,” I tell him truthfully. “But … I think there was some flirting.”