“You’re being ridiculous,” she states, following after me. “I’ve made a lot of leaps in my time tryin’ to defend his ass, but this? You’re insane. There’s something wrong with you.”
“I’m not the one who forced herself on an unconscious ex because he doesn’t want me when he’s awake,” I tell her.
“You fucking idiot.” She grabs my arm, yanking me back. “Watch the video. That is not what this is.”
I don’t want to look at the phone. There’s no possible positive outcome. Either she shows me something horrible that verifies she violated my boyfriend, or she shows me something horrible that shows this turning into something else. Something Carter vehemently denied happening.
The agony of wondering which it is might be worse, though, so I force my gaze back to the screen. She unpauses it and I try to keep control of the anger pulsating through me.
“Mm, I’m gonna take good care of you, baby,” Erika murmurs in the video. I missed the transition, but she’s on top of Carter now, straddling him. She sits back, grabs the hem of her shirt, and pulls it off over her head. After tossing it back on the floor, she leans down to kiss him again.
His hands move, coming to rest on her sides. Now he is clearly awake, because he’s… kissing her back. It goes on for what feels like an endless measure of time, then Erika grinds her hips and Carter groans.
I’m going to be sick. My heart can’t beat properly and my stomach is so twisted up, I want to vomit.
Finally they break the kiss and I wait, my aching heart hoping for something from Carter that will make this sting less. He’ll tell her to get off him, to stop, that he was still half-asleep and didn’t realize…
Instead, he grabs her around the waist with one arm, braces his weight on the bed with the other, and flips her on her back so he can be on top. He climbs between her legs and leans down, so close he smashes her bare breasts against his chest. Erika giggles and locks a leg around his hips. She tilts her head and I see him bending to kiss her neck the way she did a moment ago.
Because of Carter’s movement, the phone slips and falls flat. Now all I can see is the wood of the top shelf. She’s right, though, I can still hear it. I can still hear Erika moaning as my boyfriend kisses her neck.
The bell rings, alerting me that I’m late to class. I pull myself out of the video, but I can’t shake the weight of sadness. The icky sensation of complete and utter disappointment.
My limbs feel shaky and not up to the job of walking to class. I still feel like I’m going to vomit. I really should race to a restroom, but Erika could follow me in there. The last thing I’m going to give her is the satisfaction of standing outside the stalls listening to me throw up my guts.
Swallowing down the anger, hurt, and bile rising up inside me, I walk away from Erika without a word. Well, I intend to walk away without a word, but I’m feeling too exposed right now to hold my temper.
“Don’t you wanna watch the rest?” she calls out innocently.
“Fuck off, Erika.”
I’m so angry that I can hear it. The blood surging through my veins, the discomfort oozing as my head feels close to combusting. I replay Carter’s bullshit words in my mind, his insistence that nothing happened between him and Erika, that she was making it all up, saying things she knew would make me doubt him.
I believed him. I struggled with it, but ultimately, I chose to give him the benefit of the doubt. I chose to trust him instead of her.
And he fucking lied to me.
Once I’ve turned the corner so Erika can’t see me anymore, I pull out my cell phone. My hands tremble and my fingers shake, making it difficult to navigate where I want to go. Frustration surges at the delay, at the difficulty to click a damn button because I’m so upset, but I finally get my message chain with Carter open.
“Where are you?” I type without thought.
I stare at the screen as I approach my class. I don’t know how I’ll focus on schoolwork when I’m this upset. I don’t know how talking to Carter will make it any better, but all these feelings are trapped inside me and I feel like I’m going to explode if I don’t find some outlet for them.
Finally, three little gray bubbles move across the screen and Carter types back, “What? I’m in class. Where are you?”
Now that I have him, I don’t know what to say. I guess we can’t have this conversation via text, and we don’t have a free period until lunch.