“Cassie... Cassie…” I say, cautiously opening the door to the girls’ restroom.
I’d already checked the locker room, it was empty, this was the next plausible solution.
A sniffle so faint I wouldn’t have heard it, had I not been listening for it, sounds when I turn to leave.
I say her name again with the same hesitancy. Following the noise to the very last stall, finding her. Cassie’s knees buried to her chest as she stifled a sob.
My shoulders sag. “Look, I’m just making sure you’re okay.”
“Why should you care,” she answers sourly. “You don’t know me.”
“I don’t.” She winces at my honesty, and I sigh, softening my tone. “I know what it’s like to feel like this.” Embarrassed and ashamed.
“Did you gag when a guy went too deep downyourthroat?”
I scratch at my temple. “Uh, not particularly.”
She hugs herself tighter and I mentally groan. I had my own demons, why was I involving myself in this.Because you know what it’s like, stupid.
Sliding down the wall, my butt hits the ground. I couldn’t leave her, not like this. If she didn’t want to talk, fine, but at least she wouldn’t have to be by herself.
It was more than I ever got.
“What happened to your shirt?” Cassie speaks after a while. “That’s a boy’s shirt.”
I tug at the collar, remembering I was wearing Cole’s shirt. The girls’ are a light blue, his is darker.
“Got in a fight with a shuttlecock.”
She snorts out a laugh. The tears along her eyes finally starting to dry. My butt was long past numb, but I don’t complain.
“Turns out the name isn’t as funny as it suggests, flying at your face when you don’t know how to use a racket.”
Her eyebrows go to her hairline. “No way!”
“Maybe Coach wasn’t so crazy after all.”
Cassie’s grin grows, buying the lie. Cringing at the oversized shirt that hits my knees.
“Don’t put so much tension on it, it’s made of feathers and cork, not titanium,” Cassie mimics, deepening her voice. “Was he angry?”
Raising my foot, I begin to rotate it in small circles, the joints in my leg stiff. “Meh, he seemed… lapsed.”
Standing, I dust off my hands. Cassie deciding it was time to face the world again.
“You know, I never got your name,” she says, looking at me through the mirror redoing the makeup she didn’t cry off.
I shrug indifferently. “It’s Rory.”
She mulls that over. Tucking away the last of her things away before speaking. “Well Rory, I have a feeling you’re going to be good for this place.”
Her comment couldn’t have been more wrong.
seventeen
Cole
“Whatwasthat?”Finnrepeats the same line he’s said about a dozen times.