“You don’t get to be mad at me right now!”
“I do when you ignore me and put yourself in harm’s way!”
I want to kiss him and strangle him. Scream at him and take care of him. Careless, reckless man.He grips my wrists lightly with each hand, slowly lowering them. It’s not until his steady hands are on me that I realize mine are shaking.
“I hit Aaron. You can shout at me, Stassie.”
Perhaps the one person I wasn’t expecting to hear that from is Henry, but here he is, sipping a beer and pressing an ice pack to the side of his head. He doesn’t look guilty, there is no hint of remorse in his voice. He was just simply informing me that he hit Aaron.
“What the fuck, Henry?” I squeak, brushing Nate’s hands off me when he moves up my arms and tries to squeeze my shoulders.
I’m still mad at him and he doesn’t get a free pass just because Henry wants to be Muhammad Ali.
“I’m not going to apologize.”
“I got a busted face splitting up the bullshit you caused,” Nate shouts at him, pressing a Band-Aid to his cheek. “You’re gonna fucking apologize to her if she wants an apology.”
“You want me to repeat the things he says about her? So she understands why he deserved it?” Henry says, looking straight at Nathan, face emotionless. “He’s a piece of shit and I’m not sorry. You’re only pissed at me because you should have done it months ago.”
“Watch it, kid,” Nate snaps, and my stomach sinks.
“At least your ban would have been worth it. He came here looking to start shit. He succeeded. End of story.”
“What do you mean what he says about me? Can you stop talking about me like I’m not here?”
Everyone’s eyes are on me, but no one is saying anything. It feels like screaming into a void. It’s like there’s a huge secret and I’m the only one who wasn’t clued in.
“It doesn’t matter, Stassie,” Robbie mutters. “You can’t just fucking fight people for talking shit, Hen.”
“I happen to disagree,” JJ says, standing from the couch to grab another beer. “Just give me the heads-up next time yeah, Hen? I was about to score and your little dramatics cockblocked me. Consider us even for the Gen thing.”
“Can someone please explain to me what the fuck is being said about me!” I shout over them chatting like somehow this situation is normal.
Sabrina is totally unfazed as she examines each of them for injuries, moving on to the next when she’s cleaned all the cuts.
“Brinny, how are you so calm?” The adrenaline is well and truly worn off; I feel exhausted, and I haven’t even done anything other than get more and more confused and shout.
She shrugs and kicks at Nathan with her foot until he gets the message and shuffles along enough for her to sit down beside me. “I have brothers. Our house looked like this most days—this is tame.” She looks at Nathan and scowls. “Make yourself useful and go get her a drink, Rocky.”
She wraps an arm around me and kisses me on the forehead. “Sometimes it’s better not to know what people say behind your back, honey. I think we both know Aaron is a snakey little shit, and when you get back from Colorado it might be time for us to talk about our living situation.” I tilt my head to rest it on her shoulder. “Don’t be too hard on him,” she whispers. “He was protecting Henry.”
Nathan reappears with two bottles of water in one hand, holding out his other to me. “Let’s go to bed.” He’s not asking, he’s telling, and as much as I want to stay down here, I feel like I’m more likely to get answers from him alone.
Brin kisses me on the head again. “Go, I’ll see you in the morning.”
THIRTY-TWO | NATHAN
How the fuckam I in more trouble than Henry?
She’s stomping around naked getting ready for bed, ignoring my existence. I can only imagine how she must be feeling, knowing once again Aaron is in the center of another fucking disaster.
I don’t even know what he said this time. Henry’s right though, I’m pissed because I should have done something weeks ago. I see why Anastasia wants to give him the benefit of the doubt, allow him room to grow and be the friend she believes he can be.
From the stories she’s shared about their friendship and the good times with him, I can understand her reluctance to cut him off. The problem I have is I know what he says behind her back, and she doesn’t. I made a choice, rightly or wrongly, and I’ve kept it to myself.
I’m selfish; I don’t want to be the one she associates with the hurt she’s going to feel. I don’t want to see her face drop when she realizes just how much of a prick the guy is.
Stassie was fast asleep in my lap when I heard the signature sound of shit going down. Fighting isn’t normally something we have to deal with at our parties; we all have enough of it during games, we don’t need that kind of shit in our downtime too.