“I need to leave.” She turned toward the door. Sam had to get away from here. Between her scholarship possibly falling through and everything that had happened with Callum, she was about to break. She needed to get home to Kristin. She needed to leave Topline and go work at Peet’s with Christian. She needed to get away from all these stupid feelings, because all they caused was heartache and pain.
“You are not taking the bus this late.” Callum grabbed his keys and ran after her.
“I don’t have another option, Callum!” she screamed as she turned around to face him. “I don’t have a car or money for an Uber. I can barely afford my bus fare. I don’t have another option.” The last sentence was barely a whisper.
“You have me.”
“No, I don’t!” She pulled at her hair as the words came barreling out of her. “You don’t seem to get it. Everything was fine in my life. Everything was going according to plan and then you show up and everything gets fucked up. You fucked it up! You kiss me and my brain turns to mush and I can’t think straight and then I can’t study. I can’t study and I fail assignments. I have never failed an assignment in my life and since meeting you I have failed two, possibly more from the way that email sounded. I can’t deviate from my plan. I can’t have distractions. And you, Callum Barker, are the biggest fucking distraction I have ever known.”
He stood still, frozen in shock at her outburst, and then took a step back, his face so full of pain that she momentarily wanted to take the three steps to him and melt her body into his as she profusely apologized.
She hated herself for the words that she just spoke. She hated herself more than she had ever hated anyone or anything. She hated the look of pain that now races across his features that she had caused.
He wasn’t the massive fuck-up he thought he was.
It was her.
She was the fuck-up.
She watched as his face all but crumpled in front of her and she knew no other escape than to run far away. To run away from him and everything that knowing him brought with it.
But she didn’t want that. She didn’t want to run away from him. She wanted to run to him.
Fuck!
“I’m sorry.” His voice broke, and with it her heart.
She nodded her head as she felt a tear fall down her cheek.
Her feet were leaden. Her heart was screaming at her to take it all back, but she just couldn’t move.
“I’m taking the bus.” Her voice was barely a whisper and her chin trembled with the words. “Please don’t follow me home this time.”
“Okay.”
Chapter 31 - Sam
Sam made it all the way into her room before she made the call. With how long the bus took to get her home , she wasn’t sure if he would be asleep or awake. But she knew he would answer.
“Hello?” Christian’s voice was muffled as if he still had his face buried in his pillow.
“Christian?”
“Sam? You okay?”
“I’m going to lose my scholarship.” Her voice broke with the words.
“What are you talking about?” His voice sounded much louder now, but still just as groggy.
“I just forwarded you the email I got tonight.”
“Okay. Hold on. Let me read it.”
He paused for a moment, and she heard the familiar clicking noise as he searched through his phone for the email. Then there was silence for far too long and she knew he had read it over at least twice.
“What date did you pick?” This time she could tell he was wide awake.
“Next Wednesday. Will you–”