“You teach me now how cruel you've been — cruel and false. Why did you despise me? Why did you break your own heart, Cathy?” — Heathcliff Earnshaw.
I was too engulfed with my pride to show him that I’m both skeptical and left off guard by his sudden urge to negotiate a deal between us both. The last time I checked, his face gave away the fact that he wanted to give a square hit to my jaw.
“What’s the catch?” No sooner had the words left my mouth, I saw him cock his head to the side as if he were lost in deep thought. He quietly parted his lips, running a tongue over them, pushing his hands back into his short pockets. Ahem, I should not have been looking at that unless I wanted to be seen leaving from here with an embarrassing erection, which I didn’t.
“If you lose, I'd publically humiliate you for the talentless person you are, in front of the whole college, I assure you.” Quirking his lips, the bewitching grey orbs assessed my facial expression, which almost drove me in a heated frenzy. I had to be in control of this situation and of all others that would follow. I hated him so much.
“Deal.” Confidence was flooding in my tone, which even he didn’t fail to gather. And for the record, he grimaced, scrunching up his nose as if he'd been face to face with an awful stench. The tension, whether sexual or not, could have been cut with a butter knife. Because I took it, he was straight as an arrow.
Grey eyes burnt holes at my back, as I stormed out of the room, banging the door shut from outside. I didn’t glance back to see if he was following suit, because I couldn’t tolerate being close to him.
—
“Hey, I'm sorry for how Xander behaved with you today.” A disembodied voice called out to me, when I whirled around to face the source. Jeremy.
“Bold of you to assume I care.” I had no reason to be a prick, yet I was being one, because the matter surrounds Mr. Asshole. I saw him shake his head, moving forward as he stuck out a hand to me.
“Jeremy Wesley.”
“Tobias Harris. Germaphobe.”
A hearty chuckle came from him after which he withdrew his hand; the hurt in his soft hazel eyes being hard to ignore. Ah, bitchy Tobias Harris was another story.
“We got off on the wrong foot, Tobias. I have not a bit of grudge against you because you took my spot. You deserved it.” His words seemed to me as honest and sincere, but I wasn’t that much of a trusting person. The only one I could count on is me. Oh, and that idiot Niall.
“Bad for you, Jeremy. Because you'd need to fuel yourself with anger in order to win the challenge next day.” He shot me a puzzled expression, while I threw my head back and let out a soft laugh.
“I'm sorry? What challenge?”
“You’ll know.” Throwing him a quick wink, I strode away from the empty hallway. Maybe Jeremy wasn't that bad because if he was, he wouldn’t have come to offer a truce.
—
I found myself slouching on the sofa, gobbling down beer as if it were water. The golden, bitter liquid sloshed inside the aluminum can as I gulped contents of one can after the other, emptying a six pack of beer. Beer wasn't my favourite, but you know, us college students needed to manage everything in our broke ass budget.
The television screen was flashing in various shades of colour before me as I squinted my eyes to decode what was going on in the film which I had decided to watch.
“You shouldn’t have drank that much, you absolute wanker.” Niall complained, his voice so shrill, that I feared that I would be deaf by the very second. Alcohol was flowing in my system, which was messing up with the words I wanted to give as a reply. God damn.
“Don’t be worried, silly.” That was all I could manage to slur, when I took notice that the film going on, was a comedic one. The scene wasn’t that funny, but over consumption of booze had always exaggerated my senses. I toppled over in a hysteric fit of laughter, as I heard Renault smack his face with his palm.
“Dude, I can tell that you're out of your fucking senses, man.”
“I know. Doesn’t matter even if I'm sober.” A deep sigh was the answer to my earlier statement, as I continued to laugh until my stomach hurt. Tears streamed down my cheeks, as I felt my throat burning. Ah, should've had a proper meal before drinking that much.
“Jenna called you. Twice. She’s still in love with you, Toby.”
“I told her that I wasn’t. Twice. Never was.”