I walk into school on Monday morning with a refueled determination to solve the mystery that was Nathan Rhodes. Sunday night had been spent trying to piece together the new information I gathered from the tracks this weekend. So far, I had constructed the theory that Nathan and his friends hated Thomas and his friends because they were racing rivals, which is why Thomas was so mad when he saw me with Nathan.
I had texted Reese on my way back from the tracks with Nathan to let him know what had happened, and he spent the better part of Sunday night apologizing profusely via text. I forgave him, of course, but decided that I didn't want to pursue things further. After all, I was already expected to put all of my energy into pulling this experiment off, and I had also decided to solve the mystery surrounding Nathan.
Per Stephanie's request, I was wearing black jeans with a rip at the knee, her tan booties, and a navy blue sweater with cut outs on the shoulders. My hair was straightened for a change instead of in the usual blonde waves, and I continued the trend of winged eyeliner and mascara. I got through the first few periods of my day effortlessly before it reached lunchtime and tried to find Nathan.
All day my mind had been working a million miles a minute, thinking of all the questions that I wanted to ask him. So, instead of going straight to the art room and hiding out there while I continued to fill my sketchbook, I instead went straight to the cafeteria. When I walked into the cafeteria, I ignored the stares and whispers that followed as I passed, instead keeping my chin held high as I scanned the room for Nathan.
I knew to check the center of the lunch room first, considering when Nathan and his friends bothered to show up, they were always the center of attention in the middle of the cafeteria. And, as I had suspected, I saw Vincent and Asher sitting at a table with a girl that I didn't recognize. I took a deep breath and walked straight to their table confidently, all too aware of the tables that silenced as I passed.
Asher was talking to Vincent as I approached the table, but when his eyes shifted to me, he stopped talking to give me a friendly smile. "Hey Lauren," Asher greets happily. "What's up? You want to sit down?"
"Hey Asher," I can't help but smile back at him because his grin was so infectious. "I'm actually looking for Nathan. Do you know where he is?"
The girl whom I didn't recognize had straight brunette hair and striking blue eyes. She spoke to Vincent quietly as Asher and I talked, and I was surprised how I never noticed her before. Not only was she really pretty, but she was the only girl who had managed to gain the bad boy's friendship.
Asher and Nathan were both famous for hooking up with girls and then leaving them high and dry. And girls, just the same, were famous or trying to tame the bad boys. They chased after Asher and Nathan with the thought of making them change their ways and turn them into good boys, but it never worked. Both of them were infamous for breaking girls hearts.
"I think he's around the parking lot behind the school," Asher supplements with a suggestive smirk. "Have fun. Be safe."
My cheeks warm at his insinuation and I mutter, "Shut up Asher."
I hear Asher and Vincent snicker as I turn back around and stalk out of the cafeteria, set on finding Nathan. I walk along the empty hallways to take the most direct route to the parking lot. The artificial color of the yellow lights in the hall make the white marble floors look pasty and rough as my shoes click against the ground.
I glance to the left as I pass the library, looking through the glass wall at the rows of books beside the sitting area. I slowly stop when I see, sitting at a round table across the library, Sasha and Bailey eating lunch together. A pang hit my heart hard as I stare at the two as they discuss something together and I realize this is the reason why they haven't been in the cafeteria.
They were eating lunch without me instead. After a long moment, I shake my head to myself and force myself to keep moving forward, tearing my gaze off of the window. I feel myself deflate as I walk over to the row of lockers and lean against one. My eyes shut for a brief moment as I wonder what I was doing. Not right now, but in the grand scheme of things.
I was letting my friendship with Bailey and Sasha crumble before my eyes. I had chosen some social experiment, a mere project for Stephanie's sociology class, a way for me to get my own personal revenge over an asshole of an ex-boyfriend, over my two friends. But there was something about my change that excited me. The prospect of standing up for myself, of people taking me seriously. After all, Bailey and Sasha were two of my biggest critics.
"Collins?" A deep voice cut through my thoughts.
I opened my eyes to see Nathan standing in front of me with black joggers and a grey long sleeve. He looked effortlessly attractive, even with the faint smell of cigarette smoke stuck on the cotton of his shirt.
"Hey," I push off the locker and stand on my own to flash him a fake smile. "I was looking for you."
"I know," Nathan answers coolly.
"I wanted to-" I stop and frown at him. "Wait, what do you mean you know? I was literally just on my way."
A smirk slid onto his lips and I had a feeling I didn't want to know, but he said anyway, "Asher texted me to practice safe sex, so I had a feeling you were coming to get me."
My cheeks warmed at Asher's insinuation for the second time in ten minutes and I immediately broke eye contact with Nathan. I sighed, shook my head, and looked at him again with false confidence. "Well that's lovely," I mutter. "Why didn't you just wait out there?"
"The guys that hang around back there aren't good guys. I thought I'd save you the trouble." Nathan explains curtly before he eyes me. "Besides, it looks like you weren't very happy when I found you."
The image of Bailey and Sasha sitting in the library flashes to the forefront of my mind before I narrow my eyes at Nathan. "It's nothing." I excuse quickly. "I was coming to ask you about when you were going to race next."
Nathan frowns at me and looks around to check if anyone is nearby that could hear us. I guess I should've done that before I spoke, but we both knew that my curiosity pushed me into making some thoughtless decisions. When Nathan meets my eager gaze again, he doesn't look happy. But then again, does Nathan ever look happy?
"Why does it matter?" Nathan's voice held the same authority it always did when he was talking down to someone. "You're not going back to the tracks."
I held my ground under his observant stare. "I wanted to talk to you about that. I think that we should go together. That way you can keep your eye on me and I can prove to you that I don't need to be babysat. Besides, I want to see you race again."
His frown sets deeper into his face until there's a deep crease line in his forehead that shows me he's stressed by what I said. His lips were sort of in a pout, and for a second I got lost in how attractive he looked. I quickly compose myself and force myself to seem calm and nonchalant on the outside while, on the inside, I was nervous for his answer.
"Why do you want to go so bad?" Nathan's voice was full and rough and demanded an answer.
I blink at him in confusion before saying simply, "Watching you race was one of the most exciting experiences I've ever had. I don't know what about the race was so amazing, but I know that I want to see it again."
These words render Nathan speechless for the first time in the history of ever as he stands there, staring at me for what felt like an eternity. But when he does speak, he straightens up and squares his shoulders, his voice filled with finality. "I'm not letting you go back there. It's full of drunk assholes who would do some scummy shit to get their hands on you. It's not safe."
"I'll be fine, Nathan," I press with a frown as I make a last ditch attempt to make him agree with me. "Besides, nobody was messing with me when I was with you. Why won't you trust me that I'll be fine?"
"It's not you I don't trust," Nathan mutters as he runs a frustrated hand through his hair. His gaze pierced mine and from the tone of his voice I could tell I wasn't going to win this battle. "Just drop it."
I stare at him for a long moment before I say boldly, "If you don't let me come with you, then I'll just go alone."
This seemed to anger him more, and I decided then that it was as good of a time as ever to leave before he exploded. So I took a step away from him silently as his dark eyes followed my movements, his mouth opening to snap at me, I was sure.
Instead of letting him speak, I flash him a fake smile. "Have a great day, Nathan."
And, as I was walking away with my heart beating erratically in my chest from going against the bad boys orders,
I hear Nathan call, "You better be bluffing, Collins."
But I wasn't.
. . .
Stephanie ignores the sentiment of what I told her and instead gasps, "Since when are you friends with Nathan Rhodes?"
I groan at her, "Can we stay on topic please?"
"Can you answer me please? Since when do you hang out with the hottest bad boy in the history of Littleton High? He never has female friends," I roll my eyes at Stephanie. "Just girls that he hooks up with. So, tell me: when did you start hanging out with him?"
I shrug, and then realize she can't see me, and press my phone closer to my ear. "I don't know, a week or two?"
"Lauren, you have to be careful." Steph warns after a moment of hesitation. "Nathan Rhodes is a bad kid."
For some reason, this made me frown. "You don't even know him."
Again, she hesitated for a moment before accusing, "Don't tell me you like him."
My cheeks warmed and I quickly defended, "No, Steph, I don't like him! But he's actually a good guy, y'know, underneath all that leather. I'm just saying don't judge a book by its cover."
"Can I judge the book if the book has done drugs before, or if the book has been to juvie, or if the book-" Steph lists stubbornly.
"Those are all rumors," I butt in, and sit up on my bed. "Come on Steph, if everyone listened to A. J. Katz in the eighth grade when he said you pooped your pants, wouldn't you be upset? Don't believe everything you hear. Nathan is a pretty cool guy."
Stephanie sighed dramatically, the noise coming out kind of static-y over the receiver. "Okay, okay, fine. Go on, then."
I nod to myself when I manage to get my easily distracted best friend on topic again. "Well, as I was saying, I found out through Nathan that Thomas races at this racetrack at night, and I went on Saturday, and saw-"
But of course, she interrupts yet again. "You went to the tracks?"
I frown at her interruption, but most importantly the way that she spoke as if she knew what the tracks were. "You mean you know about them?"
"Justin used to race Sophomore year," Stephanie explains sheepishly, and I roll my eyes at her talking about Justin Jones. When they were in High School, she'd do anything for him. "I went once or twice with him. It's not a good scene, L. That place is illegal, not to mention full of scumbags."
All this time, my best friend had known about the tracks. If I only asked her about them, I would've saved myself a ton of trouble.
"I know it's not a good place," I say, deliberately leaving out the part about Nathan having to save me from that asshole on Saturday night. "But Thomas races there, and I think he and Nathan might be enemies, or rivals, or whatever you want to call it. When I talked to Thomas-"
"You talked to Thomas?" Stephanie presses next, and I groan at all of her interruptions.
"Yes, and he was pissed that I was wish Nathan," I finish explaining. "Which is why I think they're rivals. But I don't know for sure."
She asks in a 'duh' tone, "Why don't you just ask Nathan?"
"That's the problem," I explain, and fall back onto my bed with a 'humph'. "He doesn't answer any of my questions. He's so secretive. I have to find everything out by myself."
I shut my eyes and listened to my breathing while Stephanie formed a response. "Well, that just means we need to investigate on our own."
My eyes flew open at her words. "Investigate?"
"Lauren, I think you and I should check out the tracks ourselves. We could find out what's going on with Nathan and Thomas, and maybe then some. What do you say?" Stephanie proposed excitedly, as if this were her best plan yet.
My lips curled into a smirk as I listened to her plan that she was making on the fly. After we set down the specifics, I couldn't help but feel excitement flutter into my stomach.
And then I said the magic words: "Let's do it."
As we began planning out what we would be doing to prepare for our investigation, I begin to feel a little bad about going against Nathan to find answers. But he wont give them to me, and as he said, I'm too curious for my own good, so nothing was going to stop me. Not even my guilt.
Somewhere in the middle of our plotting, Stephanie began talking about out outfits. "We need to wear all black, okay?"
I laugh at her. "All black? Why?"
"We're ninjas," She hisses into the phone. "Of course we need to wear all black! We need to blend in!"
I continue to laugh until I hear my moms voice, muffled by my bedroom door. "Dinner!"
I said my goodbyes to Stephanie and made a promise to meet at my house this weekend so we could drive to the tracks together. The giddy excitement settles as a weight on my chest as I skip down the stairs toward the rare smell of my mothers homemade cooking. A smile was on my lips as I went toward the kitchen, but it slowly disappeared when I noticed two suitcases by the front door.
Suspiciously, I walk into the kitchen, where my suspicions were confirmed. There were tubs of different type of cookies that my mom had spent all day stress baking, something she did when she was about to leave again. I narrowed my eyes at the cookies and turned around to see my mom at the kitchen table, looking at me nervously.
"You're leaving," I say flatly. "You stress baked again."
She stood up suddenly with a frown that matched mine. "Honey, I didn't know I had to leave again so soon, but I'll be back before you know it. It's just until Friday morning."
My heart sunk and I knew she could see it, because she walks over and pulls me into a tight hug. I couldn't be mad if I tried; I knew she hated leaving her children like this all the time. You could see it plain as day from the guilt on her face, not to mention the overflow of cookies she leaves us with every time an unplanned trip comes up.
In an effort to make her feel better, I hug her back and tell her, "It's okay, mom. Really. It's only a few days."
"It is," She pulls away to look at me seriously. "It's going to be a short trip. I promise."
I show off a smile in the hopes it would make her feel better, and I watched some of the worry lines in her forehead disappear. "Let's eat dinner."
She grinned and nodded, but walked out of the kitchen. A minute later, I heard her voice bellow: "Luke, if you're not down here in one minute, Lauren and I are eating all of the lasagna!"
The warning was all it took before I heard his bedroom door slam from upstairs followed by his feverish footsteps down the stairs. I allow myself a smile as I walk over to the kitchen table. Luke doesn't say anything about the multitudes of cookies or the suitcases by the front door, which makes me believe that he already knew.
Before I could begin eating, I hear a knock on the front door, and Luke springs up to go get it. I ignore Luke's jittery behavior as I begin to dish myself out some of my moms famous lasagna, and vaguely hear the door shut in the background. A moment later, two pairs of footsteps come back into the kitchen, and Cole is trailing behind Luke with his head down.
"Cole's joining us for dinner," Luke announces as he falls back onto his chair.
My mom smiles and waves at Cole. "Cole, it's so nice to see you! Why don't you have a- oh, dear, what happened to your jaw?"
My eyes raise immediately at the sound of her voice change and my gaze zeroes in on Cole's jaw, where a nasty black and blue bruise resided. Surprised, I take a quick intake of breath and examine the bruise, silently wondering where it came from. When I look back up at Cole's face, he was smiling a forced and sheepishly at my mom.
"I, uh, fell." Cole lies poorly, and then catches my gaze.
I raise my eyebrows to silently question his lie, but Cole looks away again and slinks into a chair instead of elaborating. My mom frowned at the obvious lie but doesn't press any further, probably sensing something that I didn't. I bit my tongue and looked down at my plate, very aware that a string of questions would come out if I opened my mouth.
"So, mom," Luke asks in between bites of his lasagna as he tries to change the subject. "Where are you heading?"
She looks at him and smiles warmly. "San Fransisco."
"Sick," Luke responds easily, talking with his mouth full. I make a face at him, but he's too excited about the news. "Will you get me a Giants jersey while you're there?"
I risk a glance back up at Cole, curiosity basically oozing out of me. What happened to his jaw? Did he get in a fight? Did it have anything to do with Nathan's roughed up face a few days ago? Cole is looking down at his food, and as he raises his fork to his mouth, he also raises his eyes and meets my gaze. My eyes narrowed at his bruised jaw as a series of questions floated through my head, and I had to bite my lip to keep myself from asking any of them.
My mom laughs and nods. "Sure, honey. Lauren, any special requests?"
I look away from Cole quickly as my mom catches my attention. I perk up and nod as I look at her excitedly. "Can you please go to the City Lights bookstore and get me a book?"
She grins at me. Being an author, she appreciated my eagerness to get a book from the famous City Lights bookstore, which was a major part of the beat generation in the 1950's. "Of course. That was my first stop, actually; I couldn't miss a chance to get a copy of Howl there, where it all started."
"That's going to be amazing," I gush. "Please take pictures."
"Of course. Do you think I'm going to walk into a store filled with Kerouac, Ferlinghetti, and Ginsberg and not take pictures?" She nerds out with me.
Luke snorted and I glance over at him in time to see him roll his eyes at us. "You two are serious dorks. Lauren, you're nerding out with mom. I expected more of you."
This time, I roll my eyes. "Shut up, Luke."
We spend the rest of dinner talking about my mom's trip to San Fran, mostly telling her things that she needed to try, take pictures of, or bring back for us. Every now and again, I stole a glance at Cole to examine his bruise, and by the time dinner was over, I was desperate to ask him what had happened. So, as soon as everyone was finished, I jumped up from the dinner table and grabbed everybody's plate, stuck them in the dishwasher, and followed Luke and Cole to the basement. When they saw me walk in, Luke grinned from the couch.
"Hey, nerd," My brother teased. "Want to play some GTA?"
I shook my head. "Not tonight. Actually-"
A ringing phone cut me off, and Luke fumbled in the pockets of his sweatpants before he pulled out his phone and looked at the screen. I don't know if I was seeing things or not, but I swear he became tense and stood up quickly. He muttered an apology and walked out the door in the basement as he takes the call in the freezing weather outside.
Luckily, this meant I was alone with Cole, who was looking at me from the couch warily. "Lauren, please don't ask questions about-"
"What happened?" I ignored him, taking a few steps closer until I sat beside him on the couch, getting a better view of his jaw. Cole set his jaw and looked away from me, clearly annoyed. "You're a shit liar, Cole, so you better just tell me."
"It's not a big deal," Cole insisted without looking at me in the eyes.
I groaned. "It's a big deal! Your jaw looks like something out of a movie, it's so damn purple. Come on, Cole, if something like this happened to me, you wouldn't quit until I told you."
I was tired of being left out of secrets, and if there was one person I could get to tell me something, it was my little brothers best friend. Cole's eyes flicker to mine and I see a piece of his resolve chip away. I stare at him with wide, imploring eyes, willing him to tell me what the hell happened to him.
"I just... got into a bit of an argument with Alex and his buddies. Nothing you need to worry about." He smiles at me, but it's weak and fake and makes me more curious.
Alex and his buddies.
"Alex?" I frown. "Was Thomas there?"
Cole's hesitation tells me what I need to know. I shoot up out off of the couch and groan, feeling my heart thump against my chest loudly. Thomas and Alex had done this to Cole. I whip around and face Cole again, who is already watching me.
"Why did they do that? What was the argument about?" I fire off questions.
Cole lets out a breath and shakes his head. "Lauren, seriously, fucking drop it. I can't talk about this with you."
His words hurt, because they sound too much like Nathan's. Except I've known Cole since we were gross little kids who ate mud pies and drew with crayons all over the walls, and to hear him shut me out made me upset. I frowned at him but quickly tried to regain composure and hide my feelings.
Of course, he knows me too well, and Cole can easily spot the flicker of emotion in my eyes before I push it away. He sighs and stands up, looking like he wants to say something else, but I shake my head. Instead of letting him speak, I flash him a quick smile and take a step back.
"I'm sorry they hurt you," I murmured, and then turned around to run up the stairs.
It looks like I wasn't even getting answers from Cole tonight. But as I lay in bed twenty minutes later, thinking about his bruised jaw, I can't help but think that I was asking the wrong questions. Something big was going on with the people all around me, and they were all trying to keep it a secret. But unfortunately for them, secrets don't sit right with me, and I can't stop asking questions until I get the right answers.