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“That’s good.”
“But then we got back home, and it was right back to the den and the Jack bottle,” she said.
“Sorry.” I put my arm around her and gave her shoulder a quick squeeze. “You can hang out here till you think it’s safe to go back.”
She put her head on my shoulder. “Thanks. You’re the best, you know that?”
“I’m aware.”
She laughed, and I got back to cha
But all I could think about was Hammond and Ally. Hammond and Ally on a bed. Hammond and Ally undressing each other. Hammond and Ally with their tongues in each other’s mouths.
And as much as I liked Sha
ally
Five thirty in the morning in January may as well be midnight. It’s so freaking dark out that it should be illegal for anyone to be up, let alone working. And it’s freezingly, frigidly, bitingly cold. By the time I’d walked up the hill to the school and around to the service entrance—located directly across from the a
But as I knocked on the door, I was actually trembling more from excitement than the cold. Excited for ass-crack-of-dawn detention. What was wrong with me?
A rotund man with red hair and a matching moustache opened the door for me. He was wearing perfectly clean, pressed coveralls. Color: paper bag brown.
“Good morning! So. You must be Ally!” he said brightly.
“Yep.”
“I’m Barry,” he said, offering a meaty hand. “So. Nice to meet you.”
“Thanks. You too.”
We stepped just inside the door. He stood there for a prolonged moment and just smiled at me. Jake was clearly not here yet.
“So. Got yourself into some shenanigans, did ya?” he said.
The “so” thing was going to get old really fast. “Apparently,” I replied.
“So. Should we wait for your friend, then?” he asked. “Or would you like to just get started?”
“Uh, I guess we should—”
There was a bang on the door. One loud bang. My heart skipped a nervous beat. I hadn’t seen Jake since the morning our punishment had been handed down. My mouth went dry as Barry leaned by me to open the door.
“Jake Graydon?” he said.
“Yeah.”
His voice sent a shiver down my spine. This was very not good. In a deliciously forbidden way. Jake slipped inside, hands in his jacket pockets. He’d gotten a haircut. It was all buzzed short on the sides. He looked hot. He gave me a quick sideways glance and I started to smile, but he quickly averted his eyes.
Ouch. What was that about? Was I wrong when I thought he’d be looking forward to this, too? Hadn’t he smiled at me that morning as he was walking out? I’d thought that had meant something. I’d been counting on it, actually.
Barry introduced himself and they shook hands.
“So. Let’s get to it then.”
Barry led us down the dimly lit hall, past the science labs, and into one of those rarely visited corners of the school where there were random offices and a bathroom no one ever used. Jake and I fell into step behind him, only about two feet apart, but it felt like there was a wall between us.
Barry shoved open the door of a closet marked CUSTODIAN ONLY and went inside. It wasn’t big enough for all of us, so Jake and I waited on either side of the door, facing each other but not talking to each other.
I had no idea what was going on, but I was not going to be the first to speak.
“So. Here you go!”
Barry reemerged and handed us each a putty knife and a plastic bucket. They looked as if they had seen better days.
“What’re these for?” Jake asked.
“They’re for scraping!” Barry a
Scraping. Why did I not like the sound of this? Barry led us down the main hallway, which was quiet as a church on Friday night, and into the cafeteria. The lights were ablaze, and every single table in the place was turned upside down. Instantly, I knew what we were going to be scraping. The tables’ undersides were all pimpled with a disgustingly colorful array of gum wads.
“We didn’t get a chance to clear away all the gum over break,” Barry said, putting his hands on his hips and sticking his gut out as he surveyed the tables with what seemed like pride. “I got ’em all turned over before you got here, so I saved you that.” He whipped out two pairs of plastic gloves as if from nowhere and handed them to me. Then he slapped us on our backs. “So. Enjoy!”
The cafeteria door let out a loud squeal as he shut us in together. Jake and I looked at each another. It was almost like he was seeing me for the first time and he didn’t like what he saw.
“Is something wrong?” I asked, unable to take the silence any longer.
“No. What could be wrong?” he asked, dropping to the floor next to the first table. His vibe was so cold I was turning into a Popsicle.
“I don’t know. You tell me.” I sat down next to him, my bucket clunking against the floor. “Are you mad at me? Because it’s not like it’s my fault we’re here.”
“I know that,” he said through his teeth.
“Then, what?” I asked, my voice small.
Jake looked up at me. He did a sort of double take and rubbed his forehead with his hand. “It’s nothing. Sorry. I just . . . I guess I’m not a morning person.”
I snorted a laugh, relaxing a little. “Maybe tomorrow I’ll bring coffee.”
“Yeah. Good idea.”
There was a long moment of silence. I fiddled with my putty knife and bit my lip, trying to think of what to say next.
“Listen, I’m sorry about all this,” Jake said finally.
I handed him a pair of gloves. “I should have figured out they were setting me up. You were just trying to help.”
Jake looked down at the gloves and blushed.
“So, really I should be thanking you,” I rambled on, “for, you know, swooping in and trying to save me.”
Jake smiled for the first time. “I thought you didn’t need a knight in shining armor.”
I was pulling on a glove as he said this, and it snapped against my wrist. Ow. But I couldn’t believe he’d actually remembered something I said back in September.
“Yeah, well . . . I guess sometimes I do,” I said, tugging the other glove over my fingers. “But in the future, try saving me before the cops show.”
Jake’s laugh filled the cafeteria and melted my insides like s’mores over a flame. He had this deep, uninhibited laugh. I could listen to it all day.
And then I realized that I would be listening to it—to his laugh, his voice—for two hours every day for the next ten school days. Who ever said detention was a bad thing?
ally
“Heads up!”
I looked up just in time to stop the basketball that was hurtling toward my head. I batted it down with my forearm and glared at Sha
“Nice reflexes.” She picked up the ball and cradled it between her wrist and hip. “Wa
She had to be kidding me. I got up and walked past her, grabbing a ball from the rack near the wall and shooting it over her head. It swished through the hoop, and I grabbed another.
“Oh. So, what? You’re not talking to me now?” she teased, tossing her ball from hand to hand.
I glared at her and shot another perfect, arcing shot over her head.
“Come on, Ally. It was just a joke. God, you’re as bad as Jake,” she said, grabbing my third ball out of my hands.
“A joke?” I blurted. “I thought we called a truce. What the hell, Sha