Paper Airplanes (24 page)

There was no way Cassie had talked to Brooke about me. No way in hell.
She didn’t know anything. She was just jealous. Six months ago that would have made me ecstatic, but now it was just annoying.

“I can tell, but I also know a girl like her isn’t right for you.”

A girl like her?

“Why not?”
I asked warily as she played into the fears that had been plaguing me since I’d met Cassie’s friend the night before.

“Because she’s slumming this summer, obviously.”

Ouch.

Both of my eyebrows rose involuntarily. “Excuse me?”

“Oh, come on. It’s not like you guys could have something long lasting. She’s the Homecoming Queen, and you’re a geek underneath that hot body. A girl like her can’t see how great you really are. She’ll always see who you used to be.”

Would it be wrong for me to hit a girl?
I couldn’t believe she’d actually called me a geek. She was really hitting below the belt.

Unfort
unately she knew where to hit me where it would hurt the most, and her words landed a little too close to home. Brooke and I had talked too many times while we’d been dating about what it had been like living on the outside. We’d gone to the same high school, and even though she was a grade older, she knew who Cassie and her friends were. Everyone did. Brooke hadn’t been popular in high school either, and although she hadn’t been bullied like I had, she still knew what it was like to watch the popular, beautiful people shine while you were stuck in the shadows.

No one would know that if they met her today, because she’d completely revamped her image a few years back, but at her core were layers and layers of insecurity and low self-esteem. And that was what had initially drawn me to her. We had that in common. Two people who looked one way on the outside but were still
the same people we’d always been on the inside – not quite as cool and together as everyone thought we were. Of course Brooke overcompensated for her past insecurities by being a total bitch and a little bit of a slut if we’re being honest, but it didn’t mean we didn’t understand each other.

“Cassie’s not like that,” I told Brooke. “She’s different. You don’t know her.”

“I know enough. Hale’s told me stories about her, and they’re enough for me to know that she’s not the right girl for you.”

And you think you are? Please.

“And why is that?”

“Because she’d chew yo
u up and spit you out, Jare. You’re too nice for her. She’s totally taking advantage of you. I can see it.”

“Kind of like you did?”

That made Brooke pout. “I told you I was sorry about breaking up with you. I thought I wanted something different, but I didn’t. I want
you
, Jare.”

“
Don’t forget that you also cheated on me, and don’t call me Jare,” I told her. I hated when she did that.

She reached up and cupped my face with her hand, so I pushed it away. “Baby, don’t
be like that,” she cooed.

I sighed. “Brooke, if you wanted to be with me so bad, you shouldn’t have
slept with someone else. Plain and simple. I’m not interested, and you need to get that through your head. Now please, get out of my way. I have to bring drinks to my table.”

I pushed past her and moved over to the drink machine. She glared at me for a few seconds before she turned on her heel and stormed off in a huff. But I knew she’d be back. She didn’t get off until six. I’d have two more hours of dealing with her
, and I knew once she got over her hissy fit she’d be back to bother me some more.

But
on the bright side I’d get to see Cassie in just a few seconds. I was hoping the insecure feelings that had washed over me the night before, and that Brooke had so kindly echoed just a few seconds earlier, would go away when I saw her. I wanted her to hug me like she always did and smile at me and force me to see that she didn’t see me like Brooke had described.

Cassie had barely said goodbye to me
the night before, but things had been disjointed. Her friend had shown up out of the blue, it had been an emotional night, and there was a weirdness between us after we kissed. I couldn’t hold that against her. And a part of me really needed to know that everything was okay with us, that I hadn’t lost my chance with her completely. I needed to tell her how I felt.

I looked up at that moment to see her walk through the door, her friend from the night before trailing behind her wearing a tiny sundress that barely hit her mid-thighs. She tossed her long brown hair over one shoulder and smiled as Cassie introduced her to Rick who was practically drooling. Then he gestured for them both to go into his office, so they followed him.

I looked back at the three drinks I’d set on my tray, ready to pick it up to take it to my lone table. It was kind of dead with only four tables filled in the whole restaurant, but in an hour or so we’d be slammed with the dinner rush. I figured I should relish in the lull before it got nuts again.

“Dude!” Scott said, coming up behind me. “Did you see that girl with Cassie?”

“Yeah, that’s her friend, Marley,” I said, not needing to turn around to see the wide-eyed, goofy-ass expression on his face.

“She’s so hot! I think I’m in love, like seriously.”

I picked up my tray as I looked over my shoulder at him. “No, you’re not. You don’t even know her.”

“I don’t have to. She’s so
pretty and sexy,” he said as he followed me to my table. “What’s not to love?”

I se
t the drinks down in front of the three teenagers while Scott stood quietly behind me, thankfully having the good grace not to wax on about Cassie’s hot friend in front of customers. As I walked back to the servers’ station, he was close on my heels.

“You have to introduce me,” he begged.

“I don’t even know her.”

“You met her last night, right? Right?” he asked, bouncing up and down
on the balls of his feet. “Please, Jared.”

The last thing I wanted was for Scott to get his heart broken, and just seeing that girl today confirmed for me that she was so far out of his league it wasn’t even funny. It wasn’t that she was so good looking that he couldn’t date her, but more like she seemed experienced, and Scott just wasn’t. He’d likely throw himself at her, and she’d think he was too over-the-top, and she’d hurt him. I wasn’t about to let that happen.

I sighed. Between my lack of sleep, the doubts filling my head, Brooke’s lingering presence and Scott’s exuberance, I realized I was in a shitty mood. And seeing Cassie hadn’t helped. It only made me realize how much I wanted her. But for some reason it felt like she was out of reach now. I tried to tell myself that it was all in my head, but the tugging I felt in my gut told me differently.

“There she is!” Scott hissed when I didn’t answer his request for an introduction.

I looked up to see Cassie and Marley walking toward us, but they were intercepted by Hale who pulled Marley up into a hug, almost swinging her around.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, as she laughed.

He set her on the ground and shot her one of his smiles that made girls’ heads turn.

“I’m staying with Cassie for the summer,” she announced, and my heart sank.

I’d been under the impression that she was just staying for a visit. If she was there for the whole summer, I knew my days with Cassie were numbered. Brooke was right. She’d just been hanging out with Scott and me because it was convenient. Now that she had a friend in town, she wouldn’t want to watch us play video games and talk about Scott’s lighting techniques or the latest sci-fi movie we wanted to see. And I realized I’d known this all along. I just hadn’t wanted to admit it, but we were too different.

“That’s so cool!” Hale gushed. “We have to hang out. I’m so psyched to see you.”

“Well, you’ll be seeing a lot of me,” Marley said, beaming at him. “I’m the new hostess here.”

“That’s awesome,” he said, hugging her again. “This is a great crew. You’ll love it.”

Marley smiled. “I know. Cass has told me all about everyone. Are you working tonight?”

“Yeah, I’m closing with Cassie.”

“Cool,” Marley said brightly. “I’m training with Anna, so we’ll all be working together. Maybe afterward we can go out?”

“Love it,” Hale said, and I just shook my head.

It was only a matter of time.

I looked up to see that I’d been double-sat, so I headed out to the floor to greet my new tables and
take their drink orders. I’d have to wait to talk to Cassie it seemed, to feel out where her head was at. That sucked. The gnawing feeling in my stomach was starting to eat away at me.

Unfortunately, w
e got busy right after Cassie started her shift, so I’d barely had a chance to say anything but hi to her. We seemed to always be going in opposite directions. I at least wanted to see if she was okay. Of course she seemed fine, but I wanted to be sure. She’d had one hell of a meltdown the night before.

Fifteen
minutes before the end of my shift three guys we’d gone to high school with came in and sat in Cassie’s section. They were loud and obnoxious, just like they’d been two years earlier. They all took turns hugging her and kissing her on the cheek while I watched with a twisted expression on my face. They were the same guys who had made my and Scott’s lives miserable for four years. I hated those guys.

“I hate those guys,” Scott said,
echoing my sentiments as he came up behind me and watched Cassie flirting and joking with them.

They were making her laugh, and she was shoving one of them in the shoulder playfully. I couldn’t look away. It was like a train wreck – or rather it was like I was stuck on the tracks and the train was coming right at me but I couldn’t move. I felt sick inside
. It was like I didn’t know her. She was acting completely different than I’d ever seen her – at least in the past month and a half.

“Me too,” I told Scott. “
They were assholes back then, and it seems like they haven’t changed much.”

“
Brock Thomas stuck my head in a toilet junior year. Do you remember that?”

I nodded, not bothe
ring to look back at Scott. I didn’t want to see the expression on his face. High school had done some damage to both of us, and no matter how much we thought we were past it, when guys like Brock Thomas, Kyle Fowler and Andre Bolden came around, we reverted back into the helpless victims we’d been for so many years. No matter that I could probably take on each of them now, and Scott was a better person than them any day, they still had the power to make us feel like shit all over again.

“I can’t believe Cassie’s friends with them,” Scott commented
as Marley ran over to the table. She reached over and started hugging all three guys like her life depended on it. “I mean, I know they were her friends back in high school, but she’s so different now. She’s not like them. Why is she flirting with them?”

Great. He could see it too. So
it wasn’t just my imagination.

Cassie
and Marley were both giggling and practically batting their eyelashes. Andre said something, and Marley playfully smacking him on the shoulder, making him and the rest of the table laugh. Cassie looked so in her element as she laughed along with them.

I realized then that she
hadn’t looked like that since I’d met her. She was usually serious, introspective and reserved. Sure, she was playful with me, but she wasn’t like that with anyone else. I usually got a side of her that not many other people did, but I thought there was a reason for that. I should have remembered what she’d been like in high school, which was exactly how she was acting now. I think I just forgot about it, because the girl she was to me was so different from the one standing across the restaurant.

“Maybe we don’t really know her as well as we thought we did,” I mumbled.

“Nah, Cassie’s cool,” Scott said, but I could tell he wasn’t convinced.

He was thinking the same thing I was, probably even remembering her standing nearby when one of
those jerks called us a homo or a loser. Maybe I should have just kept that in mind. People don’t really change. I had no doubt the shooting affected her, but it was only a matter of time before she started to feel okay in her skin again. And once that happened, she’d see we were from different planets, and she wouldn’t want anything to do with me. I wondered if it was already starting to happen.

Rick called Scott back to the
kitchen before I could respond to him. I wasn’t even sure what I’d say if given the opportunity. My confidence was shit in that moment, and I was trying to pick through what was real and what was in my head. Dammit if Cassie hadn’t been kissing
me
the night before. That had to count for something. I couldn’t have read her that wrong, could I? I didn’t know. All I knew was that the girl laughing and shamelessly flirting with those other guys wasn’t the one I’d fallen for.

Andre
smacked her on the ass as she turned to walk away, and I had the urge to go over there and sucker-punch him, but then Cassie laughed and stuck her tongue out at him. She hadn’t felt that was the least bit degrading. And if she felt that way, I wasn’t risking getting fired for her.