Always a Friend

Chapter 32

"So, how did it go yesterday?" Chloe asked, walking up to my car as I grabbed my things from the backseat. 

"Huh?" I stood up, almost smacking my head on the doorframe. 

"Don't huh me. You know exactly what I asked." She held out her hand, pausing for a second, glancing down at the iced latte. "Maybe...I shouldn't give you this since you don't want to give me any details." 

I grabbed the latte out of her hand before she could take it away from me. "Nothing happened. We went to coffee, Claudia tried to start shit..." 

"Claudia was there? Was Ashton?" Chloe sipped on her iced latte. "Let me guess...Claudia was trying to flirt with Rhys, even though she's with Ashton?" 

"Pretty much." I rolled my eyes. 

"Gemma! Wait up!" I stopped in the middle of the parking lot, lowered my hand, and glanced over my shoulder.  

"Damn, he's hot," Chloe whispered. "And he likes you. A lot." She raised her eyebrows and sipped on her latte. 

"No, he doesn't." 

"Whatever..." 

"Iced latte?" Rhys laughed, pointing to our drinks. I knew what he was thinking by his comment yesterday about not seeing many people around here drinking hot coffee. I'm sure some drank hot coffee around here, but if I had to guess, kids around our age were known to have an iced drink in their hand. I had to assume where he lived before; they must have drunk a lot of hot coffee from how he always reacted to iced lattes. "It does look good, though. Do you care if I walk with you?" He smiled. 

"No." I sipped on my drink as we walked toward the school. Chloe and I had to finish our drinks before school started because water was the only drink students were allowed to take into the classrooms. I thought it unfair because the teachers were allowed to have their coffee. If we could have coffee with us in the morning, we might do better in that first class. 

Rhys walked close to me but didn't try to hold my hand or anything. So, I was pretty sure yesterday was a pitty coffee date. Another blow to my self-esteem, letting me know I was a failure at dating. Like I needed any more reminders that I sucked at dating, for some strange reason, the universe was finding hilarity in proving that I was undateable. I was beginning to accept the fact that I was going to be the only junior not at the dance. His hand kept brushing against mine, and I thought about just grabbing his hand at one point, but what if the feelings weren't mutual? 

"I'll see you later in Math." Rhys kept walking down the hall when we reached my locker. 

"Sure..." I sighed. 

"He likes you." Chloe beamed. 

My eyes widened at her comment. Did I miss something? I looked around the hall to make sure she wasn't looking at another couple because I knew she couldn't have been talking about Rhys. I shook my head in disbelief and stepped closer to my locker, spinning the dial to open it. I opened my locker door, glancing over at her, trying to figure out where she got that crazy notion that he likes me. She looked over at me, shrugging her shoulders, asking me why I was looking at her like that. I shook my head in disbelief again and returned my focus to the books in my locker. 

"Hey!" Ava hollered, walking up behind us. 

At that moment, I wanted my locker to open up and swallow me. I wasn't in the mood to deal with Ava and Caleb and their on-again, off-again love affair. This morning she was all cheerful, but in another hour, she'd be wanting to rip Caleb's head off for pissing her off about something. It was exhausting being around them all the time. 

"Hey, Ava," I mumbled into my locker. 

"Was that Rhys I saw walking away from your locker? Hmm..." 

"What? No. He doesn't like me." I slammed my locker door shut. "We've got to get to class before we're late." I motioned my head down the hall. 

"Grouchy..." Ava mumbled, grabbing her phone. She wasn't wrong, I was grouchy. I had every right to be that way, too. I was tired of being poor little Gemma, the girl no guy wanted to date. Then when they did date me, get ditched in the middle of the date for some bitch. Either I was doomed to be dateless for the rest of my life, or I had to do something about it. I still have time before the dance to find a date. I promised myself I wouldn't be sitting at home alone while my friends were having fun. I was so preoccupied with my thoughts that I almost passed up Math class. 

"Um...Gemma, our class is back here." Ava laughed, pointing to the door to the left of her. She walked through the doorway while I stood there staring at it, wanting to take off running down the hall and out the front doors to my car. My head dropped back as I stared at the egg-colored ceiling tiles gracing every high school, wondering why dating was virtually impossible for me. 

"You okay, Gemma?" 

"Uh...Yeah...I...I thought I saw something." I lowered my head, pointing up to the ceiling. 

Rhys glanced up to where I was pointing. "Yeah, I've seen some big-ass bugs roaming around here." 

"Huh?" I glanced around the floor, prepared to scream at the first sight of any bug crawling on the floor. "We should probably get to class before Mr. King marks us tardy." I motioned to the door, not taking my eyes off the beige linoleum floor. Now, I would be staring at the floors most of the day, praying I didn't see any bugs. Why did boys always have to mention bugs to girls? Was it funny to them to freak us out? True, some girls didn't mind bugs, but the vast majority hated bugs, and I, for one, was one of them. 

"Yeah...I noticed he can be a dick about that." 

"Gemma, Rhys, I don't want to have to count you both tardy," Mr. King said behind us. 

I snapped out of my bug paranoia, grabbed Rhys's arm, and hurried to the door. "Sorry, Mr. King!" I shouted over my shoulder. Luckily for us, I was one of Mr. King's favorites. I knew that sounded shallow and conceded, and teachers would never admit to having favorites, but it was true. I never caused trouble in class and always completed my homework on time. As Mr. King walked into the classroom, we made it to our seats, announcing everyone to be quiet. I got my book out of my bag and hung it on the back of my chair, and I couldn't help but notice Ashton staring at me with discontent. I shrugged my shoulders at him, motioning my head as if I was asking him what I'd done wrong. He looked away, not responding to me. I stared at him for a minute, then turned around before Mr. King accused me of talking to Ashton. Mr. King started class with writing problems on the board and told us we better write them down because they might be on the test next week. I paused for a minute while Mr. King continued to scribble problems across the board, explaining how he got the answers. I sat there with this feeling in the pit of my stomach that someone was watching me. I turned to the left, acting like I was grabbing something out of my book bag, glancing back at Ashton, who was busy writing in his notebook. I twisted my mouth in frustration and turned around, drumming the pencil on the side of my face, scanning the kids in front of me. Then it hit me who was watching me. I lowered my pencil and turned to the right, and sure enough, Jude was looking right at me. I glared, letting him know I didn't appreciate him watching me, and turned around. 

"Hey, you okay?" Ava asked when the bell rang. 

"Yeah." I looked at Jude's back as he walked past. 

"Gemma, I'll see you later in the Library," Rhys said, walking past. 

"Okay," I said, standing up. I jumped at the thud of someone running into a desk. We turned and saw Ashton moving the desk back. He glanced at both of us and then left without saying a word.