My Cliche Love Story | ✓

Chapter 17

"You know, you should warn a girl that you're going to kiss her before you actually kiss her," I breathe after he releases me from his capture.

Giving me a glimpse of his old self, Dylan smirks, which is an expression that holds every kind of mischief. On the other hand, his eyes are widening, showing me mock innocence, in which I am known for having, too. God, who would have guessed that we ended up being so much alike?

"Okay," he answers, and just to tease me, adds, "I was going to kiss you just then."

"Yeah," I grumble, "couldn't miss it." I cross my arms in front of my chest, and turn around, clambering out of the window. Before I can leap across the empty air, though, he's there, grabbing me and pulling me back inside.

"Wait," he says, and I roll my eyes.

"Okay, we kissed, but now I need to leave, even though it was all great and wonderful and confusing and--"

"Katie's here," he hisses, and I shut up quickly, now that I know what's wrong with her. But Dylan's eyes widen in surprise. "Great and wonderful?"

I sigh. I've been caught. "Well, I haven't really kissed anyone--"

"Ever?" I expect there to be an amused expression on his face, but instead, I find pure shock. 

Slapping his arm, I shake my head. "No, of course not. You know, I'm not a total virgin to these things." 

That didn't come out right, it won't be too long until I'm forced to tell him. 

"Oh--oh," he says, and I'm still surprised to see that his face and voice are totally rid of sarcasm and teasing. It all changed after that kiss. Well, maybe magic is real.

There's a knock on the door, and immediately, Dylan tenses before I can protest his remark. "Who's there?"

"It's me, Dylan." I cringe as Katie's sickly sweet, fake voice floats through the door. Without waiting for an answer, she's already opening the door and stepping into the room. Her eyes blaze when she sees me in his room, and even more so when she notices the lack of space between us. "Seriously?" she snarls.

"'Seriously,' what?" Dylan responds with a hint of a smirk.

I think he just likes to annoy her. Maybe it's because I'm here, maybe not.

She scoffs, and for once, the anger in her tone is enough to make me take a step back, pressed up against the open windowsill. "I'm sick and tired of you making time with this waste of space and energy," she spits at him.

"'Waste of space and energy' is all you can do?" I smirk, but Dylan shakes his head.

"Don't encourage her, that'll just make it worse," he warns.

"Make it worse?" she cuts in with ferocity. "It's already as bad as it gets, Dylan. You've completely abandoned me. Ever since the day that I left, I always thought that you'd come get me, come rescue me and be my knight in shining armor. But the years went by, and I started to think that you'd forgotten about me. Of course, that's what makes the most sense, now that you've gone and gotten yourself another toy to play with."

In any other circumstance, I would have spit in her face(quite literally) or done something else, but I know that this is just what she is, she has no way of controlling it once she gets started. Maybe she'll just run out of energy after a while, right?

Wrong.

Now turned to me and determined to make my life miserable, she continues her rant. "And you, you're nothing. Absolutely nothing. When I was first back in town and looking for Dylan, I'd heard your name a few times, but all of them were just talking about your poor daddy, and how he left you. I heard some different guesses on why he did it, but here's my opinion: I bet your daddy left you because you're a backstabber that doesn't care about anyone but yourself, and because you just can't stand it when someone's better at something than you. Oh, and God forbid you have to get off your lazy ass and work for something for once in your sorry excuse for a life."

It's the first time that I've cried since Dad left us.

Tears aren't streaming out over my cheeks yet, but my face burns, and my vision is blurry with the salty drops threatening to overflow. Dylan reaches for me, but I wrench myself free from his hands. Wiping my eyes, the anger pulses through my body with such energy that at first, I'm scared of what I might say. But I can't just let her get away with talking about my father, or calling me a backstabber.

"Look here, you piece of lying garbage," I growl, ignoring Dylan's protests, "I couldn't care less if you picked on me. Call me anything you want, but you have no right talking about my father. Yeah, he left us. Yeah, he's a real jerk. But that doesn't give you permission to stomp your fake wedges in here and tell me what he's done wrong. I know what he's done, and nobody else needs to know that. Get your manicured claws out of here before you threaten to ruin someone else's lives, and run away back to the insane asylum."

She glares at me for a couple seconds, and the tension in the air is so thick that I could take a knife and slice through it. But apparently she can't come up with a better response, and just huffs, stomping her way out the door and into the driveway. I watch her from the window as she climbs into her car and drives away, the brakes squealing. 

"That's right, run away scared," I mutter, running a hand through my locks. "You may be a terrible person with a temper, but your father didn't kick you, he didn't change your life by coming home drunk one night and punching you in the face--"

"What?" Dylan's voice is soft. "He what?"

I freeze, having totally forgotten that he was here. This is his room, after all. But he'd been so quiet, it was easy to think he was somewhere else. 

Well, the big secret had to come out sometime, didn't it? 

I turn to him slowly, my hands held out in front of me, willing him to just listen to me. 

"Yeah, um, I've got something to tell you."

01/01/2016