Carter Ortese is Trouble - completed (The Boys #1)

Chapter 22: Emma

My friends are at our usual seats at the end of the long row of cafeteria tables. The noise inside the large room strikes me first, becoming an assault on my senses. I'm still feeling off, like none of the rest of the world matters after losing my lead position. It could all fall away, and I'd still wonder why Georgia challenged me and how I failed.

I failed. Plain and simple.

As if on instinct, my fingers curl tighter around my bagged lunch. Mika looks over at the entrance and sees me. She lifts her hand in a little wave. Britt stifles a yawn, but doesn't take her eyes off her lunch. Stacy casts a sidelong glance at me, as if she doesn't know me anymore. What has been going on between us? The emptiness in her gaze sends shivers up my spine.

I can't possibly sit with them today. I can't possibly explain what happened in band. They would never understand.

I turn, walking toward Carter and the farther end of the long row. I slide into a seat opposite him. He's turning over a sandwich in his hands, observing it like it's a lab rat. "We're lunch friends now?"

"Friends?" I ask, arching an eyebrow. "Is that all?"

"Depends. Do we still get to make out?" He looks up at me, and I swear my heart starts beating for the first time today. A new, fluid rhythm that I've been lacking for days, months, years. His irises remind me of an oncoming storm over the tropics, deep, beautiful, and horrifying all in one moment.

"Depends," I counter.

He glances at the end of the table. "Doesn't seem like your friends know what to do with you."

"That makes two of us."

"What's up with you anyway?"

I shrug. "I'm not sure. This summer went by so fast, and I barely saw Stacy and Britt. Mika and I hung out a lot, but things have been weird since school started again..." I let the rest of my words drift away.

"Since me," Carter fills it in. He puts his sandwich down, and it slaps onto the tray like wet newspaper against concrete. "Are you using me to make your friends jealous, Emma?"

"What?" I ask, pulling out my lunch. My parents custom designed my sandwiches to be the best possible mix of brain food. I try to hand him half, but he waves it away. "What would I have to gain from their jealousy?"

Carter shrugs, a small smirk curving at the corner of his mouth. "You tell me. Good girl dates the bad boy, makes him better, the story goes on."

"I'm not." I glance down at the end of the row, and now Stacy is openly glaring at me. I'm not sure what her problem is.

"It's a statement to them, isn't it? Sitting with me?"

I let out a breath. "I'm not sure how to tell them what happened with Georgia. I'm not even sure they would care. You know that Mika's parents are talking her into marriage? While she's still in high school?" I take a large bite of my sandwich, letting that thought sink in. Carter pokes at a piece of his bread, not answering my rhetorical question. "My problems seem so inconsequential, but they still matter to me."

He nods. "I get that. Like this food. It's free, so I shouldn't complain, right?" The bread squishes under his fingertip and some mayonnaise bubbles through it from the other side.

I pull out an apple and offer it to him with a tilt of my head. He takes it and bites down hard. "You could have half of my lunch. It's fine."

"Then I'd be eating another free sandwich."

"But this tastes better."

"I'll settle for the free apple. Thank you." He curves another smile at me, and I feel sparks all the way down to the end of my toes. Our gazes lock, and I'm so wrapped up in looking at Carter that I almost miss the low angry voice behind me.