𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐁𝐚𝐝 𝐁𝐨𝐲'𝐬 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐢𝐩𝐥𝐞

46 | 𝐺𝑎𝑦 𝐷𝑟𝑢𝑛𝑘 𝐸𝑥 𝑈𝑛𝑐𝑙𝑒

I laid my head up against the grass with the sun in my eyes.

I created a starfish as the beautiful yellow, warm cascading streams of light washed over my pale complexion and the soft, itchy grass surrounding. My hair splattered on the ground and my red and white polka dot dress was laying on my body.

"I missed the nice weather for a change," I told him, shifting my head and angling it so I can see him lying next to me.

His head propped up by his head, his elbows poking to the sky and his eyes trained on the houses lined down his row. We were on his front lawn, technically, he was supposed to drive me home, but I kind of just popped a squat and haven't gotten up since. He of course, found comfort next to me and we drifted off to silence.

"Me too," he murmured before propping himself up to sit upright, the palms of his hands stamped to the yellowing grass bleached in sunlight. He squinted at me. "We should get going now. It's bad enough you're here." Victor stood up and outstretched his hand.

"I know, but are you sure we can't talk?" I pressed.

"I don't want to." Victor took my hand and tugged me into a hug. "We'll talk about this eventually, but Corbett doesn't even want this much now." He ran a few circles on my back, then separated. "You'll drive?"

We routinely practiced.

"You're eighteen," I reminded him, also another way of saying I'm not ready for the roads.

"Okay, but I would at your command," he crooned, twisting the keys around his finger before slipping into the driver's side of the jeep and staring out at me through the passenger window with a half-hearted smile. After a few seconds of absorbing the sunlight, I was seated next to him as he drove me home.

We'd been in this awkward stage for a while, mainly because I couldn't allow my heart to open to the possibility of what I felt so strongly before. After hearing Sullivan accuse Victor of such things, and make me block him and ignore him, I was starting to resent my crush. Decidedly, I did keep Victor blocked in case Sullivan was to go through my phone again. I learned that he does that sometimes if he starts to lack trust in me, but I will make sure he trusts me soon enough.

Victor drove mindlessly with one hand on the wheel, his other on the middle consul when his fingers briefly brushed over my knee warmly. The touch made me look down to his fingers toying with the fringe at the end of my red dress before he pulled his hand back and started driving with it.

I was steadying my breathing, biting my lip as we approached my house. "Thank you," I told him. "For today."

"We just watched a horror movie," he recalled, raising an eyebrow.

"Exactly, but I loved it." I grinned from ear to ear, slamming the door shut and hurrying up the lawn to my door. When I opened it and locked it shut once inside, I heard a muse of chatter run to my ears. The familiar voices had a strange churn in my gut. 

I walked in the direction of the volume, greeting two people in the dining room. "Dad?" I asked, my voice hollow.

He squealed out of the mahogany chair, standing from the table and looking at me. "My little girl is dating, your mom was telling me--"

"What?" I surveyed a look at my mom as she shrugged, sipping her coffee as if to tell me she didn't know he was coming. "Why are you here?"

He sighed. "I want to be there for your graduation--"

"I told you no."

"How about I see you before prom?"

"No."