Beauty and the Beat

Beauty and the Beat (5)

Maxxon and I just stood there, staring each other down, just like we always did. Neither of us said anything as we just stood there in the middle of the hallway, completely alone. It was silent, and I couldn’t help but find all of this eerie.

“Can I leave now?” I asked, even though I was going to leave no matter what his answer was.

I turned around, but Maxxon grabbed onto my arm before I could get too far away. “What’s going on, Sadie?” he asked me, tugging me back toward him. “Tell me what’s going on.”

“Nothing’s going on!”

“Sadie.”

“Maxxon, let go of me,” I spat, trying my hardest to yank my arm out of his grasp, but to no avail. This wasn’t something I was used to; usually I could always get myself away from Maxxon without a problem. Why was it so difficult now? “Maxxon!”

“Is there a problem here?”

At the sound of this voice, Maxxon and I both spun around to see who it was. My stomach nearly dropped when I saw that it was Ethan, who looked at Maxxon and then to me as if we weren’t from this planet.

“Oh, nothing,” Maxxon shrugged, yanking me toward him and wrapping his arm around my shoulder. “Sadie and I were just talking, that’s all.”

I punched him in the side. “Let me go.”

He did as he was told, rubbing where I had punched him as he glared right back at me.

I looked from Maxxon to Ethan, and none of said a single word to each other. It was probably the most awkward thing I had ever had to go through, and I knew I didn’t want to know what the other two were thinking.

“You know, Mr. Kelly,” Ethan started, and I only rolled my eyes at him. He only ever used people’s last names when he was angry or mocking. And by the smirk on his face, I knew this was mocking. “Sexual assault is illegal.”

Both Maxxon and I nearly choked on our own saliva before Maxxon nearly shouted, “I wasn’t sexually assaulting her!”

Ethan shrugged. “Physical assault, then. Still illegal.”

This was definitely not going to end well. I might have known that getting into a fight with a teacher meant bad news, but I was sure Maxxon didn’t. Especially when it was a physical fight, which I knew would have been coming eventually if one of them didn’t shut up.

“Look, just because you two were chummy when we were all younger, doesn’t mean you can rekindle any kind of romance you had now,” Maxxon scowled at our teacher now.

Ethan just blinked at him, obviously surprised by what he had said. I just stood there, my mouth agape because I had no idea what the hell I was supposed to do. He remembered? He remembered how we had known Ethan when we were kids? Then why hadn’t he brought it up until now?

But I couldn’t tell if that was the reason why I felt like I was going to faint, or if it was because he actually thought something was going on between Ethan and me. When we were kids, and now.

“Nothing is going on between us!” I made sure to clear, cutting Ethan off before he could say anything to the younger boy. “And nothing ever did go on between us!”

“Oh, yeah.” Maxxon rolled his eyes. “You had the hots for his brother.”

I turned so red, I felt my ears burn. “Will anyone ever let me forget that?”

Both Maxxon and Ethan looked at each other and then back at me as they said in unison, “No.”

Since when were they on the same side? This was turning out to be really unfair! Dealing with both of them separately was bad enough, but now they were going to torment me together?