Were's the Love?

Chapter 19: A Turkey Club with a Side of Personal Hell

How much of an idiot can someone be? All that worrying about what I did because that mutt let some birdbrained moron fill his head with a lot of nonsense about birds that isn't even true! I swear, the next time I see Maggie on the street, I'm going to punch her. With the kind of person Jason is, she had to realize that he would believe everything she told him! The way he trusts everyone so easily... He's like a child! That man probably still believes that Santa Claus delivers all his presents and the Easter Bunny is the one who gives him candy!

I throw a stack of papers into the top drawer of my desk and slam it shut. I returned to my classroom about five minutes ago, but everything that happened with Jason is bouncing around in my head, frustrating me to no end.

I honestly don't know which of us is the bigger idiot. Him, for believing what Maggie had told him and thinking he'd scare me off by acting like the goofy dog that he is, or me, for wasting so much time thinking I had done something wrong?

I should have known better.

In Jason's eyes, most people are incapable of doing anything wrong. Even those bitchy students who have been lying to him to get out of gym class. Plus, after everything his sister said, I should have realized how he felt. However, the whole "windy bird girl" thing was over a decade ago. How was I supposed to know that he still felt the same way?

He likes me.

Then again, he likes everybody, so that's nothing special.

But he did say that he likes me more than anyone else. And he mentioned that he'd like to never stop being my mate. Then, there was that whole comment about wanting me in his hair. What was that about? I've heard him say a lot of odd things over the years, but that might have been one of the oddest.

I want to groan, loudly, but instead, I take a deep breath and try to clear my head. I am overthinking things again and I know it. I'm just confused.

I really was prepared to speak to the elders and the chief about possibly ending our time together early. After seeing Jason run from me, again, then lie to me and tell me that it wasn't me, it was him, I genuinely thought that he wanted out of this relationship. It didn't surprise me at all that he would. Over the past month, I convinced myself that he was getting tired of me. I'm not an easy person to get along with. I've been told that countless times by dozens of people.

I'm too quiet. Too moody. Too distant. Too full of myself. Too everything, apparently.

The thing is... I know that's how it seems. I know that I'm too quiet and that I act distant from people. I can't help it. It's just the way that I am.

I've always had trouble making friends and maintaining steady relationships. Every time I think I may have found someone who finally gets me, I do something wrong and lose them or they turn out to be liars and cheats. I learned at a young age that it was better to keep my guards up than to get hurt by someone I thought was a friend. And that lesson only became more solidified in my head after I started dating. If you never let people in, then they can't hurt you when they leave.

However, it's clear to me now that I was letting my guard down with Jason. Why else would it have bothered me so much that he was avoiding me? If it had been anyone else, I would have been fine with it. I like being left alone and I used to love having a bed to myself. Whenever Derek or Jeremy were given overnight guard duty, I was happy to finally have the chance for peace and time to relax by myself. But when Jason was gone, I just felt... lonely.

I didn't like it.

And if that feeling of loneliness wasn't enough to let me know that my guard was crumbling, it's written all over the way I reacted to his kiss in the shower stall. There wasn't a second of hesitation within me when I reciprocated that kiss. Even thinking that he didn't want me around anymore, I still dove headfirst into that all-too-short, forbidden make-out session in the boys' locker room.