The Opposition

Chapter 6: Carter

As I sit in the middle on the cafeteria, I can't help but wonder how many kids at this school are heartbroken. It could be from a break up. Maybe they were cheated on. Or they can't make tuition next year. A family member is now gone. There are about a million reasons for your heart to tell your brain that it's split in two, while it secretly remains whole. The heart is deceiving. And I always wondered whether I should trust mine.

Landon has a class, so it's only Dimitri and I, and Tyrone, eating lunch together. Across the dining hall, Sadie sits beside Lena–the girl who's face Landon was eating last night. I guess Anastasia and Angie have a different class schedule. She looks anxious for some reason, like something is on her mind and she can't focus on anything else. She seemed fine in math and art. Well, "fine" means "no different than usual." She stares at some random point in the air, biting her bottom lip while Lena talks her ear off. I wish she would stop doing that because it makes her look hot as hell and she's not supposed to be hot. She's supposed to be stubborn and annoying and conniving. Every now and then, she'll anxiously shift in her seat and her short skirt will ride up her thighs and I have to avert my eyes and internally scream: "That's Sadie you idiot!"

"I doubt she'd go out with you," Dimitri is saying to Tyrone, and I will myself to focus on the conversation.

"Yeah, I know she doesn't do the whole dating thing, but I'm sure she does something else," Tyrone smirks. No dating? There's only girl in this whole school that doesn't do dating.

"I mean she's really fucking annoying, but she's crazy hot. Do you see those short-ass skirts she wears. I'm glad I don't have any classes with her because I wouldn't be able to focus with her sitting a few feet away from me. I don't know how you do it, Carter."

Heat returns to my veins and I can feel my blood pumping through my body. My hands ball into fists under the table and I don't even know why. He's allowed to think Sadie's hot. I think she's hot. I mean, not in a I'm-going-to-do-something-about-it kind of way, but more of a hey-she's-really-fucking-pretty kind of way.

"She's just Sadie," I reply, trying to loosen my clenched fists. I want to punch something. I want to punch Tyrone. But why do I want to punch him? He hasn't really done anything wrong. He talks about girls all the time. Snap out of it, Carter.

"Speaking of Sadie; she's coming over," Dimitri comments, taking a sip of his apple juice. This dude is such a people-watcher. I guess it's the journalist in him, but he can literally just sit back and stare and listen to people for hours, silent as a fruit fly.

He wasn't lying. Sadie is sauntering over towards our table, leaving Lena to look over her bag and food. I didn't actually know her and Lena were friends. I know they played volleyball together, but seeing as I called her "redheaded girl" until today, it's not that surprising. Her eyes are trained on me: green today. Her skirt rises slightly as she picks up the speed of her walk, revealing a hole in her tights on the inside of her thigh. Fuck. She's wearing a silky white button up that's raised to reveal her forearms. I don't know why I find it so goddamn attractive. It's because I'm tired, right? Lack of sleep is making me delusional. It's fucking Sadie.

She sits down between Tyrone and I, sliding me over on the bench with her hip. She turns to say something to me when Tyrone slings an arm around her shoulders, pulling her in. My jaw twitches.

"Hey, gorgeous."

She turns to face him, and her face twists up into disgust. I don't know why that makes me happy. "Get your fucking arm off me, Ty," she deadpans.

I don't know why called him Ty. Are they on a nickname basis? She didn't use his last name either. She seems to only do that with me.

"C'mon, babe. Relax," Tyrone says, lowing his voice to sound all seductive and shit.