Renna Rose Lancaster is the girl people stare at like she belongs in a glass case, carved with angel-soft beauty, a life airbrushed into unattainable perfection. But Renna knows perfection is nothing but a golden prison, coated in pretty lies that k...
“Home isn't hard to find, just wrap me in your arms and I'll wrap you in mine.”
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I trudged across the courtyard with Cameron at my side, drenched in that sticky, pre-rain smell the earth loved to shove in everyone’s face. Clouds hung low enough to clip your head if you jumped. Noon on campus always meant bodies everywhere. People stretching on benches, idiots playing keepie-uppie with a half-flat football, someone blasting grime from a speaker that should’ve been binned years ago. Same circus, different day.
Cameron elbowed me. “Bet Logan’s already asleep.”
“He won’t be if you’re breathing anywhere near the building,” I muttered.
He slapped his hands around his mouth and let out a bellow that probably rattled the windows of the Hunterian Museum.
“LOGAN. LOGAN, YOU USELESS TROLLEY.”
Every single person in the courtyard went quiet for a split second. Then the snorts started up again, the lads muttering things like “here he fucking goes” and “Christ, Cameron, give it a rest.”
I kept walking like this wasn’t my daily suffering. I’d honestly become immune. Cameron shouting someone’s name across three buildings was basically uni ambience at this point.
He didn’t stop.
Why would he? He lived for this crap.
“LOGAN FUCKING LENNOX, I KNOW YOU’RE IN THERE, YOU SNEAKY RAT.”
More laughter. Someone whistled. A group of lads near the fountains said something about Cameron needing psychiatric evaluation, but loudly enough that he heard them. He just gave them a thumbs-up like a menace.
I leaned against one of the courtyard pillars, hands in my pockets, feeling the cold stone bite into my back.
Should’ve stayed in Isla's room. Should’ve let this clown embarrass himself alone. Should’ve pretended I didn’t know him. Too late now.
Cameron was still screaming.
Then the dorm door slammed open behind us, and out blustered Miss McNally, dorm warden, professional terror of teenage boys, Scottish through-and-through with enough authority to make demons behave.
Her voice could’ve shattered windows.
“CAMERON ERIKSEN! WILL YE STOAP YER BELLOWIN’ LIKE A DYIN’ COW? I’VE TOLD YE TEN TIMES THIS WEEK! TEN!”
Cameron swivelled around, grin too wide, charm dialled to maximum.
“Miss McNally, my favourite woman over thirty,” he said, hands up as if he were offering peace. "Any chance you could shout up to Logan for me? He’s being emotionally unavailable.”
She stared at him like he was the worst thing produced by the human race. “Ye did this yesterday! And the day before! And last bloody week! I’m no shoutin’ for that lad because yer too bone idle tae text him.”
