Reining Her In (Student/Teacher Romance)

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

"Hey," I said, jogging to catch up to Barney. It was the first time I'd seen him alone since my bad party experience, and I needed to talk to him about it.

"What's up?" Barney shifted his weight, and took a glance behind him. I'd spied him leaving the Academy building on the way to the stables.

"I wanted to talk to you about something."

"I gathered, from the jogging. So, what's up?"

I scowled at him, and he cracked a grin. "The other night at that party, I had a shitty time."

"Ruby mentioned that. You should have told me, I could have helped."

"You've had something like that before?" Walking with Mr. Campbell had ended up being much better, in the end. I'd needed to get out of that party—my paranoia wouldn't have faded whilst I was still in the room.

"Not personally, but I've heard stories. I read a lot of forums about these things. I like to know what I'm getting into."

And that was apparently where we differed. I threw myself into things without knowing or caring about the consequences because anything was better than having to think about real life.

"I just thought I should tell you, in case you didn't realise."

Barney beamed at me. "Nothing is going to deter me. I enjoy it, and I don't think a time would ever be bad enough to convince me to stop."

"You know we did a ridiculous amount of that shit during the summer, right?"

"I know, but it's no big deal. We've calmed down now."

I gawked at him. "We've just done it twice in one week. I don't think that's calming down."

He waved me off. "It's not a big deal," he stressed again. "I'm not saying you should do it—you shouldn't if you don't want to. But I'm having fun, and that's all that matters to me. I'm not going to be seventeen forever."

"You're going to be seventeen in a month, so no, you're not." My eighteenth had been in the early days of September. If we'd been living in a city somewhere, I would have been out drinking all the time. The smile didn't leave his face, but I could tell he was beginning to fidget. I couldn't let up yet, though. "I had a panic attack yesterday."

"Oh shit, you okay?"

"It's from doing too much ecstasy."

Barney waved me off without hesitation. "You don't know that. It could have been about anything. You're stressed with life in general."

"No, I'm not." It was a bit of a lie. My future was a constant thought weighing on me, but it wasn't causing me so much stress that I'd had severe anxiety about anything. This was something else. "It was caused by that, I know it. I looked it up, too, and it can happen. I'm just warning you, Barney. If you want to keep doing it then it's none of my business, either, I just wanted to say."

He opened his mouth, and for a moment I thought he was going to say something he'd regret. But he stopped himself, running a hand through his hair, and nodding. "Fair enough. Thanks for the warning. For looking out for me."

My smile was real. "Of course." Ruby, Barney and I lived in a very low stress friendship. There was no drama. We always joked and laughed. Even if one of us had individual drama, it never caused arguments between the three of us, and that was how I liked it.

I definitely didn't want some stupid drugs putting an end to that. "I'm sorry to be rude, but I really need to go."

"Wait, wait." I held him back for just a few more minutes. "I wanted to ask you where you get the drugs from."

"What? Why?"

"Well, I was wondering if maybe it was a bad batch and that's why I had a bad reaction to it." Barney's defensive tone put me on edge a bit. I had to lie anyway—I couldn't go telling him that Mr. Campbell wanted to bust his dealer. A wave of guilt hit me, and I wanted to backtrack. Mr. Campbell had done me a favour, but Barney had been my best friend for years. Lying to him wasn't okay.

"My stuff is good, trust me. I get it off someone back home, and I know they wouldn't sell me anything dodgy. They test it."

That would have soothed my nerves, but it didn't exactly make sense. Barney lived hours away from the school, and he never went home at the weekends. No one came to visit him. I doubted he sent it through the post. He was either lying, or this friend gave him nigh on a hundred pills to last him through a term.

"That's all right, then. It was just something that crossed my mind, is all." The guilt for lying was still there, but now I suspected he was lying too, it lessened. "Where are you off to, anyway?"

Barney leaned closer to me, even though we were completely alone. "I'm going to meet Estella."

My eyebrows shot up. She was a girl in our year who I barely knew. There was only one reason he was going to meet her in the grounds. "Well, you should have said, I wouldn't have pestered you so much."

He grinned. "She said she didn't want anyone to know, so keep it down about it, if you would."

"Of course." Gossip wasn't something I cared for, anyway. "Well, have fun. Stay safe."

We shared a final laugh, and went our separate ways.

My mind was racing with new information. If Barney really got it from a friend at home, then there was nothing I could do. He was out of the school's reach. I didn't want to get involved if that was the case.

If, however, he was lying, then I both wanted to know why, and who for. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A little bit of a short rubbish chapter, but there's some good ones coming up! Thanks to everyone who has been voting on this book, it means a lot!