Drop Dead Gorgeous 〰 Jake Fitzgerald

29

"So, how are you and Jake doing?"

I glared at Eli for a second before sighing a bit.

"We're okay."

Our surprisingly lonely lunch table had made the entire week even worse than it already was. One by one, each day of our returning week to school, our little group began to disperse to who-know's where, starting with Jake and Gustavo who seemed to be spending an awful lot of time together.

"Ignoring you, huh?"

"Is it really that obvious?"

Eli chuckled, pouring loads of ketchup on his plastic-tasting school hamburger. "Give it time. We're all still recovering from hell."

"You seem to be doing just fine."

"As do you."

I groaned slightly and put my head down, facing Eli.

"We all have our ways to cope with what happened. Brooke, for example, has gone on seventeen shopping sprees this week, Noah has for the fifth time this week made a podcast about the deceased, and Audrey is on full-blown "Don't talk to me" mode."

"And what do you think Jake is doing?"

"Don't know. That's the kind of thing Noah or Gustavo would do, but seeing as they're not here-"

"Right, got it," I spat out.

Eli stood quiet, holding an empty ketchup packet, deep in thought. He hesitated, but finally choked out, "What if Jake's... you know..."

I turned to him, watching him struggle.

"What?"

"Well, you know-"

"No I don't."

Eli took in a deep breath. "Well, I mean, he's a guy."

"Duh," I said, agreeing to the obvious.

"And, well, Gustavo's a guy."

"No shit."

"Well, what if they're... like..."

I waited for him to finish, anticipating whatever he had to say as he stalled with silence.

"...like, lovers or something..."

"Whoa wait, lovers? That's not..."

I trailed off, processing what Eli had said before finally reacting.

"Ew! Dude, that's... that can't be... but he's dating me!"

"Hey, it was just a theory, don't go all killer-mode on me."

I turned to him immediately after he said, causing him to grin slightly in shame.

"Sorry," he began. "Too soon?"

"Definitely, but never mind that - Eli, your theory could and might just be true. But then why ask me out?"

"Maybe neither one of them knew."

I groaned loudly, starting to overthink about a million different reasons of why Jake would do this.

The worst part was that in the middle of a town where murder was the norm, Jake cheating on me with Gustavo of all people didn't seem so bad. I was more surprised than angry at the thought actually, and that was the real horror of it all.

"That's it, I'm out," I told him, grabbing my backpack and walking away.

"Whoa - wait, Lexa!"

I heard his footsteps nearing me as I reached the school hallways.