The Candace Clique

Chapter Nine

“So, I’ll just transpose this, isolate the x, and I get the answer?” Patrick inquired, bent over his notebook, a pencil in hand. His brow creased as he scribbled down on his homework, habitually rubbing the eraser end of the pencil against his forehead while on thought.

Bridget nodded, pointing at the transposed variable, “Yeah,” she breathed, “you’re doing it right.”

He bit his lower lips, scratching the eraser on his forehead before saying, “So, x equals forty?”

Looking down at his work, she smiled, “Yeah, you got it.”

“Wow,” he exhaled, dropping his pencil and stretching his arm up in the air, “that’s much easier than I thought.”

Bridget’s heart skipped a bit as his lips formed up into an easy smile, her ribcage bruised at how much her heart had been jumping the last two hours they were together, trying to solve a ridiculously easy algebra homework. She still couldn’t believe that the Patrick Bentley was right there in her room, just across from her on the table and was smiling down at her like she was the prettiest he’d ever seen anyone been. She tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear and pushed herself up, crossing the room, “So...do you want to stay for dinner?”

She heard the chair being pulled back and she turned around to face him. Patrick’s hands were stuffed inside his jeans pocket and a smile was on his face, his biceps bunched up at his t-shirt sleeves and Bridget couldn’t help but wipe the her sweaty hands on her jeans. He crossed the room in less than three strides, his tall frame towering over her, “Sure.”

Nikolai rolled the blunt, lighted it up and stuck it in between his lips, giving it a long satisfying drag before handing it over to Julia, “That guy you’re with, what’s his name?”

The two of them were sitting on Nikolai’s roof, his house giving off a beautiful scenery of the sunset kissing the orange touched clouds. The sun eliminated Nikolai’s tattoos, making them stand out from his white v-neck t-shirt. They were both sitting side by side, their knees touching, watching the sunset like they always had.

Julia took the joint from him, rolling it in between her fingers while she took a swig of their whiskey from the hip flask, letting the strong, bitter taste of the alcohol burn her throat. She puffed at the joint, forming an o with her mouth and blowing out small o’s from it, “Ryder,” she said, “Ryder Douglas.”

“And,” he took the hip flask from her, taking a swig and making a face when the alcohol hit his tongue, “you’re occasional fuck buddies?” he returned the container to her, pointing at it, “that is the strongest whiskey I’ve ever had.”

Julia laughed, dropping it beside her, wincing as the metal caught the sun’s rays and temporarily blinded her, “No,” she took the blunt into her mouth again, “we just did it once,” she looked over at her best friend, “just today.”

He turned to look at her, the agonizingly familiar blues of her eyes now caught flame with all the faults pointed at the sun, her hair was now back to her original chestnut brown, only now it was highlighted with ruby, her blood red lips circled the joint between her fingers only to blow out smoke afterwards. Julia turned to him, handing him the drug with a smile. The smile she offered was so crooked, so imperfect and yet it caught on to him like a fish hooked onto a bait, he was a goner. The mere fact that Julia had just slept with a random tattoo artist didn’t seem to mind him at all, to him, she was perfect, no matter how much her flaws paraded themselves in front of him. “So this guy,” he started, grinding the already burnt up joint on the floor of the roof, not meeting his friend’s eyes, “you like him?”

Julia didn’t skip a beat in answering. She snorted, looking back at him with an expression that said, you have got to be kidding me, “Are you seriously asking me that question, Maddox?”