Unapologetically, Juliet

Chapter Six

BRIDEZILLA Meltdown went viral.

I totally forgot all about the bridal shop girl filming the entire scene, until I got a bunch of texts from all the Burke siblings telling me to check the internet, because I was a tiny bit famous. Actually, it was mostly Maya, but people seemed interested in my reaction to her.

My entire family had been calling me nonstop for almost four days straight, but I'd ignored every single one of them. Ever since the incident with Maya, I'd locked myself in my apartment, and refused to answer the door or phone or any texts. I even called the school and work, telling them I was sick for a few days in a row.

Everyone was going to blame me again, for whatever happened with Chance and Maya.

They were both among the many callers blowing up my phone. I considered just throwing the damn thing out the window, which probably would've made King the happiest feline on the planet, but I didn't want to have to spend the money on a new one.

So, I just turned it off, instead.

Wednesday night, when the knocking on my door started, I wasn't actually all that surprised. I thought for sure it was either one of my brothers, or Shel and Trixi, even though I knew the twins were out of town. I was surprised, however, when I opened it up and found Saber standing in the hall.

"What are you doing here?" I sounded cold and standoffish even to my own ears. It always happened when my whole family turned against me on something. Everything I did was never good enough for them. I pretended not to care, but it was almost impossible not to feel something.

Saber's gray eyes narrowed and he folded his arms as he leaned against the doorframe. "I came to make sure you weren't dead. You've missed three classes since Saturday and Chef said you haven't been answering your phone."

"Oh. Crap. I guess I'm pretty far behind, huh? Shit." King rubbed up against my legs and started purring. It was his way of trying to calm me down, but I'd been wound up for days, what with my self-imposed solitary confinement. "You can come in if you want." I gestured to the inside of my small apartment, and Saber entered with some hesitance while his eyes roamed my freakish sense of decoration.

"You really like horror movies, don't you?"

I shrugged. "Only the good ones. Most of them suck, though." My stomach growled loudly and for the first time in days, I remembered that I was supposed to eat. Shel had programmed alarms into my phone to remind me, especially on the days when I started writing a short story and forgot about everything else. But my phone was off and I hadn't even really thought about it.

"I like comedies better. I'd rather spend two hours laughing than being scared." I'd heard the same comment from dozens of people before.

"I bet you don't like spicy food either." I snorted unattractively as I searched my cupboards for something to eat, but I'd forgotten I was supposed to go grocery shopping on Sunday.

Saber laughed and I almost did too. "No, I do sometimes. And speaking of food, I can go over what you missed in class, if you want. So you're not so far behind."

"Really?" I felt my mood brighten for the first time since the whole bridal shop fiasco. "You have no idea how awesome that would be!" An invisible weight lifted off my shoulders and I shot him a genuine smile.

"It's no problem. I actually really like cooking. We can start now, if you have nothing else going on." As Saber spoke, he bent down to pet King who was lingering at his feet. I opened my mouth to tell him not to put his hand anywhere near my devil cat, because he usually bit people he didn't know when they tried to touch him, but King didn't even flinch.