Something Like Love

two

《hailey》

"And he's even had the guts to laugh in my face while wrapping the damn towel around me!" I rant to my mom.

I can see that she's still processing everything I just screamed on the top of my lungs after she asked why her daughter came home wet and shivering.

"Please calm down my dear," mom tells me.

I let out a deep breath.

"Now why would they do that to you?" Worry is reflected from her eyes, but I know deep down that she's furious, probably even more furious than me.  She's just managed to keep it to herself.

I don't want to tell her that all of this is just because of some silly accident but she'll think that I really did something bad to deserve that kind of punishment.  So I do, and I tell her everything.

Mom's face grew serious to the point that it's scaring me.  She's about to go on a rampage any second now, and I wouldn't want to experience that.  So I say the best excuse my currently frozen and disfunctional brain can think of.

"I'm... gonna go and take a shower first before I catch a cold," I say before sprinting away from my murderous mother.

《hailey》

Holy shit.

They have my bag. Someone yanked it from me before they soaked me probably to keep it dry. Uhm, thanks? I was too desperate to escape to situation earlier that I hadn't noticed that I left it.

My phone's in there. No. Those devils will know all my personal information and use them to blackmail me. I wanted to scream, things couldn't get any worse now.

I didn't know how I would survive a day in school without my bag but I still did, if you consider failing a precalculus quiz and a physics seatwork surviving.

I hadn't let Aubree and Natalie know to save myself from the humiliation for now but I'll have to worry about that later. I have to get my bag from those devils' possession before anything.

As if responding to my thoughts, they suddenly show up right around the corner. One of them spots me and immediately alerts the group. A smirk forms on Colton's face the moment our eyes meet and I fight the urge to slap it off his face.

He says something to his friends before approaching me with an intense gaze. If he's trying to make me feel as if I'm an invader in his territory, he's undeniably managing to do it.

I wait until I'm certain that he can hear me against the usual buzz and chatter of students. "I need my bag back," I finally say.

He lets out a small chuckle. "It's gonna take more than that, sweetheart."

"What do you want?" I try my best not to look intimidated.

"Hmm..." he starts with a seductive low voice, deep in thought. My heartbeat starts to pick up. I am absolutely not prepared for what's gonna come out of the devil's mouth.

Will he make me his slave? Do I have to drive him to school or wherever? Do I have to pay for his food? Do I have to do his assignments for him? But wait, aren't I two years younger than him?

"Let me borrow your ride."

"What?" He means my motorbike, right? But I don't let anyone touch my baby.

He furrows his forehead, as if contemplating whether or not to finish his sentence. "And go out with me whenever I want you to."

"WHAT!?" I absolutely did not expect that. "But, but why do I have to—" He cuts me off.

"You do want your bag back, don't you?"

I let out a deep breath, together with all the hatred I have for the man in front of me and for all this injustice because I just really need my bag back.

"Fine," I say as I throw the keys to my motorbike at him, which he catches swiftly with one hand.

"See you around, Hailey King." His voice is filled with venom. I can only stare at his lean back until he disappears into the sea of people.

The boy who even managed to give me a smile even after I spilled coffee on his shirt was nowhere to be seen on his face, perhaps it's because it was never who he was anyways.