Heartbreakers

-10-

My alarm went off promptly at 7:00 a.m. the next morning, and I woke up to the familiar feeling of a person in my bed next to me- although this time for entirely different reasons. I saw Carter opening his eyes groggily and I smiled, only to be startled by the sound of footprints at my door and the familiar rattle of my mom's jangly bracelets on the doorknob. My eyes shot open and I looked at Carter in panic, I turned and immediately shoved him off his side of the bed onto the floor. He landed with a loud thud and I cringed at what seemed like the loudest noise in the universe.

"Clarke? Are you awake?" My mom called, then opened the door to peek into my room.

"Yeah mom, I'm up..." I said, trying to remain calm and hoping she couldn't see Carter's feet peeking out.

"Okay, is everything alright in here? I heard a loud noise..." She questioned and her eyes took a quick swing around the room.

"Yup, I'm fine! It's all good!" I said in a way that was suspiciously too cheery for the half-awake state I was in. It was like a scene out of one of those corny, albeit lovable, teenage romance movies.

"Okay... If you say so..." She said apprehensively. She checked her watch, and I got the impression she didn't have enough time to be focusing on this right now, because she promptly began to walk out.

"Hey, wait!" I called after her and she turned around. "Can you, um, shut the door behind you?" I asked. She rolled her eyes but obliged, and as soon as I heard her stiletto heels click-clacking on the wooden floors, I poked my head over the side of the bed.

"Owww," I heard Carter mumble as he shimmied out from under me. "You didn't have to shove me like that!" He whined.

"You should be thanking me! My quick thinking likely saved you from castration, if my mother had found out you were here..." I ran my fingers through my hair. I yawned and looked at the clock. It hit me that I would have to go to school and my mood dropped as quickly as the voice of a teenage boy.

"I don't want to go back to that place... I don't think I can handle school today..." I said quietly.

"Then don't go," he said. I looked him up and down. He was so tame around me that I guess I had forgotten he was the bad boy.

"I like where you're going with this..." I said. "But you gotta stay with me, I dunno what we'll do, but we can figure something out."

He looked around then suddenly retreated and stared out the window. I wondered what he was thinking about, and if I could have read minds I would have known it was about me. I would have known he was growing uneasy and fearful of how intimate we'd gotten. He knew how close we had come to breaking the bet earlier, and he was scared. He didn't want to tell me his secret, he didn't want me to see him in the way everyone else saw him.

I watched him carefully, unaware of the decision pacing through his mind. I didn't understand, but maybe that's because I didn't know what something real felt like. I could obviously sense his hesitation, he was facing away from me with tense shoulders and he was taking too long to answer a simple question. Carter was displaying all of the typical signs of someone on the edge. On the edge of what, I didn't know.

"I don't think I can stay," he said when he finally turned around.

"Why," I replied curtly, busying myself with the fraying hem of my blanket. We both knew this wasn't about hanging out together. This wasn't about ditching school. So I asked him again, "why can't you stay with me."

His eye contact disappeared. He seemed ashamed. "Because... Because... My mom is probably pretty worried, and it's important that I go to class because our coach doesn't let us play if we miss too many days in a month..." He trailed off.