An invisible knife twisted in Allie’s stomach as she imagined Carter hearing that gossip. She’d known word of what had happened had got out – Sylvain’s bruised face alone was enough to get people talking. But she hadn’t realised it had all been tangled up like that.
Poor Carter. Poor me.
‘We weren’t doing anything like that, Rachel.’ She was almost breathless with the need to be believed. ‘Sylvain and I aren’t … we weren’t … He was helping me … with something.’ Her own inability to explain what she and Sylvain were doing made it sound like she was lying. She needed to tell the whole story.
Can I tell her about Christopher? It wasn’t Night School, so it wouldn’t be breaking The Rules. Would it?
Once she’d made up her mind, it was such a relief her words blurred together as she explained in rapid-fire sentences what had happened. The note from Christopher. Carter’s obsession with protecting her. Her decision to go to Sylvain.
‘Oh, Allie,’ Rachel whispered when she got to that point.
‘I know.’ Allie twisted the tissue between her fingers. ‘Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe it wasn’t. But Sylvain nearly died for me. And then Carter dumped me.’
Saying those words aloud made her want to cry again, but she seemed to have used up her allotment of tears for the day and her eyes stayed dry and burning.
For a moment that seemed to stretch on too long Rachel studied her. Allie knew she didn’t like Sylvain after what had happened at the summer ball. Knew she didn’t trust him.
But she doesn’t really know him.
‘What’s really going on with you and Sylvain, Allie?’ Rachel asked at last. ‘Do you fancy him? I mean, nobody would blame you. What happened between you – the way he saved you from the fire and now,’ she swirled her hand, ‘all of this. It must have created a connection between you. A kind of bond. And that can be hard to resist. Anyone could confuse that in their head with love.’
‘No,’ Allie said instantly, although her heart sped up, and she wasn’t certain anything she was saying was true. ‘No. I don’t fancy him.’ And then … ‘Oh God. I don’t know.’ Pulling her bare feet up on to the bed and wrapping her arms around her knees, she said, ‘I feel attracted to him, I guess. But that’s not why things went bad with me and Carter. I think …’ She stopped to really consider how she actually felt. ‘Rach, I miss Carter so much but at the same time I feel like now I can breathe. When he’s around I can’t breathe.’
‘Why? Because he’s too overprotective? He suffocates you?’
Allie nodded miserably. ‘I love him, I really do. But he tells me what to do. He argues with me all the time. I think he doesn’t believe in me and it makes me doubt myself. And I know why he does it – I’ve been thinking about it a lot and I know. He doesn’t have anybody. No parents, or brothers or sisters, no aunts or grandparents. He’s alone and I’m all he’s got and so he hangs on to me. He wants to protect me. But when he does that I can’t breathe.’
‘It was that bad?’
‘I don’t know. Yes … No …’ Allie held up her hands helplessly. ‘I’m making it sound worse than it is. There was so much good stuff too. But as much as I miss Carter – and I do – I feel free without him.’
Rachel let her breath out slowly. ‘Then you have to stay broken up, Allie. If you feel like that, no matter how hard it is to move on, I think you have to do it.’
‘But I don’t know how.’ Tears returned as suddenly as they’d left. ‘All I do is think about him. All day I’m like, Carter and I stood here and Carter and I laughed here. It’s so stupid.’ She dashed the tears away with an angry gesture. ‘But I can’t stop. It’s like my mind is obsessed with him.’
‘This is why breaking up sucks, Allie.’ Rachel’s tone was gentle. ‘This is why people don’t like to do it. It takes time. And I think you need to distract yourself. All you ever do any more is work. So do some things you didn’t ever do with Carter. Hang out with Jo, even if she’s as mad as a box of chickens. Or me. Or Zoe. Avoid Carter … and Sylvain,’ she added hastily. ‘The last thing you need is a sloppy rebound. You need to find out who you are now so you’ll know what you want. Maybe you do want Sylvain, I don’t know. But maybe that’s just your heart looking for a replacement model. And I don’t think replacement models ever work out as well as the real thing. So, take some time to row your boat down the River Allie.’
Almost laughing through her tears, Allie said, ‘I can’t believe you just freakin’ said that.’
‘Me neither.’ Rachel grinned. ‘This therapy session is over. I’ll invoice you later.’
Allie tried to take Rachel’s advice. Forcing herself to hang out in the common room playing chess with Jo. Or, rather, losing to Jo at chess. Going to a kick-boxing class with Zoe, who passionately loved kicking things. Sitting with Rachel and Lucas at dinner talking about classes she didn’t really care about.
She practised not searching for Carter in every room. Getting through classes they had together without once looking his way. Not looking up until he’d walked out the door.
It helped that Carter had taken to sitting across the dining hall with Jules and her friends. But everybody still walked on eggshells around the two of them, trying not pick sides, though loyalties were inevitably divided.