Just hearing her reveal the diagnosis makes me want to take her in my arms and protect her from the pain she’s obviously feeling right now.
“Does Trey know?”
She holds her head up high. “No. And I don’t want you to tell him. Promise me you won’t tell him,” she pleads in an unsteady voice.
“Why?”
“Because I have it under control most of the time, and I don’t want people to treat me like I’m some invalid. Especially Trey. Ugh, I can’t believe I told you.” She looks at my hand holding her wrist with those bright green eyes. “If you treat me differently, I swear I’ll never talk to you again.”
“You went on a roller coaster,” I say. “That probably wasn’t a good idea.”
“I know. I’m stupid.” She shakes her head and puts her hand over mine. It’s an intimate gesture that makes my heart pound even faster. “Listen, Vic, I don’t want to take it easy, so I push my body to the limit. It’s a mind-over-matter thing. I’ve got to beat this. I’m gonna beat this.”
“Beat what?” comes a familiar voice from the hallway.
I turn around to see my ex standing in my doorway with a cocked brow as she catches me sitting on my bed holding onto Monika Fox’s wrist. Her hand is still over mine.
Oh, hell.
I snatch my hand back.
“Hi, Vic,” Cassidy says with a little tilt of her head. She used to tilt her head when she was trying to confront me with something I did wrong. To her, I was always doing something wrong.
Monika takes two steps away from me, obviously noting how guilty we must look. “Hey, Cassidy.”
“Hey,” I say, trying to come off as if nothing is wrong. “What are you doin’ here?”
“Dani called me and asked if I’d take her to the mall for a homecoming dress.” Her eyes narrow the slightest bit. “I thought I’d come up and say hi before I drive her. I obviously didn’t know you had company.”
“I was just leaving,” Monika says, grabbing her purse off the chair by my window. “I’ll talk to you later,” she tells me before saying bye to Cassidy and slipping out of the room.
Cassidy’s gaze follows Monika until she’s out of sight. “What was that all about? Are you fucking your best friend’s girlfriend?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I saw you two holding hands.”
Rolling my eyes, I stand. “We weren’t holdin’ hands, Cass. I grabbed her arm as an experiment we were workin’ on for sociology,” I lie, knowing that if she knew the truth I’d have a lot of explaining to do.
I’m in trouble here, because Cassidy doesn’t know how to keep her mouth shut. If she thinks I’ve been screwing around with Monika, everyone in school will know it.
Hell, she’ll probably post it on the Internet.
Cassidy, who used to falsely accuse me of cheating on her and nagged me constantly that I wasn’t being a good enough boyfriend, takes a deep breath and says, “Okay, here goes. I still think about you every day, Vic.”
“Cass—” I start to say, but she holds up a hand, cutting me off.
“I’m still in love with you.” She puts her head down. I can tell she’s about to get emotional.
“What? I know you talk shit about me,” I tell her. “You think I don’t know what you say behind my back? Fremont’s a small town.”
“I trash you because I miss you,” she says, as if that’s a completely sane explanation. She looks up at me now, and I can see the tears welling in her eyes. “I miss us. If you dated anyone else it would devastate me. You don’t even look at me anymore. When I walked in here and saw you and Monika together, I got so jealous I seriously felt sick.”
“There’s no reason to be jealous.”
“Can we try one more time, Vic?” she says, walking over to me like she’s a predator. When she’s close, she runs her hands slowly on my chest and moves lower. “I swear I can be the girlfriend you want me to be.”
I take her hand off me. “I can’t be the boyfriend you want me to be, Cassidy.”
“Why? Is there someone else?”
“No,” I lie, still feeling a connection to the girl who just left my room. “I’ll never live up to your standards.”
“I promise I’ve changed. I don’t even have a date to homecoming because everyone knows I want to go with you.”
“So basically you’re blamin’ me for not having a homecoming date?”
“Exactly.” She sighs.
Damn.
I’m gonna hate myself for saying this, but I don’t want her to be without a homecoming date. “If you really want to go to homecoming, I’ll take you.”
Her face perks up. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. But this doesn’t mean we’re datin’. It just means we’re goin’ to homecoming together.”
“Okay.” She wraps her arms around my shoulders. “You’ve made me the happiest girl, Vic! Now I can shop for dresses with your sister!”
At least someone is happy around here.
Chapter Sixteen
MONIKA
On Wednesday after school, Ashtyn, Bree, and I make plans to go shopping for homecoming dresses.
Bree makes a beeline for the back of the store where the dresses are. “I want a black leather one,” she blurts out loudly.