“We?”

“Cord played with me.”

Now I was experiencing a twinge of regret, for him. “You and Cord are close now?”He shrugged again. “Close as two guy friends can get.”

I kept frowning to myself.

“He’s not Ethan, Alex.”

I jerked my head in a nod. I knew that. No one could take Ethan’s spot, but it felt good hearing that from him.

“Okay. Here we are.” Jesse pulled onto a small road. Trees were lined on both sides and it went up a hill to a clearing with playground equipment and basketball courts. He paused the car by them. “I’m going to park on the other side of the hill. The bands should be set up in the back section so wait for me. Luke said it was a small thing, but with these guys you never know. Their drummer sometimes goes on a tweeting spree. They had three hundred show up for a private gig one time.”

I nodded and got out. As I did, I could hear music in the distance, but found a bench to wait for Jesse. It wasn’t long until I heard giggling.

I knew those giggles.

Sick dread speared me and I turned around.

Marissa and Sarah Shastaine were walking towards me. When they saw me, both faltered with mixed expressions. Marissa’s eyes rounded while Sarah’s narrowed to slits. A sneer came over her and her hands shot to her hips. She lifted her chin as if to look down her nose at me, which is exactly what she was always the best at doing. “What are you doing here?”

Marissa sent her a quick glare before she moved towards me. “Hi. I left a note for brunch. You didn’t get it?”

Sarah followed her until both stood closer to me. She snorted, “Yeah, right. Why do you even care, Marissa? This one’s a freak now. She became a freak last summer and she’s always going to stay a freak.”

Jesse’s ex-girlfriend had never been my fan, but I wasn’t used to the venom that she sent my way now. “You’re drunk.”

Her hands flew up and flattened together in a praying motion. She lifted her arms to the sky before she nearly fell over, but she blasted out, “Hallelujah. The girl is not dumb. Besides,” an extra sheen of hostility came to her, “like you can sit there and judge me. You were wasted last night. You couldn’t even stand. And great friends, by the way. Real class act, running off after a fight and leaving you there all alone.”

I grinned at her. “I almost wish they were here because Hannah would rip into you for that.” I glanced at Marissa, who seemed annoyed at her friend. “They came back for me but couldn’t find me at the party.”

She jerked her gaze to me and put on an expressionless mask. The annoyance was gone. She even tried to smile nicely at me. “I know. I mean, I don’t know. But—” Sarah gasped beside her and she sent her another scathing look from the corner of her eye.

Sarah grabbed onto her arm. “That’s Jesse over there. I’m going to go say hi.”

Before Marissa could comment, she scampered down the hill and after his disappearing figure.

I glared at him. Bastard. I knew he came up, saw Sarah, and decided to avoid the entire scene.

“Uh.” Marissa chuckled to herself. “Imagine that. You show up and minutes later Jesse Hunt’s in the background.”

I turned back. She knew.

She smirked at me. “You guys are together again?”

“Were we before?”

She lifted a shoulder. “I don’t know. Yeah, I think you were. Angie hated it.”

I know. My heart sunk to my stomach. I remembered how much she hated that I was with Jesse. “She just didn’t want me hurt.”A dark look stopped any other words from spilling. Marissa shook her head. “I cannot believe that you’re defending her, after what she did to you.”

I shook my head. Nope. I wasn’t going to do this. “I’m going to go.” The tornado was back in me and it was picking up speed. I could not be here, not with her and definitely not with Jesse’s ex-girlfriend so close to prey on him.

“Okay. Stop.” She grabbed my hand. I pulled it away and started after Jesse, towards the music. “Please, stop. Alex. Come on. I really do want to talk to you.”

“Why?” I rounded on her, a strangled note in my voice.

She braked and her eyebrows shot up. From my intensity, she fell back, then her eyebrows bunched together and a determined look came over. Her shoulders squared back and her chin steadied itself before she nodded. “Okay. I get it. I messed up as a friend. I ditched you—”

“Twice.”

Silence fell between us like a heavy blanket. It was suffocating and sweltering. I wanted to fold underneath it and disappear into the ground. I forced myself to keep calm. My insides were twisting and turning, but I drew in a deep breath and hoped it would calm the chaos down.

“Okay.” Her voice had dropped to a soft whisper. “And I’m sorry for both of those times.”

I shook my head. This wasn’t even right. Marissa had dumped our friendship, but she hadn’t been the one who ran like I had grown horns. That’d been Angie. A tremor went through me as I remembered that last day. They had come to say goodbye. Justin had always been there, alongside his girlfriend, but he had stayed in his truck that day. He couldn’t even muster a goodbye in person. Angie hadn’t taken two steps inside my house. She seemed ready to crap her pants at an invitation from me.

Their goodbyes had lasted five minutes. Five minutes from the two that I had considered as close to my family as I could get.

“Stop, Marissa.”

I wasn’t going to hang my head in shame. I had done nothing wrong, but I knew she was getting ready to unburden her soul and that wasn’t right. Marissa had just gone away. That was all she had done. She’d been my best friend. She dumped me when she fought with Angie, and then she apologized at a party towards the end of the school year. That’d been it. Nothing more from the second person I considered a best friend all my life.

“What is it?”

“Just stop. You don’t have to do this.”

“Do what?”

“Apologize. That’s what you’re doing, isn’t it?” A bitter taste was in my mouth and I couldn’t get rid of it.

Her lips clamped shut and she gazed at me. Her eyes were wide and they barely blinked. I felt her studying me, slipping inside how Jesse did at times. It was an uncomfortable feeling and one I wanted to shed, like a second skin. I wanted it off me.