He smirks. “Oh, come on. You know you love it.”
I brush past him, walking down the hallway. All eyes turn on me, making heat rise on the back of my neck. I wish they’d look away, but their curious expressions follow me all the way around the corner.
I can already hear the rumors starting.Why is Myles with Emma?
Plenty of the students at Cardale went to school with us in elementary and middle school, back when Emma and Iwere still friends. It’s no secret that something happened between us. They just don’t know what it was.
I ignore everyone.
By the time I get to the nurse’s office, I’m out of breath and my arms ache. I need to set Emma down before I drop her for a second time.
Then again, she’d deserve it after beating me up.
The nurse holds the door wide open. “What happened to Miss Adler?”
Sam follows behind me. “She fainted.”
The nurse makes a face that's a cross between annoyance and frustration. “It wouldn’t be the first time. Bring her here,” she says, leading me to a cot in the back of the room.
I set Emma down. Her head falls onto the pillow, knocking some of the hair out of her face and revealing the drool coming from her mouth.
This girl . . .
I look up at the nurse, rubbing the back of my neck. “Could I get an ice pack?”
She nods. “Yes, of course. Did you get hurt?” She’s an older lady with white hair and enough laugh lines on her face to know she’s lived a great life.
I should tell her the truth, but Emma looks a little too pathetic in her dead opossum position. Besides, if I tell the truth, I’ll have to talk to the principal and it’ll turn into a much bigger deal. Our parents might be called, and I want to keep my mom as far from here as possible. “I fell.”
“You should be more careful,” she says, shaking her finger at me.
“Yeah, you really should be more careful,” Sam echoes, smiling and pointing his finger too.
I glare at him.
Thankfully, it’s all out of view of the nurse.
She walks over to the cupboards, rummaging through every single one before opening the drawers underneath them. “I thought I had some more instant ice packs, but it looks like I’m out. Why don’t you sit down on that cot over there, and I’ll be right back.” She gives me a soft smile and gestures to the cot next to Emma’s.
“Okay, thank you,” I say, sitting. My cot is closer to Emma’s than I’d like, but there isn’t another option. The room is relatively small. It has white curtains hanging from the ceiling that I could pull between us, but I won’t be here long enough to warrant it.
“You fell?” Sam asks, leaning against the exposed brick wall on the other side of the room.
I shrug.
“You weretrampled.” His eyebrows fly up. “Attacked. Brutally beaten. You’re fortunate to be alive.”
I rub the back of my neck to stop my headache from getting any worse, but my muscles are so tight I think it’s a lost cause. I’ve been on edge all month, afraid my mom will catch on to my lie, and this is the last thing I need.
Still, death is a bit of an exaggeration. “I think that's a stretch.”
“Nah, she destroyed you. She probably would’ve”—he drags his finger across his neck and clicks his tongue—“if I hadn’t been there to save you.”
He can’t be serious. “You saved me?”
“I think that was obvious. I was so powerful I knocked her out without doing a thing,” he says, gesturing toward her like he’s throwing an invisible weapon.
“Yeah, ‘without doing a thing’ is right.”
