I really should make a trip to the store, but I’m so behind with my work. Perhaps later. I’m desperate to see her, but I don’t want to upset her. The look she gave me on Christmas Eve only added to my pain. I can’t tell her the truth or how I feel. This is just how it is now and the sooner I get over her, the better.
38
VIOLET
“Lets order shots,” Yaz says.
“Hell yes.” It seems so long since I actually enjoyed myself. Tonight I’m going to forget everything and just do what every other nineteen-year-old does on their birthday. Have fun. “We’re not just celebrating my birthday tonight.”
“So, what else are we celebrating?” Yaz shouts over the music at the Black Crow.
“No Kane, No Jesse, No Jack, just us girls on a night out.”
“Speaking of Jesse.” She points over the bar that opens up into another room. Jesse lifts his pint with a smirk. Fucker. I knew I shouldn’t have asked him for a lift. First Kane, now him. Ugh.
I tip back my shot of vodka. My throat burns. I order another round as I breathe fire from my mouth.
Yaz giggles. She swipes the black hair from her face, revealing sparkly eyes, the alcohol melting away her moody scowl.
Marie stands on the other side of the bar, hanging from Jack’s arms, giving us the dead-eye.
Yaz passes me another shot, nodding to the other side of the bar. “What’s her problem?”
“We had a fight. She thought I was after Jack.”
“Like you’d date one of the blockhead brothers. They’re not even your type. Are they?” She furrows her brow as I cringe inwardly.
She’s right, I usually go for more grunge than what they offer, but she doesn’t need to know my current flavour is older, tattooed ex convicts. Why can’t I get him out of my head?
“Let’s go in the back.” She picks up a tray of drinks and weaves through the tables.
I follow Yaz into the back room with the pool table. The guys from the band are there before their next set starts.
“Hey Letty’s here,” Toby shouts.
I smile and lean against the wall with Yaz and watch the guys play pool. The night is turning out pretty decent. At least I’m with friends. Yaz and her group are my kind of people. Not a bunch of pick-me’s like Marie and Lucy’s crew.
“Kane’s here,” Yaz says.
I snap my head to the side, glancing out the window. Kane gets out of Shane’s Red Mitsubishi and both men walk to the back door. I dash into the bar and duck under a table.
Toby bends. “What are you doing?”
“I…er…I don’t want him to see me. It will be awkward.”
Yaz crouches down alongside me. “But you’re not living with him now. He won’t drag you home again, will he?”
With my intoxicated state of mind and weakened heart, I almost want him to drag me into his car, drive me home, and lock me up in that old farmhouse. I’d quite happily be his prisoner. I shake my head. No. No. No. Perhaps there’s a reason I haven’t seen him since I cleaned his place. When I took food around the next day, he wasn’t home.
I should just go.
Peering over the table, I hold my breath, watching him walk into the bar with Shane as if they own the place; their usual swagger. Kane leans on the bar, no doubt ordering his usual pint of bitter.
“Oh fuck. Jack is giving him the stink eye from the other room, through the bar,” Yaz says.
“Great.” I sit on the floor. “That’s all I need.”
Kane bristles, straightening his back and standing tall. Shane passes him a drink and they move towards the back room, all the while he’s staring through the bar as if looking for someone. Me?
