Though she still didn’t expect the shake of her head to happen. Just one little accidental shake of her head and that was it. Harrison moved on to his next victim, leaving her in something she once had a nightmare about in ninth grade. Working with Tate. On a semester-long project.
Aboutsexincinema.
“Don’t worry, we can fix this. Just go to his office and talk to him privately about it. He would have to be Satan himself to not understand,” she heard Lydia whisper.
But the words seemed even further away than her name had when Harrison read it out.
“Right. Right. Yeah. You’re right.”
“I can come with you if you want.”
“No, that’s okay. That’s fine.”
“Are you sure? You look like you’ve been punched. In the face. With a small nuclear blast.”
“I’m sure,” she said, but soon came to regret that firmness in her voice. The steady nod that told Lydia it was okay for her to go in a different direction once they were outside. It only meant that she was on her own when she got to the tiny hallway outside Harrison’s door.
And saw that Tate was already waiting.
Of course he was—he probably had the same concerns as her. No matter how sorry he was or what he thought of being in the red and being wrong, he would never want to work in close quarters with her for the entire semester. In fact, him being sorry likely made the situation seem worse to him. Most likely he had calculated all the awkward conversations they would have to have and how far apart they would have to stand to keep her comfortable, and found it as unbearable as she did.
Even though his expression seemed to say something else.
Oh god. His expression was saying something else.
Then he held up his hands, as though to calm her.
And she knew.
“All right, Letty, I know that you’re probably thinking it’s way better if you do this project with that gal pal of yours, but wait, okay? I got reasons why this is gonna be fine.”
“Is that seriously why you’re here? Tostopme asking Harrison to switch us?”
“Well…no. Not stop you exactly. Stop is a really strong word.”
“While I’m glad you’ve learned that—” she said, her voice briefly catching when she saw his wince.He winced,her mind hissed, before she forced herself to finish. “I still think it covers what’s happening here.”
“I just wanted to talk to you about it for a second. Just, like, hear me out.”
“I want to. I really do. But come on. You know I wasn’t born yesterday. This has all the hallmarks of some kind of trap or prank or joke at my expense.”
“How could itpossiblybe a trap or prank? He put people together based on…I don’t even know what he put people together based on. But it couldn’t have had anything to do with me.”
She searched his face, looking for the lie. Waiting for him to show some hint of bullshit, beneath those too-kind eyes and his spread hands and the obvious logic of what he was saying.
Only there was nothing, nothing, nothing.
And it made no difference at all.
“Okay, I buy that. I do. Yet the fact still remains: I cannot do a project with you. Ever. You have to know that doing anything like that is completely impossible for me. Right?”
“I was just thinking that maybe…maybe you could give it a chance. You know, now that we’re on speaking terms and everything is almost cool between us.”
“You think everything is cool between us?”
“Well, maybe not cool exactly. More like…okay.”
“Still need to dial it back a notch, chief.”
