Stella cleared her throat, dragging Sawyer’s and my eyes towards her high cheekbones. She was a pretty girl, although I liked her much better with clothes on. “That wasn’t very nice of you two.”
“She is the opposite of nice,” Sawyer grumbled.
“She is just having a hard time coming to terms with seeing Sebastian with someone else,” Stella retorted, her eyes begging for—and not receiving—any more of Sawyer’s attention.
“When you have a hard time with something, it usually helps to talk to your friends or a shrink,” he shot back without looking at her.
Stella rolled her eyes, then left as quickly as she came.
“Those two are friends, I take it?” I asked when she was gone.
Sawyer nodded as he reached across the table for a ripe, yellow pear. “Yup. Both mega bitches, too. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Samara and Stella were twins instead of Samara and Azain.”
I slumped back into my seat, breathing deeply to try and calm myself. I knew what she said was just to get a rise out of me, but her words hurt all the same. “What were Sebastian's other exes like?” I asked, immediately regretting it. I didn’t really want to know. It didn’t matter. Not really.
Sawyer turned in his seat to face me. He pointed a finger at me, his green eyes stuck in a sternly serious manner. “Don’t do that. Don’t sit here and try to compare yourself. What you said was true—Sebastian cares about what's on the inside, but Maeve…he thinks you are the most beautiful being to ever stepfoot on this planet.” He laid a hand on my shoulder. “And he is right. Please don’t ever forget that.”
The corner of my lip curved up. “Thanks, Sawyer.”
He nodded, then cleared his throat as his arm slid off of me. “Are you ready to train?”
I groaned, burying my face into my hands. “Not really, but I need to. I haven’t tried wielding in a while.” Specifically the cosmos. I tended to refrain from using them as much as possible due to my lack of complete control, but something told me that wouldn’t fly for much longer.
“Yeah. We’re gonna need you to save our asses if all hell breaks loose.” Sawyer jumped to his feet, taking a bite of his fruit and marching towards the exit.
After swiping an apple from the fruit bowl I hurried after him. “So.”
He didn’t turn around. “So what?”
“You know,” I inferred, dragging out the words.
Keeping his strides long, he turned his head just enough for me to see his raised eyebrow. “Idon’tknow.”
I dropped my arms to my sides. “Stella?”
“Oh.” His face tensed when he looked over his shoulder at me. “What about her? I already told you it was a one-time thing.”
I took another bite of my fruit.Where exactly was I going with this?“I know. I’m just kind of surprised…I guess.”
“Why?” His shoulders scrunched. “You shouldn’t be. Usually when someone turns you down, you move on. Did you want me pining over you forever?”
“No. I just…” I shouldn’t have started this discussion, but alas, here I was, starting conversations I would later on regret. Something I was fairly good at. “We should probably talk about it. What you said on our way here.”
Sawyer froze in the middle of the hallway, just feet from the entrance to Mealioria’s arena. He spun to face me. “No. We probably shouldn’t.”
My foot nervously tapped against the tile beneath me as I said what I would to any friend that just had their heart broken. “Sawyer. It’s okay if you…aren’t okay.”
He tossed his head back and scoffed. “I thought me fucking someone else and calling you Maevey baby made it clear, but apparently not.” He crossed his arms over his chest and blew out a deep breath as his stare settled onto me. “I just needed to get my feelings off my chest, and I did. So we’re good. Okay? Let’s just move on from the past few weeks, please.”
The look on my face made it clear that I wasn’t convinced.
“I’m already over it. Seriously,” he claimed, though the higher pitch of his voice hinted at his attempt in deflecting.
“But—”
He held a finger up. “No buts. Now shut up and get your ass in that arena so I can kick it.” He gestured to the doorway with a wide-eyed look.
“Okay. Fine.” I stomped past him. “In that case, you know Sebastian is still pissed at you, right?” The whole situation was still stressing me out, and since we werefine, I was going to talk to my friend about it.
