“Easy there, pretty boy,” Maxwell drawls.
“Shut up. Go away.” He laughs at me and bends down under my desk to pick up the broken pencil piece, but when he comes back uphe grazes his hand over my thigh. I clench my teeth and keep in the noise trying to squirm its way out.
Saved by the bell, Professor Adams announces that class is over. I shove my belongings into my bag and book it out the room, leaving the undrunk coffee and uneaten pastry.
The kid I am trying to tutor is hopeless. Every question I ask, he gets wrong. I’m starting to believe he’s doing it on purpose. I don’t know how he is going to pass his finals. We are sitting in Becky’s, and I'm drinking a coffee seeing as I didn’t have the one Maxwell gave me. I didn't drink it more out of spite than not wanting it.
We are sitting in the opposite corner than where Maxwell and I would sit. I’ve been here a handful of times in the week and I avoid that corner like it’s the plague. I hate that he’s ruined such mundane things for me. The bell over the door chimes and, lo and behold, in walks Maxwell. He scans around the room and finds me quickly, but his calm, resting face turns to anger the second he sees the guy sitting in front of me.
“Uh oh,” I say.
“What?” The guy says.
Maxwell rushes through the tables and comes up to us.
“Leave,” is all he says.
“We are studying,” I inform him.
“No more. Leave.”
“Don’t go anywhere, Riley. You’re fine,” I say to him. “Just excuse me for a moment, would you?”
“Uh, yeah. Sure.”
I get up and drag Maxwell down the hall behind the table I'm at and slip into the bathroom. I know that I'm going to regret this.
“Who do you think you are?”
“Running round leaving scars..” He sings.
“Are you quoting Jar of Hearts to me right now?”
“Maybe.”
“Seriously, though. What the hell, Maxwell?”
“That’s my spot,” he says, agitated.
“You don’t have a spot.”
“My spot is wherever you are.”
“Stop! Whatever we were is over. Don’t you understand that?”
“No,” he shrugs.
I sign, leaning my back against the wall and looking at him. I’m tired. So completely exhausted. I'm over running. I’m over pushing him away. I’m over it all, but I refuse to cave.
He steps in front of me, closing the space between us. Our chests are just a hair apart, his forehead begging to lean against mine. He is so close I can feel his breath fanning over my skin. Maxwell’s hand runs up my arm, over my shoulder, and he grips the side of my face.
“Do you still like me?” He whispers. He’s so close that it sounds like he’s screaming into my ear. Of fucking course I do. More than anything. Maxwell is the only thing that has been on my mind the last seven days. I knew that if this happened, if we were a breath away from one another, I'd say fuck my feelings because Ican'tresist him.
“Yes,” I admit.
“Then what’s the problem?” His other hand comes up, mirroring the other.
“I don’t trust you.” I shake my head.
