Bad Rep (51 page)

“You made me feel like the slut everyone else has accused me of being.  You came here and immediately assumed I was fucking Eli.  You didn't ask me what was going on.  Your mind went straight to that conclusion.”  Jordan's eyes cleared a bit and he looked contrite. 

“Maysie...” He breathed out but I wouldn't let him finish his thought. 

“This thing we have is ridiculous.  Why in the world did we think we could start a relationship built on lies?  Trust, which is so fundamental, is something we never had a chance to really build with each other.  And I think it might be too late.”

The anger left Jordan's face entirely.  I watched as two tears slid down his face.  Oh god, I didn't know if I could handle Jordan crying.  His hands were clenched at his side, as though he were fighting with himself to not touch me. 

“You're right, baby.  We began out of something ugly.  But what we became was something beautiful.  I just wish I could make you see that.” His voice broke and he took a deep breath.  My throat closed up and I had to rein in my own tears otherwise I'd be sobbing like a child. 

“But you only want to see the ugly, Maysie.  And I can't change that.  I wish just for once you would care more about what
you
think than what
everyone
else thinks.  Why does the opinion of every other jackass on campus matter more than how you and I feel?”  He reached up and wiped away his tears with the heel of his palm.  Then he scrubbed his hand over his face.  “This was a mistake.  I've got to get out of here.” He stumbled backwards and wrenched open the bathroom door. 

I followed him out of the bathroom.  “Wait, Jordan. Please,” I begged, hurrying after him.  Jordan came up short and turned to face me again. 

“No, Maysie.  You were right.  We can't save this.  This is broken and it can't be fixed.  We've spent way too much time making each other feel like shit.  This has to end now,” he said sadly. 

I saw Riley get up off of her knees, where she had been scrubbing the blood from the carpet.  Damn it, the tears were streaming down my face now.  “I'm so sorry, Jordan. I never meant to hurt you.  I...”I trailed off, not sure what else I could say.  Because this had become something so messed up that I didn't know what I could do to change it.

Jordan's face crumpled and he reached for me, crushing me against his chest and burying his face in my neck.  “My god, Maysie.  I just wish I didn't love you damn much,” he cried brokenly, his face pressed against my skin.   I had brought him to this.  How could I have done this to someone I love?  Here he was despairing over the fact that he loved me.  That his love was in fact destroying him.  My insecurities, my fears, were getting in the way of something wonderful.  I hated myself for it. 

He should have stayed with Olivia.  He would have been better off. 

Then he pulled himself backwards, almost violently, and stumbled away from me.  “Goodbye, Maysie,” he said softly, his eyes clinging to my face.  Then he turned to Riley.  “I'm sorry about the mess,” he said.  Riley waved off his comment, clearly uncomfortable with what she had just witnessed.

And then he turned and walked out the door and out of my life.  For good this time.  Because I knew without a doubt that Jordan Levitt was done.  There would be no begging or pleading for me to come back to him.  What we had was over.

I stood there, stock still, unable to move.  “You stupid, stupid, idiot,” Riley muttered before resuming her task.  I had nothing to say.  So I ran back down the hall to my bedroom and slammed the door.  Throwing myself on my bed, I burrowed under the covers, never wanting to get up again.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Picking yourself up after hitting rock bottom is a daunting task.  One that I wasn't entirely sure I was capable of.  After my relationship with Jordan tanked so miserably, I was stuck in this strange holding pattern.  Caught in the vicious cycle of avoidance and denial, I tried to sleep my life away, refusing to get up for class and only rarely to eat.

After two weeks of this, Gracie, Vivian and Riley held an intervention.  They each informed me that if I didn't snap out of it, they would personally call my parents and send me home with a one way bus ticket. 

That had done it.  I may have been clinically depressed but hell if I'd be depressed at home.  Heck, I'd probably off myself just to get out of seeing my parent's wonderful disapproval.  So I sucked it up for my friends' sake and slowly rejoined the land of the living.

It was rough.  It took time.  But gradually I started reintegrating myself back into society.  It was early November already.  School would be breaking for Thanksgiving soon and then after that our month long winter holiday.  I was planning to go home with Riley for Thanksgiving, not that my parents seemed to be bothered that I wouldn't be heading to South Carolina for the holidays. 

I started to find things to look forward to again.  I got my act together and started working my tail off in my classes.  I think I spent more time in the library than anywhere else for the next few weeks.  I stopped hiding out in my apartment.  I stopped hiding all together. 

Sure, the looks hadn't stopped.  I still heard the whispers but I was working really hard on not letting them drive me any more insane than they already had.  Living in a fish bowl was uncomfortable but that was the price you pay for notoriety. 

The Chi Delta girls continued to treat me as though I had the plague.  And I knew for a fact that they were the biggest culprits in keeping the rumors circulating.  I would have thought that after being disgracefully kicked out of my sorority and ending things with the resident heartthrob himself, it would have cooled things a bit.  But Olivia and Milla still threw daggers whenever they could.

Trying to be the bigger person was quickly getting on my nerves.  Whiny, pathetic Maysie had to take a hike.  Because bad ass, low bullshit tolerance, Maysie was back in force.  It sucked that it took losing Jordan for me to realize that life was too short to worry so much about what everyone else thought.  That what
I
thought was what truly mattered.  But it was a lesson better learned now than not at all.

So I was taking my life back.  One nasty look at a time. 

Up first, the pretentious duo in my Shakespeare and Chaucer class, aka Cyndy and Aimee.  We continued to have to work in our assigned groups for class assignments and they still treated me like I was something they scrapped off the bottom of their shoes.  Their looks of disgust and pointed glares, while before would have made me want to curl into a ball, now just pissed me off. 

Charlie had at least stopped his outright leering.  But it did little to alleviate the awkwardness within the group.  One afternoon we were working on a group essay that had to be completed by the end of class.  I was writing down ideas the others were tossing around when Cyndy clicked her tongue in annoyance. 

I looked up and raised my eyebrows.  “Yes?” I asked less than patiently.  Cyndy slid a look to Aimee who smirked. 

“I didn't say anything about using the theme of time and seasons in the Knight's Tale.  I think that's a little obvious for this class.  You know, something you'd find in SparksNotes or something.”  Aimee snickered at Cyndy's dig. 

Charlie looked uncomfortable but didn't say anything.  I gritted my teeth and held out my pen.  “Would you prefer to write this stuff down?  I mean since your ideas are so superior to mine,” I said with sarcastic politeness.

Cyndy widened her eyes in mock surprise.  “I'm not trying to be rude or anything, Maysie.  I mean, I know that's probably the best you can come up with.  But some of us take this class seriously and would like a passing grade.”  She gave me a patronizing smile. 

I slowly put the pen down on my desk and folded my hands over the paper.  I leveled both Cyndy and Aimee with a hard look.  “Okay.  It's no big mystery that you don't like me,” I began. 

Cyndy peered down her nose at me.  “Yeah, no mystery there,” she said condescendingly. 

I cleared my throat.  “Okay, let me try this again.  I really don't give a fuck what you think about me.  Sorry that I actually have a life that involves a bit more than sitting on my couch, eating ice cream and watching PBS while pontificating to my only friend about how morally superior I think I am.  See, some of us live our lives and enjoy them.  If you spent as much time actually getting to know people instead of judging them, you'd find that you're no better than anyone else.  So you tell me why in the hell would I waste one second of my time worrying if two sad and lonely bitches liked me?  And, let me make myself crystal clear.  If you have nothing more to offer this group than your bad attitudes, then you can do Charlie and I a favor and keep your mouths shut.  Because some of us would like to do our work and spend less time listening to your condescending bullshit.” I gave them both a bright smile before turning to Charlie, who sat there with his mouth hanging open. 

“What are your thoughts on the themes of season and time in the Knight's Tale?” I asked him batting my eyelashes.  Charlie coughed and looked over at our fellow group members who seemed taken aback.  I had to suppress the urge to laugh.  But that would ruin the moment, so I pretended they weren't even there.

Charlie and I opened our books to the Canterbury Tales and started going through the text as I wrote down our ideas.  And after a few minutes, Cyndy and Aimee joined in.  They were still cool but their scathing comments were noticeably absent.  We were able to finish up the essay in record time and when we were done Aimee tapped her pencil on my desk.

I looked up at her and she gave me a small smile. “Good job,” she told me.  It was on the tip of my tongue to reply with some sort of sarcastic comment, but I figured that would completely undo our tentative truce. 

So I had smiled back and said “thanks.” 

After that, there were no more hateful comments during the Shakespeare/Chaucer class and I felt I had won a small victory.  I started walking with my head just a little bit higher.  Sure it did nothing to erase the gaping hole in my chest, but I stopped feeling like such a victim.  Taking a proactive stance in my life was long overdue.

“Check out the grin on your face!  What's the occasion?” Vivian asked as we sat down for lunch one day in the commons.

“Nothin'.  Just feeling kinda good,”  I replied, sliding into my seat and opening my bottle of juice. 

“Well that's a nice change,” Gracie said, stirring ranch dressing into her salad.

“You know, there's really no point in eating a salad if you're going to dump 2,000 calories on top of it,” I told her dryly. 

Gracie took a huge mouth full and daintily dabbed her mouth.  “Mmm.  Delish,” she said after swallowing.  I rolled my eyes and returned to my lunch. 

“So how are things at Chi Delta?” I asked, trying to ignore the accompanying knot in my stomach. 

Vivian looked at me pointedly.  “Do you really care?” she asked. 

I laughed.  “Not really, but thought I'd ask.”  I took a bite of my hamburger, ketchup oozing out of the sides, just the way I liked it.  Gracie swirled her salad around in the bowl. 

“Do you miss it at all?” she asked me quietly.

I took in a sharp breath.  Did I miss it?  Of course I did.  I missed feeling like I was a part of something.  I loved the community and the sisterhood.  I missed having the belief that there were forty-five other girls who would have my back.  Even if that had turned out to be a lie, I missed the illusion of it. 

But I sure as hell didn't miss the cattiness and the back stabbing.  And the hatred disguised as friendship.  When I thought about it like that, the negatives far outweighed the positives.   “Can't say that I do, ladies,” I answered truthfully.  Gracie sighed. 

“Yeah, I figured you'd say that.  You know, I'm thinking about withdrawing,” she said, shocking the hell out of me.  Gracie was Miss Sorority.  She loved it.  I couldn't imagine her
not
being in Chi Delta.  It had come to define so much of who she was, that I worried about her should she no longer have it. 

“Why would you do that?” I asked in confusion.  Vivian made a noise.

“Oh please.  Since you were kicked out, Gracie and I have become Chi Delta's Most Wanted.  Sure, they're still nice to our faces, but Milla has made it a point to make us feel very unwelcome.”  I hated this for them and it stirred up all those guilty feelings.