Because of you (5 page)

“
So… You’re Addison’s roommate, huh?” He takes a step closer, cutting off my oxygen supply to my already confused brain. I nod silently. “Huh,” he snorts, putting his hand behind his neck, where it remains frozen for a few seconds.

“
What is that supposed to mean?” I ask, baffled.

“
Nothing, I’m just wondering about your intentions, why you’re hanging out with her. Are you also one of those girls who are just using Addison’s friendship to get to our money?” I gape incredulously at his accusation. What the hell is he talking about? I have no idea what he’s asking me. “What’s wrong, cat got your tongue?” He gets even closer, making me hit the counter with my back, and I put my hands on his chest.

“
Jackson, what are you asking me? What are you talking about? What money?” I stare into his eyes, still flabbergasted.

“
Jackson? What makes you think I’m Jackson?” He throws his head back in laughter. His reaction makes me frown.

“
What do you mean, what makes me think? Addison said she’s dating Jackson… I saw you two kissing, and she sat on your lap back there. What, you’re not Jackson?” Shit, I hope I didn’t mess up anything.

“
I’m definitely not Jackson. I’m Ryder, Addison’s brother. She told you about me.” I stare at him and put my hand over my gaping mouth.

“
Oh, I’m sorry—I just assumed…” He abruptly interrupts me.

“
Yeah, that’s what’s wrong with you girls, always jumping to conclusions instead of asking.” I am shaking my head violently, when I hear Noah’s voice from behind Ryder.

“
Hey, is everything okay here?” I distance myself from Ryder, coming closer to Noah, who protectively puts his hand on my hip and looks from me to Ryder. “What is going on here?” he asks us. I shrug.

“
It was just a misunderstanding, we’ve already cleared things up.” I turn to Ryder, who only nods, takes a beer from the fridge and leaves the kitchen. I finally let out a breath I was holding the whole time.

“
What was that?” Noah keeps insisting.

“
I don’t even know myself. Evidently, he doesn’t like me. He was acting strange. It’d probably be best if I leave, I don’t want to be the thorn in anyone’s side.”

“
What? Why? Just ignore him, he can be an ass sometimes. He’ll get over it,” he’s trying to convince me with a comforting stroke of my hand. I turn around and step away.

“
I don’t know, I’d rather leave. Can I borrow your phone to call the cab? I left mine at home.” Noah takes my wrist and takes me to the living room.

“
No. If you insist on leaving, I’ll take you.” We cross the room, everyone is already in the middle of playing cards, and they all looks up at us. Ryder is sitting in an armchair, drinking beer and looking
at us with a piercing gaze,
and Addison stands up and comes to us.

“
I’m going home,” I tell her.

“
Why? What’s wrong?” she asks, looking sideways at Noah.

“
I don’t feel well, I’d rather go home. See you tomorrow, okay? Have fun.” She hugs me.

“
Okay, if you say so. Bye.” Noah and I wave at everybody and leave.

Chapter 4

Ryder

Pretty or not, she has hidden motives. She must have found out about our money somewhere, and, like everyone else, she wants to take advantage of us. When will this stop? I take a large gulp of my beer and watch my friends play cards. Everyone is laughing and having fun, but my thoughts are with Aaliyah. Did Addison invite her or did she invite herself? I suspect it’s the latter—she’s trying to get her hands on our money one way or another. Muttering out loud, I run my hand through my hair.

“What’s wrong with you tonight, Ryder?” Addison turns to me and starts interrogating me. “Why are you so sullen?”

“
Who invited Aaliyah to come here? Did she invite herself?” I ask her angrily.

“
Huh? … Why do you want to know? Does it matter who invited her?” I give her a shake of my head.

“
Answer my question!” I demand harshly.

“
No, it wasn’t me. Well…”

“
I invited her, is there a problem?” Noah says as he slams the door shut. We all turn to him. “I invited Aaliyah. Why? Does anybody have something against her?” he repeats. I draw closer to him. We’re facing each other, hardly any space between us. I glare at him, then, shaking my head, I turn around and leave for my room.

“
What’s wrong with him today?” I hear right before I close the door. I turn on the radio and pump up the volume to the max. 
Imagine Dragons’ Radioactive
is currently playing. I throw myself on the bed and ponder about Aaliyah and her motives.

“Yo, man, get up, we have classes.” I am awoken by loud knocking and Marc’s voice that is still
echoing
through the door. “Come on, grab a quick shower, we’re in a hurry.”

“
Yeah, yeah, I’m coming,” I respond as I sleepily roll out of bed. I put my legs on the floor, my elbows resting on my knees, and rub my hands over my face.

I step out of the shower, quickly shave and dress, and I’m ready to leave. I grab my bag and phone when I hear Marc urging me to hurry up. “I’m all set, why are you so nervous,” I say lazily as I run through the door to the car.

Ten minutes on the road
,
we still have a ten-minute drive ahead of us.

“
What was with you yesterday? Why were you so rude to Aaliyah the whole evening? She
didn’t want to cause any trouble. As I could see, she more or less avoided you.”

“
Fuck, now you’re riding me about this, too?  I have my reasons, let’s just leave it at that.” My lips form a straight line.

“
Okay, I’ll butt out, but still—you were very rude. She’s a nice girl.”

Aaliyah

Addison and I have just arrived at the university, and she rushes to the lockers in the hallway where she’s meeting Jackson. I slowly approach them. They have just stopped kissing as I come closer. I still cannot believe I thought Ryder was Jackson.

“
I apologize for yesterday—I wasn’t feeling well, so I went home.” I reach out my hands to finally officially meet him. His eyes are an interesting shade of green and he has longish brown hair.

“
Don’t sweat it, I’m glad to finally meet you. I’m Jackson, Addison told me a lot about you.” A lot, huh—I wonder what she said, since Addison and I met just recently.

Three hours of classes pass quickly, and we’re all meeting in the cafeteria that’s
a
part of the university. Everybody is already there. Addison and Jackson, the twins, Marc, Noah, Ryder. Noah stands up when he sees me, smiles and brings an extra chair, so I can sit with them. They’re chatting enthusiastically, only Ryder is still throwing daggers at me with his glare. I couldn’t care less, I didn’t do anything to him, but he can be rude if he wants.

“
I’m glad you joined us, how are your classes?” Noah instantly asks.

“
Well, at least someone is happy to see me,” I say and point my head in Ryder’s direction, so he knows what I’m talking about.

“
Oh, don’t mind him, something’s eating him. He’ll come around eventually.” I nod and continue.

“
At the moment, my classes are fine, nothing special. It’s only the beginning of the semester—we’ll see how my exams will go.” I bite into the sandwich I bought before coming over.

“
Hey, Aaliyah,” Addison yells from the other side of the table, and I raise my gaze to her. “Are you coming with us to Mirage on Friday?”

“
No, I can’t, I’m working. But I’ll come over to check up on you guys in between, if I have time.” Addison pouts her lips.

“
That’s a shame. When you’re free, you have to tell me, so we can all go out together, okay?” I nod.

“
Hey, do you happen to know who’s performing in Mirage on Friday? I hope it’s someone good.”

“
I’m not sure, but I think I heard Patrick say some female band is coming, Prestige or something like that.” It’s a new band on the scene, slowly becoming
famous.

“
So no cute guys
singing
, noooo,” Addison acts upset.

“
Hey, what about me—you can look at me all you want,” Jackson responds playfully.

“
But that’s not the same,” she winks at him before they start making out passionately. I turn my head the other way and listen to the conversation between Ryder, Noah and their friends. They’re discussing practice they have in the afternoon. I like how passionately they are talking about basketball, I can see in their eyes how much they love this sport. I recognize that look—I had the same look in my eyes when Hope and I sang together. I desperately miss the times we spent together and filmed ourselves fooling around in front of the camera. Unfortunately, my camera is in the closet, broken, and will remain that way as I don’t have the money to get it fixed yet.

“
Hey,” Noah nudges me with an elbow, interrupting my thoughts, “do you want me to pick you up on the way to work so you won’t have to walk?” I offer him an honest smile.

“
That would be great, thank you.” But my smile quickly fades away when I see Ryder piercing me with a glare. Seriously, what is wrong with him? I shake my head and leave the cafeteria, because I still have two long classes to attend.

The next day, Addison and I decide to go spend some money at the shopping mall after classes. Well, she’s going to spend money, and I’m just coming with her to help her choose what to buy. She asked me to help her pick some sexy lingerie and clothes for her date with Jackson. I’m not completely sure I’m the right person for this job, but she begged and begged, so I couldn’t refuse. We drive up to the parking lot and enter the shopping mall. I look around, there are stores and people everywhere. Addison grabs my hand and takes me to the first store that sells lingerie. We check out a few shelves and stop at corsets.

“
Wow,” I don’t hide my excitement as I hold a sexy black lace corset in my hands.

“
Isn’t it beautiful?” she asks.

“
It’s gorgeous,” I look at the price tag and cough, the price almost knocking me flat on my ass, “expensive, too,” I groan and put it back down.

“
It’s not that pricey, you should try it on! I bet it would look great on you.”

“
No, seriously, it’s too expensive—who pays 200 dollars for a corset?” Addison shrugs and gets the saleslady.

“
Do you have this in 34B?” She turns to me. “You’re a 34B, right?” My eyes almost pop out, and I snatch the corset out of her hands.

“
Seriously, I said I won’t take it. I don’t have that kind of money.”

“
Relax, it’s my treat. And please,” she says to the saleslady, “could you also find one in 34A for me?”

“
No, thank you, buy it for yourself, I don’t need one.” I turn around and start browsing around the store when I hear Addison calling me from the changing room.

“
What do you think?” she asks as she draws back the curtain and confidently steps out, ignoring the couple that’s also in the store.

“
Wow, awesome! You look fantastic,” I compliment her. She really looks amazing in it.

“
Do you think I should buy it?” she asks, biting her lip, waiting for my response.

“
Sure, if you want it, buy it—it’s really pretty.” She also finds
a
matching black thong and black stockings. While she’s paying, I step out of the store, because my head is spinning from such high prices for tiny pieces of material. We walk up to the designer stores, where prices are
also
appropriately steep.

“
What exactly are you looking for?” I ask Addison as we’re walking past the evening wear section of the store.

“
Hmm, Jackson is taking me to dinner at Pierre’s, so I have to wear an evening dress.” I run my fingers through beautiful dresses. Some have crystals on them, some are sprinkled with glitters and others have exquisite details, but every single one is gorgeous.

“
Don’t you have enough evening dresses hanging in your closet? I saw a whole bunch of them in there the other day.”

“
Those old rags?” Addison waves her hand. “No, no, I need something new, sexy, so I
will
take Jackson’s breath away when he sees me.” I shake my head. I guess when you have money, this is normal. Addison steps out of the changing room, dressed in a long purple evening dress.