Trainwreck (10 page)

Chapter 17

Saturday, October 10
6:58am

To say that Asher was surprised at the fact that he actually showed up for detention early, let alone on time, was definitely an understatement. However, he had nothing planned earlier in the morning – like his friends would even consider waking up at such an unreasonable hour – and he didn't want to hang around his house with his father still awake after coming home from the graveyard shift at a liquor store out of town. Asher's father had no qualms drinking early in the morning, which meant he had no qualms with becoming enraged at something minuscule Asher would do. Asher wasn't in the mood for fighting, so he left early and arrived at school.

His warm brown eyes flicked around the empty library and he realized that today was going to be an incredibly boring day. There was only one other person in the room, and he knew she was a tweaker. He wasn't sure what her name was, but he had seen her affiliated with members of his posse on numerous times. She was sitting in the back row like him, save for the fact that she was in the left one while he took up the majority of the right. From the corner of her eyes, he studied her, wondering if she would be interesting enough to help these long nine hours along.

The girl was a junior, or so he had heard, but he suspected she was an older junior. Not that it mattered, of course. She had jet-black hair that was ironed straight, with layers adding volume to the hair. Asher wasn't an expert when it came to hair, but it was highly doubtful that the ebony locks were her natural color. Her eyes were a pretty sapphire color, but it didn't clash well with her faux tan. Her lips were thin but angled and she had a dimple in her left cheek and a cleft in her chin. She was skinny, lacking curves, but all in all, she was pretty. Her style was somewhat goth, with black, white, and red colors taking up the majority or her wardrobe, but he didn't think she would label herself. Currently, she was wore a white t-shirt with a black hemline, a black and red mini skirt that resembled a dark school girl's skirt, black and white knee socks underneath black knee-high combat boots. Her makeup was put together but dramatic.

Asher pushed his brows up but he wasn't won over by her. He sighed through his nose. Another long day it was...

At that moment, one of the most surprising things took place and he had to blink a couple of times to ensure that what he was seeing was actually happening. Sadie Brown walked into the library with a pointed frown on her face. Asher glanced back up at the clock. And she was two minutes late. Which meant Stewey was two minutes late. But none of that mattered whatsoever. What mattered was why Sadie was here in the first place.

"Well, well, well," he drawled, his lips curling up in a crooked smirk, revealing a nice set of straight, white teeth. "Well, princess, I never expected to see
you
back here, let alone two minutes late." He crossed his arms over his chest as he shook his head condescendingly. "Tsk, tsk, tsk."

Sadie glanced from Asher and then over the raven-haired girl sitting on the opposite side of the room before looking back at Asher. His chocolate eyes were on her, studying her intricately. Instead of answering, she rolled her eyes and took the same seat she had taken last time; third row on the right side in the left seat.

---

Sadie knew there was a good possibility she would be spending another nine hours with him in this room as she had last weekend, but though a part of her was ecstatic about this, she wasn't sure if she wanted to be in some room with him for such a long portion of time. Not after going through the entire week with him practically ignoring her presence.

It wasn't long before Stewey came into the room, practically decked in the same outfit he had been wearing last Saturday, save for the fact that this one was beige rather than grey. He gave the same speech he had last time, and after giving both Sadie and Asher mutually exclusive warnings, he left.

"Hey," the girl said in a voice that mirrored a whisper. Her voice was raspy due to the fact that she smoked cigarettes quite frequently. Sadie turned to regard the girl, but found the girl wasn't looking at her; she was looking at Asher. "You're Asher Boyd, aren't you?"

Asher looked like this whole conversation was paining him to have. "Who wants to know?" he asked, his eyes fixated on the ceiling above him rather than on the girl who had addressed him.

"I'm Kristen," she said in the same voice. "Kristen Boiler. I think we had a class my freshman year."


Asher shrugged, still refusing to look Kristen's way. "I wouldn't remember," he replied, his voice mumbled.

Sadie tried to ignore the exchange between the two. Instead, she leaned down and grabbed her book that she brought, hoping it would help her mind escape. Luckily, her mother wasn't too upset at the fact that Sadie had another consecutive Saturday school, despite the fact that Sadie had actually punched someone. When Sadie had explained what had happened at school, the rumor that was going around, Ellen understood why Sadie had done it, though she couldn't exactly commend Sadie lest she want her parental abilities to be questioned. Even her brother Harry, who had heard about the incident through friends, thought that what Sadie had done was one of the funniest things he had ever heard. It was nice to have her family's support.

"Asher," Kristen called, interrupting Sadie's thoughts though she would never admit this fact out loud. "Are you still going out with Brittany?"

---

Asher's warm brown eyes narrowed in Sadie's direction and his lips quirked up. A lot of people underestimated Asher's capabilities; they all thought he was some slacker stoner who did nothing but smoke weed and ditch class constantly. Asher was actually a lot smarter than people gave him credit for. The problem was with the fact that he was bored in school, and as result, he had to stir up something amusing for himself in each class every day in order to get through them. The problem with that was that usually, the things that amused him also caused him to get detentions or Saturday schools. And it didn't help that his teachers didn't like him anyway.

But his eyes were sharp, and his analytical mind was quite capable of depicting body language. And even though Sadie had a book out, based on her body language, she seemed to be listening to his conversation with Kristen quite intently. She was jealous. Not so long a day after all...

"No," he said, finally turning his head in order to look at Kristen. "I broke up with her sometime last week. Why?"

Kristen blushed and glanced away, but she couldn't stop the smile if she tried. "Nothing," she managed to say.

---

Sadie couldn't help but roll her eyes at the answer.
Oh please
, she thought to herself. Sadie knew flirting when she saw or even heard it. And it didn't help that this girl was being rather obvious about it too.

"Hey Blondie," Asher called, his eyes going back over to Sadie. She could feel his eyes on her back. "What'd you do to get in here? I mean, besides the fact that you miss me and whatever." Another smirk touched his cheeks, and somehow, she knew it.

Sadie refused to answer, doing her absolute damndest to ignore him despite the fact that she wasn't very good with patience whatsoever. However, she didn't have to answer, it would seem; Kristen decided to answer for her, probably because Asher was paying more attention to Sadie's back than Kristen's face.

"She punched Paulina right in the face," Kristen said.

---

For a moment, Asher was absolutely silent and the expression littering his face was hard to decipher. He looked long and hard at Sadie, despite the fact that she still hadn't turned around to look at him. One thing Asher definitely was, was surprised. But other than that? His emotions, if he had any, were too hard and enigmatic to figure out.

At that moment, the door opened and everyone in the library tensed, sensing it was Stewey. However, it wasn't Stewey, but it was somebody very familiar. Asher felt his eyes narrow in direction of that new guy – Asher didn't know his name – who was now sitting next to Sadie in Marine Bio. He hoped that this kid wasn't in detention with them.

"Hey," Tyler said, a smile sliding onto his face when he recognized Sadie. "I thought you might be here. I heard about what had happened. Anyway, I have track right now and I'm not exactly sure where the field is. I was hoping that maybe you could show me...?" His voice trailed off and his brows were pushed up, a slightly hopeful look on his face.

"Wait a minute," Asher interjected quickly, giving Tyler a pointed stare. "Are you telling me that you don't know where a big, green grassy field is? The big, green, grassy field you couldn't miss unless you were blind?"

Sadie, surprising everyone in the room, stood at that moment, and for the first time since she got there, she glanced behind her, glaring at Asher. Then she looked back at Tyler and offered him a friendly smile. "I'd be happy to show you," she murmured, and within moments, she walked out the door, leaving Asher alone with Kristen.

Chapter 18

Sadie wasn't sure what had compelled her to get up when she knew that if she was caught, Stewey would have no problem with writing her another slip for another detention, and she highly doubted her mother would be as lenient with the entire situation, especially if Sadie got a detention over a guy she really didn't even like. Ellen was pretty laidback, but even she had her limits. Sadie only wished she could have seen the look on Asher's face as she walked out, though to be honest, he probably didn't even care. If anything, his mind was probably wondering how he could get into Kristen's pants and was grateful for her departure because it promised him alone time with Kristen.

Was it wrong for her to think that? Was Sadie looking too much into the stereotype that Asher was known by? It wasn't like she knew him, really. When they had spent those couple of hours together in that supply closet, she thought she saw glimpses of who he really was if he let down his walls. But the entire week had gone by, and she had barely gotten any chance to talk to him about what they were now. Sadie wasn't stupid; she knew that one kiss did not equal love, a relationship, or even that he liked her. A kiss wasn't as simple as it sounded. But it would have been nice to know where they stood with each other. Was she allowed to say hi to him, or would that embarrass him, especially if he was in front of his friends? It was stupid, Sadie knew, but as much as she hated these unwritten rules high school was composed of, she didn't want to embarrass him. She didn't want him to be annoyed with her. So instead of doing what she wanted and conversing about what happened with him, she stayed quiet and began to avoid him as much as he was avoiding her. And Sadie hated that more than anything because that wasn't like her at all.

Asher Boyd was the most confusing boy on the planet, she realized. And it was just her luck that he was the one she managed to fall for.

He's not complicated
, a mature sounding voice murmured through her mind.
You're just reading too much into this, as always. If you want to say hi, say hi. Who gives a shit about what his friends think? If he's embarrassed acknowledging you in public then he doesn't deserve you.

"You sound like my mother," Sadie murmured, not fully realizing she had spoken out loud.

"What was that?" Tyler asked, glancing down at Sadie through the golden locks that tainted his vision slightly because no matter what he did with them, they continuously fell into his face. It was actually pretty endearing, if Sadie was being honest.

"I said," Sadie said, thinking quickly as her face kept up with her mind by turning a shade of red in less time than Sadie thought was actually possible. "How is your mother? How does she like it here?"

"Oh," Tyler said, after chuckling. "She really likes it, you know, because the school system here is really good and everything. My dad likes it because it's closer to his job so he doesn't have to worry about sitting on the freeway for two hours both ways just to get where he needs to go. And my brother likes it because it's close to the beach and he loves to surf, so..." He shrugged his shoulders, offering Sadie a friendly smile. "Yeah, my family definitely likes it here."

"And you?" Sadie asked, quickly glancing up at him and catching sight of his brown eyes. "Do you like it here?"

"Definitely," he said, popping his dimple. "The people here especially." He didn't elaborate any further and Sadie was too consumed in her thoughts once again to actually read between the lines of what he had said. Tyler cleared his throat almost nervously as he followed Sadie across the front of the school, and reached up to scratch the back of his head. "Except Asher. I mean, I don't think he likes me."

Sadie rolled her eyes while snorting simultaneously. "Don't take it too personally," she said, shaking her head. "Asher doesn't like anyone except himself."

"So Asher isn't your boyfriend then?" Tyler asked, pushing his brow up and shoving his hands deep into his pockets. "I mean, the only reason I ask is that he seemed to jump on me when I walked into the room, and there have been some instances where I've caught him staring at the back of my head in Marine Bio. I was debating whether or not he was into you or if that's just how he treats all the new kids."

"I wouldn't know," Sadie said, shrugging her shoulders. "I only met Asher last Saturday. I mean, I knew
of
him before, but I hadn't actually
met
him until then. But if I had to guess..." Sadie let her voice trail off, cocking her head to the side. "I don't really know, but if I had to guess... Asher doesn't seem to be the type of guy who actually cares about giving new kids a hard time only because he doesn't care about anything really. At least, that's what I think."

"So he's interested in you?" Tyler asked slowly, his tone taking form of a guess, before subconsciously holding his breath, waiting for Sadie's answer.

Sadie had to think about it for a long moment. Was Asher Boyd interested in her? The obvious answer was, of course, no. Asher Boyd had proven time and time again that he was never actually interested in a girl as a whole. Maybe he was interested in a particular body part, maybe he was interested in scoring something from her (whether it was sex or weed depended entirely upon the girl herself), but interested in a girl for the purpose of developing a relationship? She highly doubted it.

However, he had kissed her. Of course, if Sadie was being rational, she had to admit that she had kissed him first when she placed her lips on his collarbone. But he was the one who had kissed her on the lips. And oddly enough, the kiss was soft and tender rather than demanding and passionate. It was sweet, but Asher Boyd was definitely not sweet. Maybe it was just a lapse in judgment. Maybe it was his way of kissing people he wasn't actually interested in.

Or maybe it was how he kissed people he
IS
interested in!
the voice exclaimed.
You saw the way he looked at you after he kissed you. He even tried to go in for a second one. Sadie, you are not allowed to play the fool here.

"No," Sadie answered, looking into Tyler's dark eyes. "No, I couldn't say for sure whether or not Asher is interested in me. I don't think so, anyway. But to answer your first question, the answer is no, we're not seeing each other, we're not dating, and I'm not even sure we're friends."

Tyler chuckled upon hearing that and gave Sadie an amused smile. "Shouldn't you know?" he asked, quirking a brow. They had reached the field, and from the corner of her eyes, Sadie could see people dressed in running attire similar to Tyler's start warming up and stretching. However, Tyler made no move to join them yet.

"Yeah, I suppose so," she allowed, glancing around the mist-encompassed greenery. "I guess it's just complicated." Though Sadie wanted to continue avoiding Asher, she really didn't want to run into Stewey out here and have to waste another nine hours of her Saturday when she could be out seeing a movie or something.

"Well, since you
are
single," Tyler said, and though his voice came off as somewhat shy, there was slight arrogance touching his smile. "Or at least, since you
think
you are, would it be possible for you to accompany me to a party tonight?" Again, he pressed his lips together, raising his brows in hopes that maybe, just maybe, she might actually say –

"I can't," Sadie said, her tone apologetic and her eyes filling with sincerity. "My mom doesn't want me to go out and party after spending nine hours at Saturday school for punching some girl. She doesn't want to reward me for something. I'm really sorry. Maybe some other time."

"Well, if you change or mind, or if she thinks you've suffered enough, it's at Lily's place," he said, and then glanced at his teammates for the first time. "I should be going, but thanks for walking me here and I really do hope to see you tonight."

Sadie grinned and nodded before turning and heading back to the library. She slipped her hands into her jeans pockets and thought about what had just transpired between her and Tyler. She had lied to him, of course. She didn't agree to go to the party with him not because her mom wanted her home but because she really didn't want to go with him as a date. She couldn't even figure out her feelings for Asher and she didn't want to waste her time with a party she knew he wouldn't attend.