Trainwreck (13 page)

Chapter 23

Mid-October

Sadie was sitting in Marine Biology, trying desperately to pay attention to Mr. Wilbourne's explanation of conversions, but her mind kept going back to Asher, her eyes kept going to the door. Her head was resting in the palm of her hand and her elbow was propped against the cool surface of the table. She and Tyler had been talking on and off the past couple of weeks, and he had asked her out a couple of times, but she kept making excuses. To be completely honest, Sadie still wasn't over Asher, despite her utter determination to be. But there was something inside of her that wouldn't let go of him. Call her stubborn, call her whatever, but no matter how hard she begged herself, no matter how hard she tried to rationalize it, she was stuck. She felt there was some sort of reasoning behind it, but...

God, don't even start thinking about it, Sadie
, she thought to herself as Mr. Wilbourne continued to scribble equations on the whiteboard.
You'll get a headache... Why are there so many equations in Marine Biology?... Where the hell is Asher anyways? He hasn't been here for the past two weeks. Not that I've noticed or anything...

But it was true. Asher Boyd had yet to show up to Marine Biology for the past nine days. Sadie, at first, thought he was just ditching this particular class because it started at seven thirty in the morning, and it was common for any kid at the school to ditch their first-period class in order to sleep in a few more minutes on any given day. But then Sadie noticed that Asher wasn't around the campus, hanging with his friends or whoever he was quote unquote dating that week. She hadn't seen him anywhere. And there was an unsettling feeling slowly growing in the pit of her stomach that maybe... maybe something was wrong.

As she tried to copy the notes while simultaneously thinking about what to do, she came to the conclusion that she should go over to his house just to make sure he was okay. Yes, and she could say that she wanted to give him the notes over the past couple of weeks that he had missed so he wouldn't fall behind. Sadie began to smile as her ideas fell into place and it was only at the end of her thoughts did she realize something was wrong.

Shit
, she thought, and her mind was so focused she wasn't sure if she had merely thought the swearword or if she muttered it under her breath. Oh well; like it mattered. There were more pressing issues.
I'm one of
those
girls
.

By one of those girls, Sadie meant the type of girl she despised, the girl that couldn't take a hint. Maybe Asher really didn't like her. Maybe everything that had happened between them at that Saturday school, the conversation, the kiss, the ring she gave him... Maybe that didn't matter. Maybe she really couldn't take a hint. Maybe Asher really didn't like her... The thought caused Sadie's heart to constrict painfully, and as the bell rang, she tried to ignore it, tried to push the feeling aside.

Okay, okay
, Sadie tried to rationalize as she headed down the slope and to the Village to her next class.
How about this? You know how his family is. Maybe something really
had
happened to prevent him from coming to school. Check on him today after school. If he really is okay and he was ditching school, you have to make a conscious effort to get over him. No more being stubborn. Hell, go on a date with Tyler. But some sort of effort at rehabilitation needs to be made.

"Deal," Sadie murmured under her breath so the passing students wouldn't think she was weird for talking to herself. And she meant it.

After dropping off Natasha, Sadie headed to Asher's neighborhood in the Narrows. She had been there only once though she had never gone in. Tony needed to get something from Asher, and she had driven to his house with him. It had only been once, but Sadie had remembered how to get there.

Now, as she walked to the front door, she felt butterflies ram into the sides of her stomach. Maybe she shouldn't be here. God, what if he thought she was a freak. But all of her concerns didn't matter when she kept reminding herself that Asher could be hurt. Yes, she knew she wasn't a superhero or anything like that, but she could help in some way.

Sadie quickly knocked on the door before taking a step back, holding the binder she had brought (filled with actual notes regarding Marine Biology) to her chest and sucking in her breath. A man answered the door, and though he was wearing a stained white muscle shirt, pajama pants, and was thirty pounds overweight, Sadie knew immediately that this was Asher's father. He had the same brown hair, but this man's was greying, and though they shared the same colored eyes, Asher's had a warmth that this man's did not. He smelled heavily of a potent foul odor that seemed to belong to just him and the rich scent of alcohol. He had a hooked nose protruding from his face, and there were whiskers covering the lower half of his face.

"Yeah?" he asked her in a gruff voice, eyeing her with a suspicion mixed in with slight interest. "What do you want?"

"Uh, I'm here to see Asher if I can," Sadie said, praying she wouldn't stutter. "I have notes he missed for Marine Bio." She indicated the binder, hoping this would prove that she wasn't lying.

He stared at her for a long moment, as though he was experiencing some kind of surprise, before he muttered, "My God. Asher Boyd knows girl who don't look like a slut? That's a miracle if I've ever seen one." He was scratching his head as he said this and Sadie realized how uncomfortable she was feeling at that moment.

Before anything else could be exchanged between the two, Asher arrived and yanked her outside while simultaneously shutting the door so Asher's father wouldn't be able to overhear their conversation. As Sadie looked at the boy in front of her, she realized he seemed upset. His chocolate brown eyes were flaring and his was clenching his jaw, causing it to pop.

"What are you doing here?" he asked through gritted teeth, once Asher felt they were far away enough from the house. Still, he leaned forward and his voice came off soft but firm, his hair falling in his face.

"I," she began, before pausing. She wasn't sure what to say so she decided to just tell him the truth. "I – you haven't been at school for the past couple of weeks and I wanted to make sure that you were okay."

Asher rolled his eyes, scoffing at the mere notion of the idea. "Really?" he asked dryly, his voice quiet as he regarded her almost skeptically.

"Does Kristen even know where you are?" Sadie asked, almost defensively. She grabbed her wrist from Asher's grasp and crossed it over her chest, feeling herself get defensive. She should have expected something like this to happen. She should have realized he wasn't going to appreciate what she had done for him. It was over. It had to be over.

Asher furrowed his brow. "Who?" he asked, genuinely confused at who Sadie was talking about.

Now it was Sadie's turn to scoff. Of course, he wouldn't remember who she was. Sure, Sadie didn't particularly like the girl, but even she didn't deserve to be disrespected by Asher. "God, you're such an ass," she muttered, pushing her hair back with her long fingers. It didn't matter, though; the long strands fell back in her face. At least it gave her something to do. "You know what? Just forget that I even stopped by, okay?"

"Already done," Asher retorted in agreement.

Sadie said nothing more. Instead, she and the binder she was holding made their way back to the car. This time, Sadie didn't look back.

---

Asher watched her leave with an enigmatic expression on his face. He wasn't exactly sure what had happened or why it happened, but for whatever reason, it did happen, and he wasn't exactly sure how he felt about that.

God, he couldn't believe she actually came to his house. She actually came to his house, even knowing how screwed up his family was, just to make sure he was okay? He couldn't exactly understand it, but at that moment, he really didn't try. Sadie was a completely different girl compared to all the other girls he had ever met, and somewhere deep down inside of himself, he realized that he should consider himself lucky to even know her. He wasn't sure what they were – if they were friends, acquaintances, maybe even something more – but if anything, Asher considered her to be his, and in some way, considered himself hers.

He didn't wear just anybody's jewelry.

Chapter 24

When Sadie returned home, she parked the car in its usual place in the driveway before letting herself in through the garage door. The tears had refused to hold in until she reached her house, and though her heart was once again experiencing a good portion of pain, she refused to stop until she got home, and even then, she didn't want to see anybody. Without saying a word, she walked into her room, shut the door quietly, and threw herself on her bed. In order to mask her crying, she gripped her pillow, placing her face against the cool surface. Sadie hated crying. It caused her face to turn red and blotchy, her eyes hurt from all the tears, her nose became stuffy, and her head throbbed. Crying, however, was her body's only line of defense against the pain, and so she would simply have to deal with the repercussions from engaging in such an act.

Though she tried to stop herself, her mind continued to replay the scenes that she and Asher had shared that day, trying to figure out why he was so mean to her. Her initial thought was that he really didn't like her and he was getting fed up with her for thinking that she did. But then why was he wearing her necklace? That was the thought that caused Sadie to second guess herself, the reason that single part of her refused to let go of this notion that he, in some way, liked her the same way she liked him. Hell, the ring was fake and it was too gaudy for any guy she knew. Why was he wearing it?

That was the question she couldn't answer, and as a result, she couldn't shed any light on how he felt about her. Did it even matter how he felt about her? Maybe it was the fact that he knew exactly how he felt about her and instead of just admitting it, instead of just telling Sadie that he liked her and that he wanted to be with her, he wouldn't let himself. That was what hurt the most. It wasn't the fact that they weren't together, but it would seem that Sadie wasn't even worth the risk.

Sure, Asher was totally going out with girls who were easy and who were like him and probably didn't care about him in the same way that he didn't care about them. It was an understanding relationship, and he wouldn't have that with Sadie. She had too much respect for herself.

Well fine. If Sadie was simply not worth it, if Sadie didn't inspire Asher in any way to make a move on her and follow up and what they shared that Saturday, then he really didn't deserve her. Sure, it was cliché, but it was also true. And one thing Sadie definitely didn't want was to wait around for him to finally get how he felt, wait around for him to finally gather the courage to say something. She didn't want to be that girl.

It had to stop. She needed to get a grip on herself and realize that things probably weren't going to change anytime soon. This whole situation, the pain she was currently feeling, it all had to end. And it had to end tonight.

---

It took a long moment before Asher finally decided to return to his house. He knew he would hear his father say something regarding Sadie, and he tried to prepare himself for it with hopes that he wouldn't react too strongly to it. Luckily, his father seemed to be in a drunken slumber, and as a result, Asher managed to make it to his room before anything could happen. He closed his door – he would have locked it too if he had a lock – and laid on his bed, flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling.

Whenever he was deep in thought about something, he would stare up at the ceiling, hoping to find the answers embedded in the white popcorn material that occupied it. It was almost like making shapes with his ceiling, and he could literally lie there for long portions of time, skillfully blocking out his father's yelling and his mother's crying. It was moments like those that he was glad he didn't have a younger sibling. At least someone else didn't have to endure this nonsense. He refused to let himself think about what would happen if he had an older brother, however. Common sense told him that an older brother would protect him, and seeing as how he didn't have one, it didn't matter what he wished for; it wasn't going to happen.

He would have to survive on his own.

Except he began to realize that he wasn't surviving merely by himself. Thoughts of Sadie occupied his mind continuously. When his father was beating him, his mother yelling at him, it was her face, her voice, that occupied his thoughts. She was his savior in an odd sort of way because he distracted himself with her image, and the pain didn't affect him as much.

But there was no way he would ever be with her. He couldn't bring her into this kind of life. Hell, he never wanted her to meet his parents because he honestly had no idea what they would say. He didn't
want
to know what they would say, if he was being honest.

Once Sadie knew who he really was, she would dump him. Why would she want to stay with him when his family was screwed up? He had come to this conclusion time and time again, but for whatever reason, he refused to take off the necklace she had made for him using her ring and his chain. It was something physical that he could touch whenever he needed to calm himself down, or at least to remember that somebody actually cared enough to give him something.

Hell, she had come to his house to see if he was okay! Nobody had ever done that, not even his friends who knew what was going on at home.

Asher allowed himself a small smile of affection for Sadie. If anything, she was stubborn. But even more than that, it would seem that she wouldn't allow herself to give up on him. This particular feeling was what caused Asher to really like her, to appreciate who she was, and to want nothing more than to be with her. He was hardly sentimental, but when he was, she brought it out in him. Everyone he knew gave up on him – teachers, parents, his friends didn't even care, but no matter what shitty thing he did to her, she was still there, checking on him to make sure that he was okay.

Asher knew he didn't deserve her, but he thanked God for putting her in his life.

"Not like it's going to last," he muttered under his breath. One day, she was just going to stop because sooner or later, everyone got tired of being pushed away.

Maybe he would stop doing the pushing, maybe he would finally allow himself to –

"Kid!" a voice bellowed from downstairs. "Get your ass down here. I want to talk to you."

Asher rolled his eyes and sat up. He didn't want to be caught in a vulnerable position by lying down on the bed. As Asher expected, when he didn't respond, his father came rushing up the stairs, each stomp sounding closer and closer than the last one. When Asher's door was thrown open, Asher stood, prepared for whatever his father was going to do to him.

"I thought I told you to get downstairs," Asher's father said. Immediately, Asher could tell he was still drunk, which only meant that his father would have no qualms beating up on his son if he wanted to. Not like being sober stopped him anyway, but Asher couldn't remember a time when his father was actually one hundred percent sober.

Asher still said nothing, popping his jaw. He could feel his body tense up, preparing for a fight.

"You know," his father murmured, taking a step towards his son, "I really didn't think you could get a girl like the girl who stopped by today. I thought you could only get girls who were nothing but good for nothing sluts. That's all you're good for. Dirty sluts. But that girl, that ain't no slut. But boy, would I like to turn her into one, hmm?" He smiled mischievously at this, but because of how he said it and his current state of mind, it came out almost perverted.

Before Asher could think rationally, he reached out and socked his father in the face as hard as he could. To be honest, Asher had no idea he was going to do that, and apparently, his father felt the same way because he was gripping his jaw and fell back a couple of steps, completely surprised at what had just taken place. When he finally got a grip on what had happened, his eyes flashed dangerously into Asher's.

"You're going to regret that you done that, boy," he said. "Now get over here so Daddy can teach you a lesson."