Stone Creek by Davis, Lainey (reading diary .TXT) 📕

you're not going to do that to me. I know that." My eyes are pleading with him, begging him to see that what we have started here is different. "If you were still that person, with me, you would have fucked me that night I was drunk in your apartment. But you didn't. You got me a clean shirt and slept on the couch even though you'd just had surgery."

He shakes his head slowly. He stares at the wall behind me, then slowly meets my gaze. His eyes are cold. "Do you want me to be your boyfriend, Serena? You want me to buy you flowers and talk about our feelings together? I'm not going to do that. I have to focus on my recovery and my football career. I can't handle a girlfriend." He picks my hand off his leg and stands up. He puts a hand on my shoulder and says, "Find someone else to pop your cherry. You won't have any trouble."

Talon turns and walks out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him. And then I really do start crying.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

 

 

In the morning, I'm too upset to go to class, so I just stay in bed. I hear Alissa slink in around mid-day and she does a double-take when she finds me in my room. She pulls me into her arms and I tell her the whole thing.

"Lis, I know he has feelings for me. I'm not making this shit up!" I moan.

"Listen, you are definitely not making this up, Serena. He spent the whole fucking Super Bowl with his arm around you, in front of his best friends. That wasn't some bar party where everyone was picking up women. That shit was intimate."

"Thank you!" I shout, indignant, but then I just remember him telling me to find someone else to sleep with, and I start to cry again. "I don't want to sleep with someone else," I wail. "He smells so good and makes me laugh and he just…Alissa, he did really wonderful things to my body. Until I told him I was a virgin."

She holds me a bit longer and tells me she needs to go make a call. A few minutes later she returns and drags me out of bed. "Go. Shower. And then we're going to get cheesecake with Erin and the girls."

I start to feebly protest, but Alissa has the shower running and threatens to yank off my sweatpants if I don't agree to clean up. An hour later, we're in a booth at the cheesecake restaurant with the 3 girls we'd met in the student union. Erin, Sara, and Mindy listen to the whole story as Alissa tells them everything. They're polite enough not to look at me when Alissa even includes the bit about me being a virgin.

Erin whistles when she hears Talon told me to go find another guy. She grabs the arm of our waitress and tells her we need a round of whiskey shots. "My girl here with the red eyes needs a double," Erin says. As the waitress leaves to get the shots, Erin chews on the end of her straw. "Serena, do you want to say fuck you to this dude and find someone else?"

I exhale. "No. I want him. I want him to want me."

I'm about to start crying again when Alissa assures me, "He does want you. I saw his face when you won the bet money. He couldn't keep his eyes off you when you were talking to Alex about that curly-haired guy."

"Troy Pola--" I start to correct her, but she cuts me off.

"Erin, tell me if you think I'm wrong, but I think the thing to do here is for Alissa to seem like she's taking Talon's advice, and for Talon to see her doing it."

Everyone nods in agreement with Alissa. The drinks arrive and I swallow the warm liquid in two gulps. Sara pipes up that she volunteers to do some recon on the football guys to figure out where they're going out over the next few weeks. "Do not interact with him before this weekend," she says. "You need to hide how much this shit is bothering you." Another round of agreement.

By the time I've had a few more "supportive shots," I know I'll be nursing a hangover in class the next day, but the girls assure me this is a good thing, as I'll care less about avoiding Talon if I'm spending all my energy not puking in class.

As it turns out, I get the hangover without the worry. Talon isn't in class. I have to fight the urge to text him and ask what's wrong. I don't even want to assume that he's avoiding me, because that would mean he thinks I'm important enough to adjust his day. At the end of the lecture, Matt walks over and asks me if everything is ok.

"You look a little under the weather…and it appears your research partner is missing," he says.

I try to smile and shrug it off. "Well, you see, I played the stats and won a Super Bowl betting pool. I might have gone a little overboard spending my earnings…"

"Nothing contagious then. Well, good." He crosses his arms, and I notice he's keeping a wide distance between us. "I would hate to have you as one of my research subjects." He grins.

I grimace, as it's kind of a morbid joke, and I start to see why Talon always makes fun of Professor Jacobs as a super nerd.

On Thursday, I get to class with Matt and see Talon is already there, but he's sitting in the center of the back row. This causes everyone to stare at him as they walk in, and then they all stare at me. People don't just change seats around. I spend the entire class feeling hot