Whatever It Takes (Bad Reputation Duet #1)(76)

He turns red. “I…” He scratches his head. “She was joking.” Jared reads my features. “You’re really that pissed? Come on, man. You’re famous. I’d kill to have what you have.” He lets out a short laugh. “You know how easy you’ve got it?”

I glare, unblinking.

Rage and resentment infiltrates his eyes. He thinks he knows me, and I wonder if that jealous bitterness towards me has been there all along, hidden somehow.

“Stay the fuck away from me.” I unlock my door and slam it closed.

That felt good.

That shouldn’t have felt that good. I take a larger drag and blow smoke upwards. My hand trembles.

“Garrison.” Willow’s voice comes from the cell in my other fist. I press it back to my ear.

“Sorry,” I mutter, involuntary tears squeeze out of my eyes. Fuck. I wipe my wet face with the heel of my palm.

“How soon can you make it to the airport?” she asks. “Because I can get you on the next flight to London.”

I’m already heading to my closet. Grabbing a duffel bag. “Book it.”





24 BACK THEN – October


Philadelphia, Pennsylvania





WILLOW MOORE

Age 17





“You’re not dressing up?” I ask Garrison.

Seated on my fuzzy blue rug, he plays Street Fighter II on an old Sega Genesis that he brought over in September. My dorm-sized room has more personality than just the bare built-in desk, wooden dresser, and short single bed from when I first moved in.

Daisy Calloway helped me decorate. She said she’d be my labor force, and I could direct her where to go, but I liked hearing what she thought. We both agreed to string lights over the ceiling, nail a yellow poster that says Mutant & Proud in the wall, and arrange my collection of comic books on my desk.

When I tucked in my white bedding, she tossed pale blue pillows on the mattress. The last one was a blue cupcake. It wasn’t something we picked out in the store together. She said that she stitched it in her spare time—with Rose’s assistance who’s “the better sewer”—but it’s my favorite pillow. Because Daisy made it just for me.

Sitting on my bed, I watch as Ryu (Garrison’s character) attacks Blanka.

Ryu lands a punch, pushing Blanka back a couple inches.

“I don’t know yet,” Garrison says. His fingers nimbly fly over buttons, and as Blanka lies flat on his back, he pauses the game and rotates to face me.

A blonde wig is already tight on my head. I twist the hair in a single braid, the strands so long the braid reaches my thighs. This Halloween, I’m going with my staple costume, Vega from Street Fighter.

Garrison scrutinizes my hair and then his eyes fall to mine. “Are you sure you want me to come?”

My brother (it’s actually starting to feel normal calling Loren Hale that) is hosting a Halloween party for the neighborhood. Garrison is technically already invited since he lives in the same neighborhood, but I asked him to come with me anyway.

This past month has been…difficult at Dalton Academy.

No one harasses me or stuffs my locker with things anymore, but I haven’t made any friends either. Lots of behind-the-back whispers.

If someone even tries to talk to me, they only ever ask about Loren Hale. I always shut down at the start of those questions. If I discuss my time with Lo and Lily or any of her sisters, I feel like I’m betraying them.

But I finally have a nickname.

Wordless Willow.

Apparently not responding to someone paints a target on you. Though, my whole body was practically painted red before I even arrived at Dalton.

I haven’t exactly told Lo any of this. I also don’t plan to tell him today or tomorrow. Some things, I have to deal with on my own.

My current plan: focus on my classwork and not the people in my classes. I only have one semester after this one ends. I can make it.

“I want you there,” I tell Garrison. I’m not going to know many people besides Lo, Lily, her sisters, and their significant others. “But if you don’t want to go—”

“I do.” He twirls a cigarette in his fingers. He won’t smoke in my room. I’ve never told him, but he’s the only reason school isn’t unbearable. He’s the reason there aren’t more tampons in my locker—or worse. He made sure his old friends left me alone.

I’ve needed him.

If he wasn’t here, I’m not sure I’d have the strength to stay.

Maybe I’d find it somewhere else, but he’s kept me looking forward. At a better future. At a better place.

In our quiet, I hear the front door to the apartment opening, audible from my cracked bedroom door. Voices emanate from the hallway, and I’m sure my roommate (the only other person with a key) has stepped inside the living room.

Seconds later, my door swings further open, until Maya sticks her head inside. She wears a pink wig and plastic body armor. Her costume: Lightning from Final Fantasy.

“Hey,” she says. “I’m heading out. You sure you don’t want to come?” A smile creeps on her lips. “Your first college party could be a cosplay Halloween.”

At seventeen, I might be living in an off-campus apartment near the University of Pennsylvania, but I’ve successfully avoided the college parties so far. Thinking about them brings on this whole new wave of anxiety that I didn’t even know existed.