Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 106797 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106797 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
I crumpled as I lifted my eyes from where their hands were clasped to stare at Mason, open-mouthed. He still wore apologies in his eyes but no words came to support them. It was then that it hit me.
He wasn’t my Mason, anymore.
“Who are you?” I asked, voice cracking. I shook my head, tears still streaming down my hot cheeks. Then, before I embarrassed myself further, I broke through my group of friends — or, what I had always thought were my friends — and bee-lined for the parking lot. Willow chased after me.
“Natalie! Natalie, where are you going?”
“I’m leaving, Willow. I can’t do this,” I called out behind me, eyes forward.
“What? What are you talking about? What happened? I thought we were having fun,” she pleaded as she caught up to me. She wore a confused expression and it tore me up to think that maybe I’d held her back all these years. She was friends with the loser fat girl.
“You’re having fun,” I corrected her, spinning to face her and halting in my tracks. “I’m miserable. I have been since we got here. Shay just ripped into me in the bathroom and I was mad at her at first but now I almost want to thank her,” I admitted, a short laugh escaping my lips. “Because she’s right, Willow. I don’t belong here. Not in this group, not at this fair.” I motioned to the rides around us, my arm falling to my side with a slap. Pulling my bottom lip between my teeth, I shook my head. “Not in this town.”
“Natalie,” she reached out to touch me but I shrugged away from her.
“I’ll call you tomorrow. Please, don’t follow me.”
With that, I spun on my heels and walked as fast as I could in the stupid shoes I was wearing away from the group. I wasn’t sure if they’d heard what I’d said to Willow. Part of me hoped not, part of me didn’t care. I tried to hold myself together as I made my way through the crowd, but the further away I got, the more it seemed like the string tethering me to the ground was shredding into nothing. My breath was labored, tears flooded my eyes and ran down my face, and I felt a pain like nothing I’d ever experienced racking my chest.
I was nothing. I didn’t belong.
I was almost to the exit when I stopped in line at a fried food booth. I knew I shouldn’t, but I couldn’t stop myself. Food was always my answer. When I hurt, I turned to food. And at that moment, I didn’t have the fight to stop myself.
“What would you like, miss?” the man asked me when I reached the front of the line. He had dark, leather-like skin and lines on his face that told me he had worked his entire life. He eyed me cautiously and I realized I probably had makeup smeared everywhere. I chewed my lip, something inside me still trying to fight against what I was about to do.
“Miss?” he asked again.
I choked on a sob, feeling myself breaking again, when warm arms wrapped around me. I didn’t even know who they belonged to yet at the same time I somehow sensed him. I caved, leaning my weight back into his hard body, letting him hold me steady.
“She changed her mind.” I turned to meet Rhodes’ intense eyes and he pulled me into him, his arm tight around my shoulder. Something shifted in that moment — something small, almost too small to acknowledge. It was like the world tilted off its path just a millimeter, but I felt it shake everything inside me.
“Miss?” the man asked again. He seemed alarmed by the way Rhodes was staring at me. I can’t say he was alone in that sentiment.
I shook my head, pulling my gaze from Rhodes to him. “Sorry, I’m fine. Not as hungry as I thought.”
The man appraised us carefully, then shook his head. “Have a good night, folks.”
“Thank you,” I said softly as Rhodes tugged me away from the stand and in the opposite direction of the one I’d been walking in. He didn’t say anything else, but it was then that I realized he was holding my hand.
“Are you hungry?” he asked behind him as we walked. “Be honest.”
“Yes.”
He frowned as he looked back at me again. “You’ve been crying.”
I swallowed, eyes on my feet as I forced a weak smile and shrugged. He tightened the grip on my hand.
“Let’s go. I’ll make you food.”
“It’s almost midnight.”
“So I’ll make breakfast.”
I almost giggled, but I couldn’t find the strength. He was pulling me toward the south exit, the opposite side of where I’d been trying to leave. I prayed we wouldn’t run into the group and thankfully, we didn’t. I was far from ready to face them. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to again.