Frankly My Dear, All's Fair in Love and War

17: Three's a Crowd

Chapter 17: Three's a Crowd

Tristan found Cassie right before her free period. Cassie had to groan because she thought that she finally could get forty minutes alone. But of course, when she was involved with The Grand Scheme, none of her time would be private.

"Hey girlfriend," he took her bag casually.

Cassie never called him 'boyfriend'. Not even once. "Hey, you."

He slung an arm around her. She didn't mind. She hadn't minded for a while. And sometimes she thought that this gesture was friendly, amiable, platonic. Or was it? "Anyway, I heard from Tyra."

"Heard what from Tyra?"

"That you liked men with great bottoms."

Cassie's face felt hot. Okay, so groping Desmond in public wasn't exactly how she planned to start her day, but there she was.

"She saw it?"

Tristan rolled his eyes, he looked amused. "You're getting very brave."

"Is she angry?"

Cassie expected Tristan to laugh. To start snorting in his usual devil-may-care attitude and tell her that it's nothing. To give her a snarky answer to her stupid question.

But Tristan stayed quiet, and that meant trouble.

"With her, I could never tell." He finally muttered. "One day she'll be nice and sweet to you, the next day she won't even look at you."

Cassie nodded. That was how she felt with most of the Club members as well. Maybe that was a code with popular people? To never let the others know where they stand. To always let them guess. When you managed to get people confused about how they felt about you, you would gain a certain power over them; because they'd be thinking of you.

"But Cassie," there was something in the way Tristan called her. A modicum of caring, something that she hadn't felt in a long time. That made her look up.

Tristan's dark eyes were looking back at her. And they were beautiful. "He's not a good guy, you know that, right? You're not the kind of girl who will be his first choice. If you get lucky, you might get six months before being replaced by someone else."

Something inside Cassie broke.

"And you shouldn't look at Tyra too much, too," Cassie said coldly. It was just a test, really. A trial of the new thought that had just recently formed inside her head. But Tristan's reaction was what solidified her speculation.

Tristan froze, and he actually stopped breathing. "I don't-"

"I'm not blind," Cassie put a hand around his waist, since his grip around her trembled a little bit. They walked side by side along the hallways, their bodies pressed together but they had never been so far apart mentally. "You think Tyra is the most beautiful person in the room."

"Can you blame me? I think everybody who has seen her will think the same thing."

"She's doing this behind her boyfriend's back. Your taste in girls is no better than mine. Maybe if you stop pining after her, you'll know what I'm talking about."

"I don't. Pine after her." Tristan's hand hardened around her shoulder. "And what's up with your clothes? You look like you're wearing lingerie. I can practically see the lines of your breasts with all the alterations you're doing to your shirt."

"Oh, so you can be a slut, but I can't look a little sexy?" Cassie snapped. "What is it? Are you afraid you won't be able to control yourself around me?" She hadn't meant to, but something about the way Tristan talked set her off. He knew he was picking a fight with her, and she was just responding. After all, she wasn't exactly in a good mood.