Page 18 of Love is Angry

“You almost aced the damn thing,” Jamie Tancredi, senior and host, tells him with an arched eyebrow. “And your grades are above average. I don’t see why you need a tutor if you’re angling for a hockey scholarship.”

He shrugs. “You’re gonna have to talk to my mom about that. She insists that I get my grades into the realm of excellence. I guess she doesn’t have complete faith in my hockey skills. She wants to make sure I don’t depend on a hockey scholarship, to begin with.”

“Besides, any Ivy League school he might wish to get into will demand more than exquisite sportsmanship,” I chime in. “High grades will automatically bump him up every single list. It’ll open him up to Harvard, Cornell, and Princeton, too.”

Once again, I find myself the direct target of Rhue’s admiration. “That is exactly it. I’m absolutely sticking around, now.” He points a finger at me. “I might just subscribe to your services, Maddie.” He draws out my nickname, swirling it on his tongue in a way that makes it seem dirty and naughty and a heck of a lot more intriguing than it is.

I decide not to correct him, clenching my teeth, but keeping my smile steady. I can’t let Rhue get under my skin. Despite the laughable age difference, I’m still the teacher and he’s still the student in this scenario.

The rest of the session goes by slowly. Too slowly. It takes forever to end because I feel Rhue’s eyes on me the entire time. It makes my skin prick and my spine stiffen, while images form in the back of my head.

By the stars, he reeks of trouble. Life-crushing trouble.

The kind of trouble I have never gotten into. Too smart, too wise, too focused.

The kind of trouble I should never get into. Not if I’m planning on staying too smart, too wise, too focused.

But when I look back up and my eyes crash into the depths of Rhue’s, I know he thinks he’s already got his hooks in me.

He’s wrong.

I might be caught off guard now, what with him walking in here the way he did. But when the next session rolls around, I’m coming with guards wrought of steel. Guards so high and so tough, that not even the intensity in Rhue Echeveria’s eyes can tear them down.

Chapter 9

Madison

Running has become an integral part of my life, especially over the summer. When I’m back home, there is nothing more cathartic than feeling my calves and thighs burn after a solid five-mile run through Genesee Valley Park. Out here, I’ve got the jogging trails around Beebe Lake and some truly gorgeous views to keep me company. Autumn is splendiferous in these parts of New York, with explosions of rusty red and gold and burnt orange beneath a clear blue sky.

The crisp air stings my lungs, but I love the feeling. It’s instant freshness filling me up to the brim.

Sweat covers me from head to toe as I make my way back to the track. I always finish my jog with a full one-round sprint to get the most out of my cardio. It does wonders for the heart. I’ll have to peel the tights and tank top off me once I reach the shower, but I’m not there yet. My hardened muscles demand their running burst, and I can’t wait to shake the red dirt from my sneakers once I’m done.

This is my therapy.

It is the only thing that has worked to soothe most of my panic attacks. Fortunately, it’s ridiculously safe out here duringthe nights, too, thanks to a rigorous campus police system, so it’s never a problem for me to go for a midnight run if that’s what it takes to quell the demons inside my head. Wearing myself thin wears those fuckers thin, too. I can almost hear them gasping for air, now –– those devils that have taken up residence within me. A gift from Julian, I suppose. Someday I’ll get rid of them. Until then, running does the trick.

The athletic track is quite busy. In the middle, out on the football green, students giggle, hurling a lacrosse ball across long distances.

Other athletes are training at long-distance running, but I can still take the inner track for my sprint. Nobody will even notice me.

Taking deep breaths, I brace myself for the run while briefly remembering yesterday’s incident with Rhue and the girls. By the stars, they handled him a million times better than I ever would. Then again, they don’t have a personal bone to pick with him. It’s easy for them to look in from the outside and call him out. I’ve got a monstrous guilt holding me back, this shameful idea that I somehow deserve everything he gives me in terms of pain and misery.

Logically and ethically, that is wrong, and I know it.

I’m running, now. Bolting down the racetrack. Short, staggered breaths fizzle out of me every other step.

I’m light on my feet. I need to get him out of my head. The harder I run, the farther away he seems. Rhue Echeveria was nothing but trouble, starting with the day I accepted the private tutoring lessons with him. I should have stuck him into group study. Nothing would have happened there. I never would have had the chance to get to know him, to find myself intrigued and unable to stop thinking about him.

“Whore,” he says.

The word comes out of his mouth with such toxicity, such blistering hatred. The word echoes in the back of my head as I run faster.

I leave the athletic team behind. They’re sprinting in their own rhythm, taut muscles jerking with each brief touch between the heels and the ground. Their breaths hiss in perfect unison somewhere behind me. It’s like music, and I try to match my own to it. In, then out. In, then out, as I run even faster. I’m halfway through, and the timer on my Apple watch is still logging seconds and milliseconds while I wonder if I’m going to break yesterday’s record.

“Whore.” What an ugly fucking word.

I never meant to hurt him, let alone his mother or his sister. How comes Laura understands that, and Rhue insists on being a prick and a bully? No, this isn’t right. The more I think about it, the harder I reject it. I worked hard to get here. I can’t let him run me out of this town.

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