Page 92 of Save Me

People around the room murmur quietly, most of them looking pretty relieved by that answer.

“Next question!” Jude announces, looking round expectantly.

Short silence. Then…

“Is it true what people say, that the teaching here is a joke compared to Balliol?”

My head flies around to look at James. He’s looking straight ahead, apparently genuinely interested, to where the three students are sitting, returning his gaze rather perplexed.

“The courses are the same,” Jude begins hesitantly, his brow furrowed slightly. “But as I study here and not there, I can’t be the judge of that. I can only tell you what things are like at St. Hilda’s.”

“A ‘yes’ would have done.”

I stare at James. I can’t believe he just said that. And in that vile tone he’s learned from his father, the one that sets off a chain of furious reactions deep within me.

The urge to open my mouth is growing by the second, and my defenses are crumbling little by little.

Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it…

I ignore my common sense.

“You’re so obvious,” I burst out.

James turns slowly toward me. “Obvious, how?”

“The only reason St. Hilda’s isn’t good enough for you is that your dad didn’t study here.” I try to keep my voice calm, but not with much success. Not after the day I’ve had. Not when he’s acting like this.

Something like pain flickers in James’s eyes. “That’s not true,” he says.

At such a barefaced lie, all the fury I’ve been holding back with all my strength in recent weeks bursts out of me like a storm. I can’t keep it in a second longer, and the words just well up out of me, loud and unfiltered. “What isn’t true? That St. Hilda’s isn’t good enough for you, just like I’m not good enough for you, because your parents want something else for you? That you only ever do what they want instead of actually thinking for once about whatyouwant from life? You’re such a coward!”

Suddenly, the common room is eerily quiet. I’m breathing hard, my chest is rising and falling like crazy, and I feel a dangerous prickling behind my eyes.

Oh no.No.

No way am I crying in front of all these people and embarrassing myself even more than I’ve already just done.

I jump up abruptly and leave the room without another word.I run down the hall and make it to the stairs before I hear equally hasty footsteps behind me. I take the steps two at a time until I get to the top and turn down the landing. James is right behind me. He overtakes me and stands in my way, so that I have to stop too.

“That’s not true,” he repeats breathlessly. His cheeks are red, his hair’s a mess. Whenever I see him, I feel like my body is tied to his in some irrational way. The need to touch him grows the closer he comes, regardless of how livid I am with him. This is impossible. How can I still want him when he hurts me this badly?

“What isn’t true?” I can barely get the words out for all the pent-up emotion inside me.

I’m totally unprepared for the pain in his eyes. “That you’re not good enough for me.”

For a moment, I stare at him in confusion. Then I clench my fists, so hard that my nails dig into my skin.

“Fucking hell,” I breathe.

He takes another step toward me. “Ruby—”

“No!” I interrupt him. “You don’t get to do this to me. You don’t get to break up with me and humiliate me in front of all your friends and then just stroke my wrist and whisper ‘good luck’ to me. You showed me more than clearly that you don’t want me in your oh-so-perfect life.”

“That wasn’t…I…”

First he comes running after me, and now he can’t even get out a coherent sentence. I want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. “That wasn’t you?” My voice is dripping with mockery.

“I’m sorry for how I acted. I’m so sorry, Ruby. But I…just can’t. It’s impossible.”

---