Page 110 of Love Me in the Dark
“I hope you’re not squeamish,” Slade chuckled from behind me, breaking me out of my thoughts on how I was going to get money to eat lunch. I was already hungry since I didn’t eat breakfast after my mom pissed me off.
Looking over my shoulder, I hissed back. “What are you talking about?”
His unique eyes scanned my face for a moment and then brightened with excitement. “About the fact that tomorrow we’ll be cutting into a baby pig.”
“Oh, I’m going nowhere near anything that once had a heartbeat.” I realized then I’d missed who my partner is. “Can you point out who I was assigned to?”
He tilted his head to the side and stared at me for a moment before he lifted a finger and pointed at his chest.
“No.” I nearly stood up from my desk and backed away. There was no way fate could be this cruel.
Pressing his hand to his chest, Slade chuckled. “You wound me. How can you say you don’t want me to be your partner when I’m the only person you know here?”
“Who says I don’t know anyone else?”
He gave a dry look that said I was stupid for the words that just came out of my mouth.
“Fine,” I huffed. “I don’t know anyone. Including you.” I looked back to the front of the classroom and saw everyone was moving to the lab portion of the room. “Please tell me we’re not doing this today.”
“Not today. We’re just getting prepared for tomorrow. Don’t worry if it makes you feel better, I’ll do all the work.”
My head shook frantically as I stood up and followed him to a table in the back. “Not really,” I said as I stared down at adiagram of a pig. “I can’t sit here and watch you cut into some poor piglet.”
His nose wrinkled up in disgust. “Are you a vegan?”
“Not a vegan, but a vegetarian.”
“Almost as bad. I don’t know how you do it.”
“Well, it’s pretty easy since I don’t like to think about eating the faces of animals that I like.”
“Oh my god, Harley, you don’t eat their faces.”
“I can assure you people do eat the cheeks of animals and other things. Still, it doesn’t matter, I won’t eat them.”
“That’s your choice, but don’t expect me to stop eating my favorite foods.”
I was sure I was looking at him like he was crazy because I was. “I would never. Plus, we’ll only see each other at school.” It wasn’t like we were going to all of a sudden start hanging out.
“And runs.”
I ignored his comment.
“What do you expect from me?” I pointed to the sheets of our assignment for tomorrow.
“Absolutely nothing. Well,” he smirked, and his brown eyes twinkled at me. “Not throwing up would be good.” He leaned over the table his face in mine. “If you do, I’ll retch all over this place.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Thanks,” he nodded and sat back down.
“What are we supposed to be doing?” Everyone was just talking. Did Mr. Brown think we needed a whole day to prepare?
“Planning,” he lifted one shoulder. “Now why don’t you tell me why you really don’t want to be my partner?”
Like he was that clueless.
“Don’t pretend like you don’t know.”
