Chapter 20: Chapter 20

Lyric’s P.O.V

“I fucked up, didn’t I?” I asked George during lunch hour as we sat outside in the courtyard, under the shade of some fancy tree that had peach colored flowers blooming everywhere.

Normally, I would’ve preferred to have my lunch at the nearest Subway or Starbucks, but George had brought homemade lunch today and he insisted that I share his. Maybe it was his way of saying thank you for saving Avery, but we both knew Lydia was the one who had done the actual saving part.

“Is this about Miss Lydia?” George asked, putting a spoonful of pasta into his mouth.

“Stop calling her Miss like she’s the President’s daughter or something.” I frowned at George. “She’s the same age as me.”

“Yes, but-”

“Never mind.” I shook my head. “Yes, it’s about Lydia and I’m getting in way over my head. Just forget I said anything.”

I went to get up from the ground but George’s next words stopped me.

“Yes. You are right. I think you did screw up.”

I turned to face the sandy haired boy who was less than half my size and admired him for his strength for the first time. Not a lot of people had the courage to say that to my face. Maybe I had underestimated the little nerd.

“Yeah?” I raised my eyebrows. “How?”

“That fact that you admitted it yourself?” George shrugged, offering me his lunch box, which I took grudgingly when my stomach rumbled. “I think she was right, you didn’t like Seth to begin with. The two of you are constantly clashing and I think you might have used Avery and Mi-Lydia, as an excuse to vent your anger out on Seth. And if Lydia hadn’t stopped you, you would’ve probably kept hitting him.”

George did have a point. Seth and I never got along, especially because of the way he treats women. It had been Seth who had tried to leak nude photos of Sophia online and that was the first time we had clashed. There had been endless instances after that too. I was surprised how women still trusted the bastard after everything he had done. They only reason he wasn’t in jail yet was because of daddy dearest who kept on cleaning his son’s sorry ass.

“How many stitches?” I asked George after I had swallowed a mouthful of pasta. George’s mom was a good cook.

“Thirteen.” George told me. “Fractured his wounded hand too. You should tell Lydia about him though. Warn her beforehand.”

I barked out a laugh at George’s concerns for Lydia. “Trust me, she can take care of herself just fine.” I shook my head laughing as I remembered how she had dislocated my finger when we first met. Damn, the pain had been excruciating! And then she had popped the bone right back into place like it was nothing.

“Well then…I think you should…apologize?” George asked nervously. “I mean…she did seem like she was worried about you.”

That bit had me sitting up in attention. “Worried about me?”

“Yeah…” George scratched the back of his head nervously. “I know she doesn’t show it on her face but she sounded worried.”

“I highly doubt that,” I frowned. Lydia was worried about me? Was that why she was angry? And why did that make me feel a lot better?

“I’ll think about it.” I told George. In truth, I didn’t think I had done anything wrong. The fucker deserved so much more for all the horrible things he had done. But maybe I had gone a bit overboard.

It was around one in the afternoon when I reached home, having decided to ditch school for the rest of the day. Lydia had gone MIA too after her first class. I had searched the entire compound looking for her but had given up when I didn’t spot her anywhere. I took a quick shower and plopped down on my bed, inspecting my hand. It was bruised but thankfully I didn’t have any cuts.

I wasn’t worried about Seth spilling his guts to his Sheriff daddy. That would mean he has to come clean about assaulting a minor. I know his father is a pretty shady person as well, who takes hefty cash as bribe for keeping the deal about the warehouse a secret and also gambles there on a daily basis. He also keeps his son out of trouble all the time, but the deal with a minor? You have to be really fucked up to let that pass.

I sighed and got up from bed. I’d been planning to apologize to Lydia all afternoon but if I keep procrastinating like this, I will never get to the real apologizing part. I didn’t feel an ounce of guilt about Seth but I did feel bad for making Lydia worried and that needs an apology.

So I threw on my T-shirt and started walking towards her house. It was a short seven minute walk and it would help me decide what I wanted to tell her when I finally came face to face with her.

But I guess I really don’t need to practice all that much? A simple ‘I’m sorry’ would mean a lot to her rather than some flowery words.

But as I approached her apartment, I found a blue Cadillac CT4 parked on the opposite side of the road. My brows furrowed as I tried to recognize the car and the chauffer. No one in Rosewater had a Cadillac. Then who could the car belong to?

It seems that I didn’t have to wait too long to get an answer as I saw Lydia exit the building at the instant with a bag in hand and the chauffer scrambled into action. He went to get her bag but Lydia shook her head so he stood by as she loaded the bag into the trunk.

Her long hair was up in a ponytail and she had ditched her normal jeans and shirts for a knitted sweater in peach and black leggings. Even the slightest change in her clothing seemed to change so much about her. She looked more relaxed. But even as the thought crossed my mind that Lydia had always been beautiful and I had only just started to realize it, I also had other, more distressing thoughts cross my mind.

What the hell was going on?

Was she leaving? Was she leaving for good? Why didn’t she tell me anything about it?

Shit! Was she leaving because of me?

Too many thoughts swam inside my head, so I did the only thing I thought was right and crossed the street over to her and asked her directly.

“Where are you going?”