Foes & Cons by Carrie Aarons (i am malala young readers edition .txt) 📗

Our team already decided on those two doing this task, and I know they’ll get it done the fastest. Laura strikes up a conversation with one of the girls she is kind of friendly with, and Glavin begins flirting with another.

“How you holding up, champ?” I turn to Sawyer and wrap my arms around him.

“We both have stomachs of steel, eh?” He smirks.

“You threw up and I’m on the verge of it, so I wouldn’t exactly say steel.” I chuckle.

He’s planting kisses on the side of my temple, and I’m just burrowing into his comfort and warmth, when a voice interrupts us.

“Sawyer, I just have to kiss you. We have to tick off kissing an athlete.” Hailey flutters her lashes in his direction and manages to wriggle in between us.

I’m forced to step away from Sawyer because of her proximity, and Nate and Matt come down from completing the task at that very moment.

He just points to his friends. “Glav and Matt are right there.”

No other explanation needed, he just shuts her down.

Unfortunately, in true Hailey fashion, she doesn’t go quietly. “Well, oh, um, they probably already did that with someone else. And you can’t kiss the same athlete as another team.”

“That’s definitely not a rule.” Laura glowers at her.

“So, it has to be you!” Hailey keeps talking as if my best friend never said a thing.

My blood is boiling, I just ate way too many Oreos, and my feet are still numb from the challenge where we had to stand in the frigid Jersey shore ocean for a minute plus.

I round on Hailey, my finger all but in her face. “Back off. You’ve been trying to nab my boyfriend the entire year, and he’s too kind to say this, so I will. He’s. Not. Interested. He wasn’t interested when we weren’t together, he wasn’t interested when you threw yourself at him, and he’s definitely not interested now. You can hate me all you want, go ahead. But stop trying to get with him, because it’s never going to happen. Back. Off.”

The look on Miss Mean Girl’s face is so priceless, I almost snap a picture and submit it as one of the scavenger hunt tasks. I don’t even know what that would fall under, but it has to earn us some kind of points.

“You … I … wh—” Hailey is floundering, sucking on air like a fish flopping around on dry land.

Laura and Nate start cackling, and blood is rushing to my face. I’ve never put Hailey in her place like that, and after years of tolerating her abuse, apparently I am at my breaking point. I’m a little embarrassed that I didn’t handle that as maturely as I could’ve, but you can only push a girl so far. After all of the advances she’s made toward Sawyer, trying to take a picture of me naked on New Year’s, and the onslaught of nasty comments I’ve always taken from her, it’s about damn time.

“We have to get in the car, it’s a three-hour drive to New York City and we’re burning daylight here,” Matt tells us, ever our commander.

Around me, I feel my friends and teammates moving on from this altercation and heading for the car. My eyes slide to the side, because Sawyer still hasn’t spoken, and I’m not sure if he’s mad at my outburst. Claiming him was rather ballsy, and dumb because we know what we have, but I’m just tired of Hailey.

When I turn to fully take in my boyfriend, he’s staring at me, an unreadable expression on his face. His perfect, pillowy lips are slightly open, he’s scrunching those emerald eyes at me, and his head is cocked to the side.

I’m about to open my mouth when he rushes at me. Scooping me up, I swallow a bit of a yelp when he sticks his tongue in my mouth. Sawyer’s hands are around my waist and in my hair, and I melt into the kiss. It seems endless, until one of our friends begins honking the car horn at us.

“Make out in the car, we have to drive!” Matt shouts.

Pulling back, I take in Sawyer’s expression. It’s the fiercest thing I’ve ever seen, and he’s eyeing me like he might tear off my clothes right here and start going at it. I have to admit, I’m well past the point of horny even with all the Oreos I just consumed sloshing around in my stomach.

“Yours.”

He whispers this, our noses pressed together, and there is nothing more he needs to say. We are each other’s, solely and completely.

Hailey is left standing there, still speechless, as we run to the van hand in hand. I have to giggle as we peel out of the parking lot and she is still looking in our direction, flabbergasted.

No one has ever stood up to her like that, that’s for sure. But that’s my man, and no one is treading on my territory anymore.

35

Sawyer

I lean against the hood of Blair’s car, holding a single red rose.

Technically, I skipped my tenth period class to come out here early, but a possible detention is worth it for this.

Last year, I took one of the most popular girls in our grade to junior prom. It wasn’t Hailey, but one of her minions, and the whole night was fucking terrible. The girl tried to cop a feel of my dick in front of my own mother during the pre-dance pictures, got way too drunk in the limo, and ended up puking on my rental tux by the end of the night. Not only was she a buzzkill, but the night didn’t feel anything like what it was supposed to. Everyone always talks up prom as one of the best nights of your high school life, but it hadn’t been for me.

Fast forward to this year, and I realize why. It’s because you’re supposed to take someone you actually like, not to mention love, as your date. Secretly,