Chapter Twenty-Six

Ryan

Most Likely to Kill Each Other

She doesn t move for a long time, just keeps huddling against the damn door. I liked it better when she was arguing with me. I liked it better when she was saying anything at all , because this quiet - this silence, this stillness - it s unnerving, coming from her.

I d almost think she was busy plotting her next move, and my demise, if she weren t all hunched up and sad-looking like that.

Which I guess, I can t really blame her for, if that s how she remembers things from school. It s not like I set out to embarrass her, but she d act so high and mighty and so goddamn annoying all the time, I was constantly itching to take her down a peg or two.

I don t know how I ever thought it didn t get to her. It got to me badly enough that she s still nagging in the back of my mind ten years later, my career shaped around the things I think she d have to say about it - so why did I ever think she was above such normal things as caring what I said to her?

Because she was. She did a good job at pretending to be, anyway. Ashleigh Easton wasn t human , in the way other people were. She was - above all that. Beyond it. We used to say she was such a square, a real bitch, because she was too mature for our childish bullshit. Sure, you d know when she was pissed off or feeling especially self-righteous or exasperated, but she never got sad .

Right now, I don t know what she is. The emptiness of it seems to roar in the space between us, and the chemistry classroom feels suddenly claustrophobic - something that has nothing to do with the locked door, and everything to do with her. Like she s sucked all the air out of the room and hugged it tight to her, because my chest feels tight and my mouth is dry and my breathing is too hard, too loud.

I swing my leg back down from the stool my ankle is propped up on, standing cautiously back onto it and relieved when there s no twinge of pain.

Ashleigh doesn t so much as twitch as I make my way slowly towards her. And, in the absolute silence that surrounds us now, I know she hears me coming. My hand is reaching for her shoulder and, at the last second, I change course to set it against one of those ridiculous puffy sleeves instead of her bare skin. As if she might burn if I get too close.

Her breath sounds like a car stalling, all sharp, uneven judders as she inhales.

I know you don t want to hear it, but - I m sorry, anyway. I never, sort of I never realised how it looked from your side. Stuff like that - with the party, I mean - I didn t do it to pick on you, or whatever. I spent a lot of time at school trying to get you to like me, you know? I admit, and it s punctuated with a self-deprecating laugh. I take my hand from her shoulder to run it through my hair agitatedly, the confession making me feel weirdly nervous.

I can go on national TV, debate over bills and laws and campaigns, tell my superiors when they re making reckless decisions, collaborate in the shadows with my so-called rivals on the other side of the bench, and I don t bat an eye.

But when it comes to Ashleigh Easton

She s something else.

And now, she peels herself slightly away from the locked door she s been treating as some kind of sanctuary and stands a little straighter as she turns around to face me. Her arms cross and her chin ticks up in challenge, but the frown that twists her dark eyebrows is quizzical and sceptical, not scathing.

I cut off whatever she s about to say. What, you don t believe me? Hand on heart. I hold it up to demonstrate. It drove me nuts that you didn t like me. Everybody liked me. Everybody still likes me, but I knew - fuck, I knew that coming here tonight, nothing would ve changed, you still wouldn t like me, and it still bugs me.

A smirk flits across her face, making her look more like herself. More like the version I know, anyway, and it ignites something in my chest that makes me push on.

I ve always been good with people. Connecting with them. Winning them round to my side. Getting them to like me. But you You never liked me. You fought me tooth and nail every step of the way, and it fucking killed me. I just couldn t get my head around the fact that you didn t , so of course I tried to get you to like me. That s why I used to invite you to parties. I flirted with you like I did with all the other girls, but that just used to piss you off. I tried to banter with you like the guys, but you never responded to that either.

Probably, because to her, it seemed like I was only ever taking the piss. I m starting to understand that now.

But Ashleigh laughs, and it s a full, warm sound that makes me lean in a little closer as she tosses her head in disbelief, and grins at me like it s the greatest joke she s ever heard. The scepticism is rooted deep in her pale blue eyes, one eyebrow arching upwards. Her lips pull wide across her cheeks and I glance, again, at that lipstick smudge.

You didn t flirt with me.

I absolutely did. I flirted with everybody.

Yeah, because you were a notorious flirt. It was practically hardwired into your DNA. I remember you flirting with Mrs Macarthur when you forgot your maths homework, one time. But you didn t flirt with me .

I told you how cute you looked that time on non-uniform day, when you wore that blue T-shirt. It was the same colour as her eyes. The first time I noticed her eyes at all, actually.

You also told me I was flat-chested, had a bony arse, looked - and I quote you directly here - like a sickly Victorian ghost child. Not even just a sick child, a sick ghost child .

I mean. I don t remember that time specifically, but I don t doubt that I would ve said it. I rub the back of my neck and give her a self-effacing smile I m not sure she can even make out in the darkness. You re pretty bloody pale, Ashleigh.

She rolls her eyes, but her smile creeps back out again.

And you did have a really bony arse. I swear I got a bruise that time you fell on me in the common room.

Hilarious. Look, tell yourself what you want about whatever you think you remember about school, but I can categorically tell you, you never flirted with me. You used to take the piss - yup, called it - and you know how I know that? Because of that one time I heard your mates dare you to kiss me at the leavers party, and you said you wouldn t even want to hold my hand if I was the last girl in the world, and couldn t even be interested in me if you were so shitfaced you forgot your own name and I threw myself at you. You called me decidedly unfuckable .

What-? I cut off as the memory of that hits with vivid clarity, playing out in my mind like a scene from a movie. I haven t thought twice about that since it happened, but her words bring it back like it was just yesterday. Ashleigh gives me a triumphant look, so confident she s just proved me wrong, but I m too busy trying to formulate a response that the expression doesn t bug me the way it usually would.

Finally, I manage, Yeah, of course I said that! What did you expect me to say? You wouldn t have wanted me to come up and snog you on our last night out with everybody after results. Or ever , actually, let s face it. And I didn t even fancy you to want to snog you, either.

You didn t just not fancy me. You didn t even want to kiss me for a dare, and I ll remind you that you ran a lap stark bollock naked around the rugby pitch one lunchtime because some of the lads egged you on, and you didn t even think twice about it.

My mouth falls open and my eyebrows scrunch together as I try to figure out how we re seeing this so differently. The rest of our interactions at school, I can maybe understand, but this one seemed so cut and dried, I don t know how she s not getting it. My hands gesture awkwardly, stiffly, between us, palm up.

Weirdly enough, Ash, I didn t want to snog you when I knew you weren t going to be into it, whatever the boys had to say about it, even for a laugh. So, yeah, I said I wouldn t touch you with a bargepole or whatever, because then they dropped it. They d have just kept on about it all night otherwise, and that would ve annoyed the both of us. Plus, I really fancied Thea at the time and she d just broken things off with Shaun s mate, so I was planning to finally get a kiss off her at the leavers party, and if I d been off snogging you instead, I don t think she would ve appreciated that too much.

The smug, exasperated look finally slides off Ashleigh s face, replaced by something slack as she digests that.

Her voice is quiet and all she has to say is, Oh.

Yeah, oh . God. This girl.

I know you re kind of up your own arse sometimes - bony as it is - but you do realise I m not a complete dick, don t you?

The face she pulls this time is on instinct, I know, because it s the same withering look I remember so well from school, but even that vanishes quickly, into something that seems to say, I m starting to .

Better late than never, I guess.

I don t know when it started to matter so much to me that Ashleigh see me, but She always has, in her own annoying, holier-than-thou way. That laser focus of hers cut right through me when I played up to my own act in school and even if everybody else thought I was always so upbeat and untouchable, she didn t.

It d just be nice if she d see that wasn t always an act, I think.

Not so I could finally win her over and revel in the victory of saying, after all this time, even Ashleigh Easton isn t immune to the infamous Lawal charm, but just because.

But, at the same time, this is us, and I can t help but slip into old habits as I smirk at her.

I brace a hand against the doorframe above her head, so that when I shift closer, I m leaning over her, despite the fact she s almost of a height with me in those heels, and she has to move back into the door again and tilt her head to look at me properly.

Don t tell me you were upset because I didn t kiss you that night.

She scoffs, but won t quite meet my eye. I ve cast her in shadow too much to tell if she s blushing, but I m not curious enough to move away. She doesn t shove me aside, either.

No.

She sounds pretty sure about that.

Are you sure about that? I tease.

Yes. I m sure.

So it didn t get to you, that I didn t want to kiss you, even for a dare? Didn t disappoint you, that I said I wasn t attracted to you?

Correct. Believe me, Ryan, when I say I could not care less that you didn t find me attractive. If anything - her shoulders drop and her body arches towards mine, eyes glinting - it sounds like you re the one who s annoyed I never responded to your pathetic attempts to flirt with me. What did you say? It drove you nuts.

I swallow a laugh. Thinking about my nuts, Easton?

God, you re insufferable, d you know that?

This time, I do chuckle. And I lean in a little closer, testing it - her - this tension that clings to the sliver of air between our bodies. She doesn t move this time, so I brush up against her, and the heat of her makes my jaw clench.

I didn t fancy Ashleigh at school. She was - fine. Not pretty in the way girls like Steph or Thea or Roisin were, didn t make an effort and have that allure like Bryony or Elise. She just was. And she was too much of a prick to be fanciable, even if she had been especially pretty.

But the Ashleigh in front of me, right now, tonight

Hell, not even just tonight . The one I ve seen in snatches, glimpses, on social media, too. It s not like she grew into her body - more like it grew into her, shaped itself around that confidence, the way she carried herself, her absolute sureness of who she was.

But, also, it looks so damn good on her.

The wispy fringe that doesn t look fashionable so much as sexy, the cut of her outfit comfortable and decisive instead of try-hard or trendy. Even that attitude that drove me crazy when we were teenagers Now, it s driving me a very different kind of crazy. The kind that makes me want to slip my tongue inside her mouth to taste her, feel the soft lines of her body pressing flush against mine.

Ashleigh draws a quiet, slow breath, and my gaze is fixed on her face as I watch her blink slowly, her whole body angled towards me, her lips parting as she moves them closer to mine

Oh, Ryan, she breathes, barely an inch from my mouth - and just as I lean in, she draws back, challenge and triumph sparkling in her eyes as her mouth curves into a closed-lipped smile. You couldn t handle it.