After We Collided

The three of us hurry inside the building, and my eyes immediately start scanning for any sign of Hardin.

  But I hear him first . . . “I don’t give a fuck, you’re nothing more than a douche bag with a fake badge! You’re basically a mall cop, you fucking prick!”

  I follow his voice and turn down the hall in pursuit of him. I hear Ken and Landon on my heels, but all I care about is getting to Hardin.

  I come to where several people are gathered . . . and see Hardin pacing back and forth inside a small cell. Holy shit. His arms are behind his back in handcuffs.

  “Fuck you! All of you!” he yells.

  “Hardin!” His father’s voice booms from behind me.

  My angry boy’s head snaps to the side, to where I’m standing, and his eyes go wide immediately. His face is split open just below his cheekbone, and his skin is sliced from his ear to the back of his head, his hair matted with blood.

  “I’m trying to contain this, and you aren’t helping!” Ken barks at his son.

  “They have me trapped in here like some fucking animal. This is bullshit. Call whoever you need to call and get them to unlock this shit!” Hardin yells, attempting to tear his hands from the cuffs.

  “Stop it,” I say to him and scowl.

  Immediately, his demeanor changes. He calms a little, but is no less angry. “Tessa, you shouldn’t even be here. What kind of genius fucking idea was it to bring her?” Hardin hisses at his father and Landon.

  “Hardin, stop it now. He’s trying to help you. You need to calm down,” I say through the bars. This doesn’t feel real, talking to him while he’s literally in a cell in handcuffs. This can’t be real. But then again, this is what happens in the real world. You get arrested if you assault someone, on campus just as anywhere else.

  As he looks at my eyes, I imagine he sees the pain I feel for him right now. I want to think that’s why he finally gives in, and softly nods and says, “Okay.”

  “Thank you, Tessa,” Ken says. Then he warns his son, “Give me a few minutes to see what I can do—in the meantime you need to stop yelling. You’re making this worse for yourself when you’re already in a load of trouble.”

  Landon looks to me, then to Hardin, before following Ken back down the narrow hallway. I hate this place already; everything is too white and black, too small, and it smells like bleach.

  The campus security officers that sit behind the desk are immersed in their own conversation at the moment, or at least they’ve begun pretending to be since the chancellor of the school showed up to deal with his son.

  “What happened?” I ask Hardin.

  “I got arrested by campus security,” he huffs.

  “Are you okay?” I ask him, desperately wanting to reach through and wipe his face.

  “Me? Yeah, I’m fine. It’s not so bad as it looks,” he answers, and examining him, I can see he’s right. I can tell from here that the cuts aren’t deep. His arms have light red streaks on them, mixing with the black ink to form a rather terrifying sight.

  “Are you upset with me?” His voice is soft, a thousand degrees from where it was moments ago while he was screaming at the police.

  “I don’t know,” I answer honestly.

  Of course I’m upset with him, because I know who he fought . . . well, it isn’t hard to guess. But I’m also worried about him, and I want to know what happened that led him to be in all of this trouble.

  “I couldn’t help it,” he says, as if that justifies his actions.

  “I told you before I wouldn’t visit you in a jail cell, remember?” I frown, looking around the cell he’s in.

  “This doesn’t count, it’s not a real cell.”

  “It looks real to me.” I tap on the metal bars to prove my point.

  “It’s not an actual jail; this is just a bullshit holding cell until they decide to involve the real police,” he says loud enough for the two officers to look up from their conversation.

  “Stop it. This isn’t a joke, Hardin. You could be in a lot of trouble.”

  Hearing that, he rolls his eyes.

  That’s the problem with Hardin: he hasn’t quite realized that his actions have consequences.

  chapter one hundred and twenty

  TESSA

  Who started it?” I ask, trying my best not to jump to conclusions like I normally do.

  Hardin tries to meet my eyes, but I look away. “I went to find him after I walked you to class,” he says.

  “You promised me that you’d leave him alone.”

  “I know.”

  “So why didn’t you?”

  “He was pushing it—he started provoking me, saying that he fucked you.” He looks at me with a wild desperation. “You aren’t lying about that, are you?” he asks, and I nearly lose it.

  “I’m not answering that question again. I already told you that nothing happened between us, and here you are in a freaking jail cell asking such a thing,” I say with frustration.

  He rolls his eyes and sits down on the small metal bench inside the holding cell. He’s really pissing me off.

  “Why did you go find him? I want to know.”

  “Because he needed his ass beat, Tessa. He needs to know that he isn’t to come near you again. I’m sick of his fucking games and the way he thinks he has some sort of fucking chance with you. I did this for you!”

  I cross my arms over my chest. “How would you feel if I’d been the one to go find him today after I told you I wouldn’t? I thought we were both trying to make this work, and here you blatantly lied to my face. You knew you weren’t going to hold up your end of the deal, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, I did, okay? It doesn’t matter now, what’s done is done,” he huffs like an angry child.

  “It matters to me, Hardin. You keep getting yourself in trouble when it’s not necessary.”

  “It’s very necessary, Tess.”

  “Where’s Zed now? Is he in jail, too?”

  “This isn’t jail.”

  “Hardin . . .”

  “I don’t know where he is, nor do I give a shit, and neither do you. You aren’t going near him.”

  “Stop being like this! Stop telling me what I can and can’t do—it’s really pissing me off.”

  “Are you cursing at me?” he says with an amused smirk.

  Why does he think this is funny? It’s anything but funny. I begin to walk away from him, and the smile disappears from his lips.

  “Tessa, come back,” he says, making me turn around.

  “I’m going to find your father to see what’s going on.”

  “Tell him to hurry up.”

  I growl at him, literally, as I walk away. He thinks just because his father is the chancellor, he’s going to get out of this easily, and honestly, I really hope he does. But it’s still nerve-racking how lightly he’s taking the whole thing.

  “What the fuck are you looking at?” I hear him say to a cop, and I rub my fingers over my temples.

  I find Ken and Landon standing next to an older man with gray hair and a mustache. He’s wearing a tie and black dress pants, and the way he’s holding himself gives me the feeling that he’s important. When Landon notices me standing in the hall, he walks over to me.

  “Who’s that?” I ask him quietly.

  “He’s the provost.”

  “That’s the vice chancellor, right?”

  Landon looks worried. “Yeah.”

  “What’s going on? What are they saying?” I try to hear the two men talking, but I can’t make out anything.

  “It’s . . . well, it’s not looking good. There was a lot of damage done to the lab that Zed was in—I’m talking thousands of dollars’ worth of damage. On top of that, Zed has a broken nose and a concussion. Someone drove him to the hospital.”

  My blood begins to boil. Hardin didn’t just push Zed around. He seriously injured him!

  “Also, Hardin shoved a professor to the floor. There’s a girl who’s in Zed’s class that already wrote a statement sayi
ng Hardin came in there looking for Zed specifically. It’s looking really bad right now. Ken’s trying his best to keep Hardin out of jail, but I don’t know if that’s going to happen.” Landon sighs, running his fingers through his hair. “The only thing that can keep him out of jail is if Zed decides to not press charges. Even then I don’t know what’ll happen.”

  My head is spinning.

  “Expulsion,” I hear the gray-haired man say, and Ken rubs his hand over his chin.

  Expulsion? Hardin can’t get expelled from school! Oh my God, this is a mess.

  “He’s my son,” Ken says quietly, and I take a sly step closer to them.

  “I know he is, but assaulting a professor and damaging school property isn’t something we can just brush aside,” the man says.

  Damn Hardin and his temper. “This is a disaster,” I tell Landon, and he nods sullenly.

  I want to throw myself on the floor and cry, or better yet, I want to stomp over to Hardin’s cell and punch him in his face. Neither of those things will help.

  “Maybe you should talk to Zed about not pressing charges?” Landon suggests.

  “Hardin will freak out if I go anywhere near him.” Not that I should even listen to him, since he doesn’t listen to me.

  “I know,” Landon replies, “but I don’t know what else to suggest at this point.”

  “I guess you’re right.” I look back at Ken, then down the hall, to where Hardin is.

  Hardin is my first priority, but I do feel awful for what he did to Zed, who I hope is going to be okay. Maybe if I go talk to him he’ll decide not to press charges, which would at least eliminate one problem.

  “Where is he? Do you know?” I ask Landon.

  “I think I overheard them say he’s at Grandview Hospital.”

  “Okay. Well, I’ll go there first.”

  “Do you need a ride back to your car?”

  “Shit. I didn’t drive.”

  Landon digs his hand into his pocket and hands me his keys. “Here. Just drive carefully.”

  I smile at my best friend. “Thanks.”

  I have no idea what I would do without him, but since he’s leaving soon, I guess I’ll have to find out. The thought saddens me but I push it back; I can’t think about Landon’s leaving right now.

  “I’ll go talk to Hardin and let him know what’s going on.”

  “Thank you again.” I wrap my arms around Landon’s neck in a tight hug.

  Just as I reach the door Hardin’s voice booms down the hall. “Tessa! Don’t you fucking dare go find him!” he screams. I ignore him and open the double doors.

  “I mean it, Tessa! Come back in here!”

  The cold air drowns out his loud voice as I walk outside. How dare he tell me what to do like that? Who does he think he is? He’s made a huge mess because he can’t control his temper and jealousy. I’m trying to help clean up this mess. He’s lucky I didn’t slap him for breaking his promise to me. God, he’s so frustrating.

  WHEN I ARRIVE at Grandview, the woman at the nurse’s station doesn’t want to give me any information on Zed. She won’t confirm if he’s here now or tell me if he’s been here at all.

  “He’s my boyfriend and I really need to see him,” I tell the young bottle blonde.

  She obnoxiously pops her chewing gum and twirls a lock of her hair between her fingers. “He’s your boyfriend? The kid with all the tattoos?” She laughs, obviously not believing me.

  “Yes. He is.” My tone is clipped, nearly threatening, and I’m surprised at how intimidating I actually manage to sound.

  It must work, because she shrugs and says, “Go down the hall and make a right. First door on the left,” before wandering off.

  Well, that wasn’t too hard. I should be more forceful more often. I do as she told me and approach the first door on the left. It’s closed, so I knock lightly before entering. I hope she told me the right room.

  Zed is sitting on the edge of a hospital bed. He’s shirtless, wearing only jeans and socks. His face.

  “Oh my God!” I can’t help but blurt out as I take in his appearance.

  His nose is broken; I already knew that, but it looks so bad. It’s so swollen and both his eyes are black. His chest is covered in bandages; the set of stars inked just below his collarbones is the only thing not covered in bandages or cuts.

  “Are you okay?” I walk over to the bed. I hope he’s not angry with me for coming here, to the hospital; this is my fault, after all.

  “Not really,” Zed says timidly. He lets out a deep breath and ruffles his hair before opening his eyes. He pats the bed next to him and I walk over to sit beside him.

  “I’m so sorry for this. Will you tell me what happened?”

  Zed’s caramel eyes meet mine and he nods. “I was in the lab—not the one I showed you, but our plant tissue lab—and he came in there and started telling me to stay away from you.”

  “Then what?”

  “I told him he doesn’t own you and he slammed my head against a metal bar.” I flinch at his words, looking at his nose.

  “Did you tell him you slept with me?” I ask, unsure whether I believe this or not.

  “Yeah. I did. I’m really sorry for saying that, but you have to understand he was attacking me, and I knew that was the only way to get to him. I feel like such an asshole for saying it. I’m really sorry, Tessa.”

  “He promised me that he’d stay away from you if I did, too,” I tell him.

  “Well, looks like he broke another promise, didn’t he?” he says pointedly.

  I stay quiet for a minute and try to put the fight together in my head. I’m angry at Zed for telling Hardin we slept together, but I’m glad he admitted it and apologized. I don’t know which of these boys to be more angry with. It’s hard to be angry at Zed as he sits here with so many injuries that I basically caused, and despite all of that he’s still being so kind to me.

  “I’m sorry that this keeps happening because of me,” I tell him.

  “It’s not your fault. It’s mine, and his. He just views you as some sort of property, and it pisses me off. You know what he said to me? He said that I should know better than to ‘fuck with what’s his.’ That’s how he talks about you when you aren’t around, Tessa.” His voice is soft and calm, totally unlike Hardin’s.

  I don’t like the way Hardin seems to think he owns me either, but it bothers me when someone else says it. Hardin doesn’t know how to handle his emotions and he’s never been in a relationship before. “He’s just territorial.”

  “You can’t really be defending him right now.”

  “I’m not, that’s not what I’m doing. I don’t know what to think. He’s in jail . . . well, in a holding cell on campus, and you’re in the hospital. This is just too much for me. I know I shouldn’t be complaining but I’m so sick of this drama all the time. Every time I feel like I can breathe, something else happens. It’s drowning me.”

  “He’s drowning you,” Zed corrects me.

  It’s not only Hardin that’s drowning me. It’s everything: it’s this college, my so-called friends who betrayed me, Hardin, Landon leaving me, my mother, Zed . . .

  “I did this to myself, though.”

  Zed says, not without a little annoyance, “Stop blaming yourself for his mistakes. He does this shit because he doesn’t care about anyone but himself. If he cared about you, he’d have stayed away from me like he promised. He wouldn’t have stood you up on your birthday . . . I could go on for ages.”

  “Did you text me from his phone?”

  “What?” He presses his palm to the bed to shift his body closer to mine. “Fuck.” He hisses from the pain.

  “Do you need something? I can call a nurse?” I offer, momentarily distracted.

  “No, I’m getting ready to leave here. They should be finishing up my discharge papers. Now, what were you saying about me texting you?” he asks.

  “Hardin seems to think you’re the one who texted me on his birthday pretend
ing to be him so I thought he was coming but he didn’t know he was supposed to.”

  “He’s lying. I would never do that. Why would I?”

  “I don’t know, he thinks you’re trying to make me hate him or something.”

  Zed’s gaze is too intense, I have to look away. “He’s doing a pretty good job of that on his own, isn’t he?”

  “No, he’s not,” I counter. No matter how angry I am with him and how confused Zed’s words are making me, I want to defend Hardin.

  “He’s only saying that so you’ll think I’m some sort of villain when I’m not. I’ve always been there for you when he wasn’t. He can’t even keep a simple promise to you. He came in there and attacked me—and a professor! He kept on saying he was going to kill me, and I really believed him. If Professor Sutton hadn’t come in, he would have. He already knows he can take me, he’s done it multiple times.” Zed shivers and stands to his feet. He grabs his green T-shirt from the chair and lifts his arms to pull it on. “Shit.” He drops it to the floor.

  I hurry to my feet to help him and grab the shirt from the ground.

  “Lift as much as you can,” I say and he brings his arms straight forward in front of him to aid me in dressing him.

  “Thank you.” He tries to smile again.

  “What hurts the most?” I ask, assessing his swollen face again.

  “Rejection,” he timidly answers.

  Ouch. I look down at my hands and begin to pick at my fingers.

  “My nose,” he then offers as a gesture to soften the moment. “When they had to set the broken bone.”

  “Are you going to press charges against him?” I finally ask what I came here to ask.

  “Yeah.”

  “Don’t, please.” I stare into his eyes.

  “Tessa, you can’t do this. It isn’t fair.”

  “I know. I’m sorry, but if you press charges he’ll go to jail, to real jail.” The thought sends me into a panic again.

  “He broke my nose and I have a concussion; if he’d hit my head against that floor again, it would’ve killed me.”

  “I’m not saying that’s okay, but I’m begging you. Please, Zed. We are leaving anyway. I’m transferring to Seattle, and Hardin will be gone, too.”