The Education of Hailey Kendrick - Eileen Cook [35]
“Like her third nipple?” I joked.
Kelsie laughed. “You know what she says . . .”
“It’s a MOLE,” we screamed together, and for a second I felt just a little bit better.
16
I was determined to make my Sunday cleaning shift, if not enjoyable, at least more tolerable. Based on how things were going, I wouldn’t be separated from this cleaning job anytime in the near future, so I figured I might as well get along with Drew. While I thought it was unfair of him to lump all of us Evesham kids together as rich brats, it wasn’t surprising. We were a fortunate crowd. It was the kind of school where the student parking lot was full of Mercedes and BMWs, and on parents’ weekend there was more than one limo parked outside.
The night before I’d even had an idea of how to do something nice for Drew. Maybe if I were nice to someone who annoyed me, the universe would see that I was trying to do the right thing.
We were scheduled to clean the gym, and I was hoping that if I showed him a different side of myself he might let me be the one to run the floor polisher rather than having to pick gum, or god knows what else, out from under the bleachers.
“Good morning!” I said in a positive singsong voice so he would know there were no hard feelings from yesterday.
“Hey,” he said, and then he froze in place when he saw me. “What the heck happened to you?”
I touched my lower lip. My flight down the stairs last night had resulted in quite a few injuries. I was so covered in bruises that I looked like a cheetah, including a giant bruise on my temple that looked like I’d colored a dot on my face with a black marker. My cut lower lip had swollen overnight. It looked like what would happen if Angelina Jolie got her mouth stuck in a vacuum.
“This?” I shrugged, trying to turn the whole thing into a joke. “Bar fight.”
Drew crossed the floor and gently cupped my chin, turning my face right and left so he could assess the damage. The skin on his hands felt rough, but also warm. “Did someone hit you?” His eyes pinned me into place. “That’s never okay. If you need help, you can tell me.”
“Are you going to beat someone up for me?” I pulled my chin back, even though I had liked it resting in his hands. It wasn’t that I wanted him to touch me, but it felt nice to be touched by anyone, given my current leper status. “How gallant.”
“I’m being serious. My sister’s ex-boyfriend used to hit her. There’s a women’s group in town that can help.”
“They can’t help me.” I held up my hand to deflect his argument. Who knew that in the chest of a teen janitor beat the heart of a knight in shining armor? It wasn’t fair to compare him with Tristan or Joel, given the circumstances, but they had seen me fall and hadn’t offered this much sympathy. “No one hit me. I fell down the stairs.”
“Why did you fall down the stairs?”
“Well, it wasn’t exactly a well-thought-out plan. It was an accident.”
“You don’t strike me as the klutzy type. Did something upset you?”
“What is this, the inquisition?” I laughed, but it sounded fake even to my own ears. “No big story. I was rushing around and missed the top step.”
“All right.” Drew looked around the gym. “You look pretty banged up. I’m not sure you should be going up and down the bleachers bending over to do gum detail. Try to take it easy.”
“I could sit over there and supervise,” I offered. “Keep you entertained with jokes or something.”
“Nice try, Prima Donna, but the best thing when you’ve taken a fall is to keep moving. Otherwise your muscles stiffen up.”
“So you have a lot of experience falling down stairs?”
“I usually manage stairs, but I’ve taken my fair share of falls. I like to ski and snowboard, and I’ve wiped out mountain climbing a couple of times.”
“Mountain climbing?”
Drew laughed. “You should see your face. It’s like I told you I like to swim in sewers.”
“I don’t see the point in climbing a mountain, just to say you did? It seems awfully risky.”
“It’s more than