Gravity Happens (Forcing Gravity) (36 page)

“Enough!” Ethan growled, squeezing his arms tighter around me. “She’s not worth it.”

“She’s a fucking bitch!” I screamed.

“She. Is. Not. Worth. It,” Ethan said, enunciating each word as we very publically left the club.

I had no idea where Garrett and Ellie and TJ and Hunter were, but I didn’t care. I was spinning in a wave of unconscious crazy that had overtaken me the minute I’d seen Chloe standing there looking all beautiful and smug and flirty like she hadn’t destroyed something so wonderful by being a selfish whore. I saw red, and I couldn’t stop myself.

As soon as we were outside, Ethan threw me into a cab and barked his address at the driver. I was vaguely aware that our picture had been taken as we left the club, but I couldn’t be bothered with that. So what if the world knew I was upset that I’d been cheated on? Who wouldn’t be? I had every right to mourn my break up and be miserable and deal with it however the fuck I wanted!

I sat back against the seat and crossed my arms in front of my chest defiantly. Screw them. Screw them all.

Ethan turned to me. “Logan, you punched her,” he said in disbelief.

“Yeah, I did,” I spat, venom coursing through my veins. “She deserved it.”

“But you punched her. You flat out hit her.”

I turned to him. “Yes, Ethan I did. I hit her, because she slept with Jase, and I’m not over it, and I’m not over him, and I hate her. So, yes, I hit her, because it felt good. Because I haven’t had a moment of internal peace i
n weeks, and I miss him, and I’m miserable, and tonight I saw him, and it just reminded me of everything I lost, that she took from me, so yes, I hit her as hard as I could, because I wanted her to feel even a sliver of the pain I’m feeling, that she inflicted on me when she was a selfish bitch who went after something that wasn’t hers.”

I was out of breath by the time I finished my diatribe and collapsed against the backseat in a huff.

“Um, okay then. I guess it was justified,” Ethan said idly, and I wondered if he wasn’t sure how to handle what I’d just thrown at him. Then he changed the subject. “Hey, there’s your billboard.”

I looked up to see the shot of me, Nora and Cody high above Sunset. I’d forgotten it was going up that day.

“Yeah.”

It didn’t even look like me.

“You guys look hot as hell.”

The finished product actually looked pr
etty amazing – more amazing than I could have predicted, and I’d seen the stills at work after the shoot. At that angle we were so life-size. I wondered idly if Jase had seen the billboard on his drive home and what he thought. Did he think I looked sexy? Would he even recognize me with all that make-up and the fake tan?

I closed my eyes then, wanting to ward off the thoughts invading my head. All I could think of was Jase’s face across the club. I looked to my right and saw the Hollywood sign and remembered all too clearly what the view of it from Jase’s back deck looked like. Had we still been together, I would have gone home with him, and we probably would have sat out on his deck talking before we went to bed together.

I squeezed my eyes even tighter, not sure how to process all that I was feeling. So many emotions were coursing through me in that moment along with the slowly fading adrenaline rush I’d felt when I’d nailed Chloe square in the face. I felt crazy and out of control and literally exhausted all at the same time.

Ethan didn’t say anything for the rest of the ride home, and when we got back to his place, I went upstairs, changed into a pair of his boxers and a t-shirt and went out to the couch
he had on the porch off of his bedroom.

“You’re sleeping outside?” he asked in disbelief.

“Yes,” I said so firmly that he didn’t say anything else.

He just tossed me a blanket, turned off the light and left me alone on the porch where I laid down on the couch where Jase had kissed me for the first time and looked up at the stars, wondering when I would start to feel a little less raw
, a little less broken. I just wanted the pain to go away.

No, in truth, I wanted Jase back
. But how could I even entertain that after what he’d done? He felt remorse that much I knew, but did it even matter? My dad had given my mom a second chance after she’d cheated, and she’d just done it again.

If I gave Jase a second chance, and I couldn’t believe I was even
considering that idea, could I ever trust him? Would our relationship consist of me freaking out every time I saw him look at another girl or panicking that the worst would happen when he had to go away on location and we were separated for months at a time?

I couldn’t live that way. I couldn’t be afraid that I’d turn around and get hurt again. I loved him and I missed him, but I wouldn’t put myself through that torture again. Getting over him was the only option I had.

Chapter
Twenty-Nine

Logan

“
You hit Chloe? For real?” Henley asked when I was getting ready for school on Monday.

I
’d hung out at Ethan’s, surfing, being lazy, and avoiding the outside world all day on Sunday, and when I’d gotten home that night, Henley hadn’t been there, so this was the first time we were talking.

“I hit her,” I confirmed, as I shoved my favorite hat over my head and looked down at my bruised knuckles.

I was playing incognito since the story of my encounter with Chloe had hit the Internet early Sunday morning. I really didn’t want to go to class, but I also didn’t want to be one of those people who hid from the media. I’d done what I’d done, and now I had to deal with it, but if I could avoid questions and stares by blending in with the crowd, it would make my day a whole hell of a lot easier.

I wasn’t sure what had come over me in that moment. I just remembered seeing red and then Chloe was there, and suddenly I was in her face, swinging. And the media was having a field day with it.
Thankfully there were no pictures of the actual incident, but there were plenty of eyewitness accounts, and those witnesses were more than happy to share their insight in exchange for fifteen minutes of fame. There were also a few shots of Chloe shopping at the farmer’s market on Sunday morning, sporting a black eye that accompanied pictures of Ethan and me leaving the club. I looked like hell.

“Oh, man, I bet that felt incredible,” Henley mused in her deep southern accent.

“Yeah, it sort of did,” I said, because for a split second it had. But it still didn’t erase what she’d done.

“I didn’t know you were so bad-ass, Logan,” she said then, and I turned away to grab my bac
kpack. I was going to be late for class if I didn’t hurry.

“Yeah, I guess I am,” I mumbled
, not really wanting to glamourize the whole incident. It definitely wasn’t the smartest move I’d ever made.

I was out the door before Henley
could say anything else, head down, walking briskly, hoping anyone I ran into wouldn’t say anything. I felt eyes on me all the way to class, but no one stopped me.

Throughout my two classes that morning, I was more focused than I ever had been before in my life, taking notes and looking only at the professor. When I sat down in Calc 2, since it was a smaller class, I heard whispers from those around me, and when the professor dismissed
the class, I got up in a hurry, but I wasn’t fast enough.

I heard a girl near me whispering to her friend. “Yeah, she really hit her, like punched her.”

“Wow,” the girl said. “That’s a little crazy if you ask me.”

At that,
I reeled around to face her and put on a fake smile. “Hi, I’m Logan. We haven’t met, but it seems you know me.”

The girl sneered at me. “I guess
. I mean, I’ve heard about you, and I’ve seen your picture in
Celebrity Weekly
a bunch of times.”

I narrowed my eyes at her, knowing exactly what she was alluding to. “You can’t believe everything you read, trust me.”

“I can if the information is true,” she said, and I wished I would have just kept walking. “Did you really hit Chloe St. James?”

“Yes,” I said, because it wasn’t like I could deny it. Too many people had seen me haul off and punch her.

The girl gave me a skeptical look. “And you don’t think that’s just a little crazy?”

I shook my head. “No, I don’t. She slept with my boyfriend. What would you do?”

I shouldn’t have said anything. I knew that. I should have just kept walking, but the girl’s comment had gotten under my skin, so there I was, spouting off all of my personal business to a virtual stranger.

Apparently making good decisions wasn’t something I was currently excelling at.

And to make matters worse, the girl still looked skeptical. “Yeah, I read that,” she said, “but are you really surprised? I mean, Chloe and Jason were like the best couple ever, so it wasn’t surprising that they got back together. They were meant to be, and she only kissed that producer guy. It wasn’t like he couldn’t have forgiven her. They were together for two years, and they were so in love.”

Yeah, they really weren’t.

“They’re not back together,” I said through gritted teeth.

The girl shrugged. “I don’t know about that. I’ve heard they’ve been seeing each other a lot since they got back to L.A. I mean, unless you know something we don’t know.”

I didn’t know anything anymore.

“I’m sorry,” I said, as politely as I could. “I shouldn’t have interjected myself into your conversation.”

I had nothing wittier to say in that moment, and I knew talking to them had been a mistake. Why did I even care what girls I didn’t know thought of me? What did it matter?

“See, I told you she was crazy,” the girl muttered to her friend as I walked away, and it took everything in me to just keep walking.

I was relieved to see Ethan calling as I was walking back to my dorm. It would give me something to do other than obsess about my mistakes of late.

“Hey E, what’s up?”

“Nothing. What are you doing between classes?”

Ethan knew
I had a wide break on Mondays and Wednesdays between my class that got over at noon and my one that was at three.

I sighed. “Well, my mother called last night. She had several stores on Rodeo put dresses on hold for me, and she wants me to go try them on to see which ones fit.
I’m supposed to have the store hold them if I like them, and then her stylist will chose which one I’ll wear to the party she and Luiz are having in May.”

“Wow, sounds like a blast.”

“Want to keep me company?”

“I can’t. I have to meet my econ study group at one. I wanted to see if you wanted to grab lunch.”

I was sort of hungry.

“I can’t. I only want to make on
e shopping trip, so I need to hurry. I’ll just eat a Pop Tart on the way.”

“Iced cherry flavored. They’re the best.”

I smiled. I loved that he was keeping things light. The last thing I needed was more reminders of what had happened on Saturday night. A part of me wanted to bitch about the girls I’d just encountered, but telling him would mean reliving the whole incident, and I wasn’t ready to do that.

“I’ve got two boxes in my room,
” I told him instead.

“Well, enjoy, and call me later.”

“You got it.”

* * *

I’d made it through two stores before I was spotted, and suddenly I was being followed and my picture snapped every few seconds. The questions all pertained to the incident on Saturday night, and I just kept my head up and ignored the photographers. When I got to the next store, the photographers waited outside, and when I emerged twenty minutes later, I was shocked to realize their numbers had doubled in size.

I still had one more store to go to, but it was at the opposite end of where I was, so I decided to skip it. I’d just tell my mom that none of the dresses
there had worked for me. I started toward my car when I was bumped from behind. I froze for a second and heard someone chuckle behind me, so I knew it was intentional. I ignored the person and kept walking.

Then I was bumped again. They were trying to provoke me, but I wasn’t going to give in. I decided to walk faster.

I could see my car across the street when some of the photographers started to walk in front of me to snap my picture. Then I realized there were a few on either side of me, and I started to feel claustrophobic.

“Can you please not walk so close?” I asked, hoping they’d be civil, but they didn’t listen.

“Answer our questions and we’ll go away,” one taunted.

“Please, just leave me alone,” I said softly, suddenly on the verge of tears. I did not want to cry in front of them.

As I stopped to cross the street, the photographers were suddenly right in my face, and they were jostling with each other to get a shot in. I started to panic for the first time, and my car suddenly seemed very far away.