I Love You More Than I'm Afraid (Our Forevers #2), Rebel Hart [best adventure books to read .txt] 📗

her. He was a great guy, and though they had a rocky start, once they both found the confidence to boldly love one another without concern for anyone else, the feelings they had for each other overflowed and made everything around them a little bit shinier and more enjoyable. There was just something about being around two people who were clearly made for each other that was difficult to be cheerful around. Tristan himself wasn’t the issue. He fit into our group fine. He was much smarter than he was posturing to be when he was dedicated to being a popular kid, or a Pop as I liked to call them.

The problem was Tristan’s best friend, Hannah.

Hannah and I had a history that went far deeper than most people knew about. I had to tell Aria about it. She’d seen right through me when we briefly believed Hannah was dating Aria’s old best friend Lucky. It broke me to see her walking around with someone else over two years after she stopped seeing Tristan. I knew Hannah was gay, that wasn’t a question. It was the fact that it seemed like she was committed to just ignoring that fact and settling for less than happiness to appease the people around her.

And the fact that she appeared to have moved on from me didn’t feel great either.

After all that time, I’d managed to convince myself that I’d gotten over Hannah and hated her for the pain that she caused me, but I was so wrong. Just that little glimpse of thinking she was dating someone else shattered me. Aria had already developed her sixth ‘Arden’ sense; she spied it from a mile away.

For a while, Aria was worried about bringing Tristan around, because Tristan came with Hannah like a poisonous, spike-covered package deal. Their friendship was a constant reminder that, after everything Hannah and I had been through for fifteen years, it wasn’t stronger than what the two of them had developed in two.

Tristan and Hannah sat with us at lunch now, which meant lunch had quickly gone from being my favorite part of the day to my least favorite part. Being around Hannah, in a word, sucked. She was a pain I didn’t know how to surmount. It was just another thing I was excited to escape when it was finally time to graduate and go to college. I’d start fresh in some totally different part of the country and leave all the frustration of things with my family and Hannah behind.

The murmur of voices from the lunchroom pierced my thoughts as I entered. There were still several open tables far from the garbage cans, and none of my friends were sitting down yet. I scanned the big, open space to see if any of them were in line for food yet, but it seemed I was the first to arrive. I hopped into the lunch line quickly, opting to get one of the salad options to get through a little faster, then came out the other side and grabbed the table just to the left of the lunch line exit. I sat on one side of the long, rectangular tables and then pulled out my phone to look through while I waited for someone else to arrive.

That was how I learned the gods of fate must hate me personally.

Someone did come to the table, only about two minutes after I sat down. I stupidly didn’t look up at first, thinking that whoever it was would say hi or something to let me know that they’d arrived, but when the newest person at the table didn’t say anything, I looked up and was sitting kitty-corner from none other than my ex herself.

Fantastic.

Hannah was watching me with a tentative expression, but I didn’t say anything. Looking at her was hard enough, doubling my heart rate and creating sweat in my palms, so I turned my attention back to my phone, ignoring her altogether.

“Is it that awful to be around me?” she asked quietly.

I didn’t dare look up. Her puppy dog eyes could trick an eskimo out of ice. “It’s pretty awful.”

She let out a little whimper and slapped her hands on the table top. Her voice was quiet and intense as she hissed, “I’m so sorry I came along and disrupted your beautiful new life with Aria.” I glared up at her, not liking the jealous look in her eyes. She didn’t get to be jealous. Not after what she pulled. “Your parents think she’s your girlfriend by the way.”

I shrugged and looked back at my phone. “Whatever. They think anything with boobs that I talk to is my girlfriend. It hasn’t stopped them from adoring her.”

“They… they adore her?” she asked.

Once again, I looked up, seeing that she looked anguished in the wake of the question. “Who doesn’t love Aria?” I asked. I felt like tacking on ‘besides you’ but decided that was best left off.

Hannah opened her mouth to retort, but before she could say anything, Aria and Tristan arrived at the table. Tristan had both her and his trays balanced in each of his hands, and set one down in front of the seat next to me where Aria quickly dropped down. She looked sideways at my food and then took my salad and swapped it with her own burger and fries.

“Hey,” I growled, though I wasn’t really mad; she could have it if she wanted.

“I know you don’t want the salad; you did it to get through the line quicker,” she said before lifting the container and pointing at the ingredients inside, “which is why you didn’t realize that this has walnuts.”

My jaw dropped. “You are a lifesaver. I would have bitten into it before I realized.”

“Honestly,” Tristan complained as he settled in next to Hannah. “You gotta be more on top of things if you have a nut allergy. Those things are everywhere.”

“It’s not a ‘kills-me’ allergy, but it does make me itchy all over. It’s