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All Chapters of CRAVING MY BULLY STEPBROTHER : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

128 Chapters

011

ISABELLEShe turned and left, I moved my feet slowly. My cheek was still burning when I walked out of that bathroom.I kept my head down, my hand not touching my face because touching it would make it even more real, and I needed it to not be real for at least the next three minutes. I made it to the end of the corridor, turned the corner, and stood against the wall with my bag pressed to my chest.I breathed but the sting didn't go anywhere.Tyler found me before fourth period.He took one look at my face and stopped walking."What happened to your cheek?"I reached for my notepad.*Nothing, I am fine.*He looked at me for a long moment, his jaw working. "Was it that girl we saw earlier? That was peeking and staring, what was her name again, Sienna?"I didn't write anything."That's a yes," he said quietly. He exhaled through his nose and looked down the corridor briefly. "We should tell someone."I shook my head immediately."Why not? She clearly hurt you."I wrote fast.*Because i

012

ISABELLEI ate dinner in my room that night. I didn't plan to. I just stood at the top of the stairs, heard Lily's voice drifting up from the kitchen asking Lucas to set the table, heard the clatter of plates and my father's murmured response, and turned around and went back to my room and closed the door.I wasn't hungry anyway.I sat on my bed with my back against the headboard and my phone in my lap and stared at the wall opposite me. The same wall Lucas's room was on the other side of. I thought about that for exactly one second and then stopped thinking about it.My phone had forty seven notifications I hadn't opened.I turned it face down. A knock came at my door around eight.I knew it wasn't my father because my father knocked like he was apologizing for the interruption. This knock was different, it was Lucas. "I know you're awake."I stayed completely still. He didn't use the spare key this time.His footsteps moved away from the door, back down the corridor, and then his o

013

ISABELLEI wrote *But, it's far away,*“I know…but you can think about it,”*I will,* I wrote quickly. Tyler read it, and smiled, “Okay, sure,” he said.I walked to the bus stop, I didn't look back at Lucas as he was staring at the parking lot. The bus came and I got on. I stared out the window the entire ride home and told myself the tight feeling in my chest was the cold air and nothing else.Lucas got home fourteen minutes after I did.I was already in my room when I heard the front door. His footsteps crossed the ground floor, paused somewhere near the kitchen, then came up the stairs at the hurried pace.They slowed outside my door, I sat on my bed with a book open to a page I hadn't read and didn't move. After a moment his footsteps continued, then his door closed quietly.I looked at the page, still hadn't read it and I stayed that way till I fell asleep.Breakfast the next morning had the energy of trying to be completely normal about everything.Lucas stood at the counter e

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ISABELLETyler looked at Lucas for a moment, then looked past him and his gaze landed on me.I didn't know what my face was doing."Stepsister?" Tyler repeated. "That's what I said," Lucas said.Tyler nodded slowly. "Okay." He looked at Lucas directly. "And what exactly does that change?""It literally changes everything," Lucas said.“Changes for who? You or her?" Tyler said. The doorway went very quiet, I finally moved, crossing the hallway and appeared properly behind Lucas. Tyler looked at me with an soft eyes that asked if I was okay without using any words, I nodded once.He looked back at Lucas. "I came to return her notebook," he said. "She left it at the library." He held it out past Lucas's shoulder toward me. I reached around Lucas and took it."Thanks for clarifying the situation," Tyler said to Lucas, pleasantly. "Goodnight."He walked back down the path, Lucas stood in the doorway watching him go, one hand on the frame, I went back upstairs without saying anything.I

015

ISABELLEI sat with his words until midnight.I turned them over from every angle, looking for the version that made them mean something other than what they sounded like. The version where Lucas Graham was simply being territorial in the way he was territorial about hockey. The version where it was about control and not about anything else.I put my phone face down and went to sleep.Morning came with rain against the window and Lucas was already gone by the time I got downstairs.Lily was at the counter. "He left early, he said he had early morning practice.” she said, without me asking. I nodded and poured coffee."Isabelle." She turned around with her own mug. "Is everything okay between you two?"I reached for my notepad.*Yes, everything is fine.*She looked at me like she didn't believe my response but she decided not to press it. "Okay then." she said.I took my coffee upstairs.This time Tyler decided to come pick me up and I couldn't refuse. He was at the front of my hous

016

ISABELLEThe corridor went completely silent.Lucas stared at me, behind him two of his teammates had frozen mid-step.I held his gaze for one more second. Then I turned and walked away.Tyler appeared at the far end of the corridor, read the room in under a second, and fell into step beside me without asking a single question.Behind us Lucas Graham stood in the corridor with my voice still sitting in the air around him, and for the first time since I had known him, he had absolutely nothing to say.I didn't think about it on the walk to the bus stop.I didn't think about it on the bus, or during the twenty minutes it took to get home, or while I changed out of my school clothes and sat on my bed with my knees pulled up and my phone face down beside me.I thought about it at exactly nine forty seven when the house had gone quiet and there was nothing left to put between me and the fact that I had spoken today.My voice came out loud. And in a corridor full of people who had spent the

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ISABELLEI pushed the previous day’s conversation at the back of my head, I felt if I didn't give any time of day, it wouldn't be stuck in my brain."She's going to do something."Tyler said it the next morning before I had even put my bag down, I looked at him."Sienna, cornered me yesterday after you left because she waited by the parking lot."I pulled out my notepad immediately.*What does she want from me for goodness sake?*"She told me you were using me." He said it without any heat on it, just laid it flat. "That the whole thing, the studying, the formal, the sign language, that it was all to get Lucas's attention. That you've been running this since the video" he gestured between us.I stared at him, not knowing how to answer that."Don't worry, I said thanks for the concern, then I left." He picked up his coffee. *Is that it? Do you believe what she said?*"That's it, I didn't believe her. I don't need to perform not believing her." He looked at me directly. "I just though

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ISABELLE I stared at the message for a long time. There was no follow up, only the message sitting on my screen at nine forty three like the person had typed it and put his phone down before the person would take it back. I typed back.*Give me one reason.* Three minutes of nothing. Then, *I'll tell you at the lake house.* I put my phone face down and went to sleep. Dinner that night had the tension of a room where two people were performing normalcy for the benefit of two others who hadn't noticed it had become a performance. My father asked Lily about her day and Lily told him in the detailed and enthusiastic way she reserved for his full attention. I didn't bother to pay attention to whatever they were saying. "Spring Formal is coming up," Lily said, at some point between the main and clearing the plates. She looked at me with bright eyes. "Are you going, Isabelle?" I reached for my notepad. *Yes, I will be going with a friend.* "That new kid?" my father asked. I nodded

019

ISABELLE The game night table was set like Lily had been planning it for days. Which she had, there was a candle in the center, actual cards with questions printed on them stacked beside it, and a look on her face that said this was happening whether anyone in the room wanted it to or not. My father sat at the head of the table, which made me very certain he had been briefed in advance and was prepared to be enthusiastic. Lucas sat across from me, chair pushed back slightly like he was maintaining the option to leave. I sat with my notepad in my lap and looked at the candle. "Alright then," Lily said, settling into her chair with a brightness that filled the room. "The rules are simple, I pull a card, I read the question, everyone answers. No phones, no deflecting, no one word answers." Lucas looked at the card stack. "Who made these?" "I did," Lily said pleasantly. "Of course you did." "Lucas, you better behave." "I'm just asking." She picked up the first card.

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LUCAS I couldn't stop hearing her voice. I lay on my back in the ceiling of my room at the lake house and stared at the ceiling and told myself I was not the kind of person this happened to. It wasn't working because I knew I wouldn't be able to hide it. The next morning I was downstairs before anyone else. I sat at the counter with coffee I wasn't drinking and listened to the house wake up around me and thought about the fact that in approximately twenty minutes Isabelle would come down those stairs and I would have to be a normal person about it. She came down at soon after, she saw me, paused for half a second, then went to the refrigerator. "Morning, Isabelle, I'm not going to make it weird," I said. She turned around and held up her notepad. *You already made it weird by announcing you won't make it weird.* I looked at that for a second. "That's fair." She poured her juice and we stood in the kitchen in silence. My mom came in and the moment closed. The libra

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