Playing His Own Games | ✔︎

chapter six | cold as ice

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"I'm not afraid of the dark; I'm afraid of what's in it."
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Carrie

THREE DAYS. HIS BEEN BACK for three days and already I have stomped on his foot and thrown my sandwich at his face. Mason Foster is something else, that's for sure.

After the dinner incident, he stayed off school for a further three days before arriving at the front gates in his silver Lexus, a cigarette hanging from his lips, tinted sunglasses tipped downwards. That whole look didn't stop me from noticing the brace on his knee and the huge cut on his cheek. Street fighting? Wouldn't put it past him.

Kane arrives tonight, no doubt darkening my already foul mood from having to deal with my vengeful next-door neighbour. He slashed my tyres and smashed my headlights; the result of me arriving to school half an hour late. The dick.

"You alright, Carrie?" Mason asks me sweetly. I glare at him, my mouth clamped shut. He humiliated me back at his house and I will never forgive him for it. Then again, I am curious about how his eyes drifted far away from the present his father had to physically drag him back into our conversation.

"Shut up, Mase, her boyfriend is arriving tonight," Piper defends me.

"Boyfriend?" Mason rolls his eyes, stretching out across the grass, holding his muscular arms behind his head. "This world is full of surprises."

"Didn't you say he was crazy, Carrie?" Lucas asks me, in full knowledge his stirring up trouble. I shoot him a hard look.

"You're perfect for each other," Mason chortles, popping a grape in his mouth.

"Yeah, well you seem fit with all the sluts you sleep with," I snarl, flourishing my hands around. "You know, since you're a massive manwhore."

"You calling yourself a slut, Carrie? You just wait until you become them." He throws his last grape in a high arc, catching it between his teeth and causing Jason and Lucas to burst into applause.

I snort. "I would never stoop down to your level, Mason Foster."

"Enough," Piper says, clapping her hands together to try and divert our attention away from each other. "Can you two please try and get along?"

"He slashed my tyres and broke my headlight, and completely degraded me in front of my parents!" I hiss, crossing my arms. "So no, I'm not going to become friends with him."

"You completely sold me out to my dad about me lying about my mum," he snaps back. "Do you know how much shit I got from him?"

"I don't care," I tell him.

"Oh for Christ's sake!" Tahlia yells. "That's it. You two are going to do a bonding activity that stops me having to listen to all this bickering. You can—I dunno—go ice skating."

"Nope," I intervene swiftly. "Never stepped on the ice and I don't intend on it."

"Mason can teach you. He used to play ice hockey."

I arch an eyebrow. "Used too? What happened?"

"Two years ago I fucked up and hurt myself; broke my shoulder. My dad dragged me from the team, said that I didn't deserve to be on it." He shrugs, looking entirely unaffected.