Read Online Sometimes It Happens by Lauren Barnholdt - Free Book Online Page B

minutes later, she comes breezing in, chatting into her phone.
    “Yes,” she says, “three thirty would be perfect, thank you so much for seeing me on such short notice.” It takes me a second to realize what that probably means, since I’m focused on trying to catch my breath (I sprinted here from my homeroom in an effort to avoid Sebastian. People thought I was crazy. Or maybe a freshman.)
    “Who was that?” I ask Lacey as she slides into the seat next to me. Even though of course I already know. I should have put a stop to this right after she supposedly hurt her neck in the car accident, but I was too distracted by my own drama.
    “Dr. Friedman,” she says. She’s off the call now, but stillon her phone looking up some directions on Google Maps.
    “And who is Dr. Friedman?”
    “My new doctor,” she says.
    “Lacey!”
    “What? I need to get my neck checked, and they just happened to have an appointment available after school.”
    “What happened to Dr. Ferguson?”
    She slides into the seat next to me and gets really busy pulling her notebook out of her bag. “Lacey?” I prompt.
    “She . . . um . . . Dr. Ferguson and I aren’t seeing each other anymore.”
    “You’re not seeing each other anymore?” It’s not like they were dating. You can’t just not be seeing your doctor anymore. Unless you’re a total hypochondriac like Lacey, who goes to the doctor for every little thing, and then doesn’t believe said doctor when they tell her she’s fine. “What does that mean?”
    “It just means that I’ve decided to go in a different direction.” She pushes a stray red curl behind her ear.
    “A different direction?”
    “Yeah, you know, with my medical needs.”
    “So basically Dr. Ferguson told you you couldn’t come back?”
    “Well, she was kind of difficult,” Lacey says. “I mean, whoever heard of a doctor that turned people away? I have insurance and I’m a good patient! It’s really not a good business practice when you think about it.”
    “And this would have nothing to do with the fact that when your blood test for anemia came back normal, you demanded a retest, saying you didn’t trust the phlebotomist or the lab?”
    “Nothing whatsoever,” Lacey says, obviously lying.
    But I don’t have time to push her on it, because at that moment, Noah walks into the room. Heat and longing rush through my body, and tears prick the backs of my eyes. I quickly look away, even though it feels like torture to take my eyes off him. He looks amazing. He’s wearing a green sweatshirt, because the classrooms on this side of the school are always kind of cold, and without even having to see it, I know he probably has a T-shirt on underneath, one with the name of an indie band on it. Baggy jeans, his hair still floppy because he was supposed to get a haircut last night until we ended up—
    He walks right by me, not saying anything, and the tears that pricked my eyes threaten to spill down my cheeks, so I squeeze my eyes shut tight, and tell myself there will be no crying, no matter what. Not here, not in school. Of course, I expected this a little bit, I knew that he might not want to talk about what happened, but I at least figured he’d be friendly, say hi. Keep up some kind of appearances. But apparently not.
    “What’s up with Noah?” Lacey asks. She’s leaning forward in her chair, and we both watch as Noah takes a seat on the other side of the room, his long legs sliding under his desk.
    “What do you mean?” I ask, hoping that I sound like it’s totally normal for Noah to be ignoring us, even though it’s so totally not.
    “He walked right in and didn’t say hi to either one of us. Did we do something to piss him off?” She’s playing on her phone, her fingers flying over the keyboard as she checks her Facebook page.
    “I don’t know,” I say, shrugging. “You know how boys are, he probably thinks he’s too cool for us now that school started back up.” I roll my eyes