Life Interrupted Read Online Free

when presented with the chance.  Our relationship was volatile, always ending up in a shouting match at which point I would end it by putting my fist into some part of his anatomy before storming off.  He always came after me a few hours later, bearing some gift (usually food) and we would laugh off whatever it was that had ignited us.  No matter what it was, Tripp never let us stay apart for long. 
    I co mforted myself with this knowledge all the way through our seventh and eighth grade years and into summer.  He might kiss other girls and hold other girls, but he never chased after other girls.  Only me.  Until freshman year.  Until Lovely Lauren.
    I knew the minute Lauren Daemon stepped into the cafeteria at freshman orientation that I was in trouble.  Tripp, normally so loud and out there, stopped talking the moment he saw her, and after an hour and no comments, the only thing he said was her name. She refused him the first few months, never saying anything more than no when he asked her out to the movies or dinner or a party.  Undaunted, Tripp continued, ignoring all of the other available girls who threw themselves at him daily, including yours truly.
    Lauren became Tripp’s mission in life.  She refused him, yet he went back for more until finally, the day before Homecoming she agreed to be his date.  They’ve been together ever since, only separating that one time, the time I took him home after their blow-up at the basketball state championship after party.  The time that he reached for me and kissed me.  The time that he touched me and held me and told me how beautiful I was, sliding his body over mine and making me weak for the first time in my life.
                  It began when he called me, his voice angry and somewhat slurred as he asked me to take him home. 
    “Rachel, I’m outside.”  Despite the fact that everyone else—my mom included—calls me Flow (because unlike a normal, supportive mother she found my public period incident hilarious), Tripp has never used anything other than my real name.  It brings goose bumps to my skin every time.  Even that night, when I could hear the alcohol in his voice.
    Just his name on my cell phone’s readout was enough to make my heart race.  We hadn’t spent as much time together since Lauren and he began dating, and honestly, I just missed him. 
    “Tripp, what are you doing outside? It’s a party, your party.  You won.”  Tripp was one of the only sophomores to make the varsity team and start.  He was a star and he should be celebrating.
    I slap ped at Jason Metz’s hand, which was trying to find its way to my ass while we played pool.  “I don’t care, I can’t be in there.  It’s Lauren.”
    I shank ed my shot and dimly heard the hoots from the guys I was playing, but I didn’t care.  My heart was beating too fast, like I had just gotten done with a long run, and I held my breath thinking that this was it, this was the moment he was going to tell me he made a mistake, that he shouldn’t have ever dated Lovely Lauren with her long strawberry-blonde hair and flawless skin. 
    “What happened, Tripp?”
    There was silence on the other end of the line but I could hear him breathing, hear the rain coming down on the tin roof of the overhang.  I was already walking outside, already ignoring Jason Metz and his friends who were calling after me.  Tripp needed me, finally, he needed me again.
                  “She says I’m not possessive enough, that I’m too friendly with other girls when we’re together.”
    Bitch .  This is Lauren’s greatest skill, and the reason I hate her. (Well, the second reason. The first is because she’s small and petite and sleeping with the boy I laid claim on when we were eight, so in fairness, I was going to hate the bitch no matter what she was like.) 
    Outside, I spotted Tripp sitting on the step under the overhang, his forearms resting on his knees as his head