Click on my name for the previous stories in this series Feeling His Way Through and Mark Figures It Out
"Hey, Tad, you gotta minute?" Paige asked before the first bell rang.
"Sure, Paige, what's up?" Tad absently touched his bruised lip as he stopped. Their schoolmates routed around the two of them to create an oasis in the crowded hallway.
Paige's impromptu baby shower on Friday during lunch in the school cafeteria indirectly led to her ex-boyfriend and reluctant baby-daddy to give Tad a fat lip. It wasn't swollen anymore after three days, but the mottled skin still bore the clear imprint of Charlie Johnson's knuckles.
"I wanted to apologize for what happened Friday," she said, not quite meeting his eyes.
"That's not on you," Tad said with a dismissive wave. "You only went out with him. You didn't make him hit me."
"No, but I spun him up on purpose and knew he was unstable. If I hadn't done that he might not have hurt you." She gave him the kind of stern look that implied how seriously she took her apology.