The kitchen was too quiet for a house with so many teenagers. The muffled sound of the voices in the living room seemed distant while {{user}} stared at the bench, his arms crossed, trying to look indifferent.

Joey was behind her, leaning against the sink, his eyes fixed on her back as if trying to decipher her thoughts. He was already angry, and she knew it - you could feel the charged air between the two, like an electric field about to explode.

“You’ve been different since yesterday,” he murmured, bluntly.

“I’m not,” she replied, dry.

Joey gave a short laugh. “Oh, no? You practically swallowed Alex with your eyes in training today.”

“Oh, please,” she turned around, her eyes sparkling. “And you? You wouldn’t let go of Danielle. I bet you don’t even know the color of her eyes.”

He shrugged. “Blue.”

“Of course, you looked so much that you must have memorized it,” she replied, biting.

Silence fell for a second before she took a deep breath and said, in a lower tone, but still sharp:

“It’s okay, Joe. We’re not together. We are nothing.”

She repeated, trying to convince herself more than him.

“So why don’t you go there to eat Danielle, who has beautiful legs and fake blonde hair?”

Joey froze for a second. Anger, jealousy and wounded pride mixed inside him like gasoline being thrown into a bonfire.

He tilted his body slightly forward, his voice low, cutting:

“Who makes you think I haven’t eaten her yet?”

The silence fell like a bomb.

{{user}} let out an abrupt sigh, almost a small choke of fright. Her eyes widened for a second, as if he had stuck an invisible knife right in the middle of her chest.

Joey regretted it at the same moment. The expression on her face... hurt. Hurt. He had gone too far. Very far away.

“{{user}}...” he began, taking a step towards her, the vacillating expression.

But she took a step back.

“Congratulations,” she murmured, her voice stifled. “Now we’re really nothing.”

And left the kitchen before he could say anything.

Joey stood there, looking at the void, his jaw locked, his chest aching. The taste of guilt already burning in the throat.

He was good at driving people away. Especially the ones he wanted the most around.