The first murmurings that something major had happened started around third period. It wasn’t until fourth period that Brady heard that Mr. Wallace’s car had been trashed and Savannah was being blamed for the damage.
The picture of the car, beaten in with a baseball bat and covered in red spray paint scribbles was being shared throughout the school. The video cameras had caught nothing; much of the vandalism had taken place while the cameras were focused on the other end of the parking lot thanks to a rock being thrown at the camera to knock it out of position and take it out of service.
It was the immobile screen from the camera that alerted the school resource officer that something was happening. By the time he arrived in the parking lot all that was left was the damaged car and Savannah Blake’s math notebook.
Taking a deep breath, Brady burst into the Principal’s office and blurted out, “Mr. Hodges, I can’t prove that Savannah didn’t total Mr. Wallace’s car, but I can submit some circumstantial evidence that might prove that somebody else did it instead.”
After making his announcement he was able to take in the scene unfolding in the office. Savannah sat crying in the chair right in front of Mr. Hodges’ desk; her parents were sitting on either side of her. Mr. Wallace stood glowering from a corner; until that day he had no reason to dislike Savannah. The SRO was standing on the other side of the door and at the opposite end of the room sat Mr. Hodges.
“Okay,” the officer prompted.
“Savannah and I broke up a few weeks ago, about two weeks before prom, because I met somebody else.”
“I introduced them, for the record,” she quickly added, looking at her father who was beginning to turn red. “Hannah from church; I knew she’d be better suited for Brady than I ever was.”
“We agreed to still go to the prom together because I had already asked, we already coordinated everything, Savannah had her dress, and the odds of her getting a replacement prom date at that late date were not favorable. So we went, danced, had fun, and I took her home. After all, we are still friends.”
Shrugging his shoulder, “When my sister asked why I came home early I didn’t think anything about it – she’s always been nosy – and I told her that Savannah and I had broken up. She thought I meant that we had broken up at Prom. I didn’t think anything about it because I was going upstairs to talk to Hannah online and tell her all about Prom. I didn’t see that Kelly wasn’t following me upstairs when I was explaining the situation to her.”
“But,” Mr. Wallace interjected, “Prom was two weeks ago.”
“It takes time to make plans, Mr. Wallace.” Taking a deep breath, “You aren’t going to like this, Mr. Hodges, but I think Aimee Kirkland and my sister were behind the damage done to Mr. Wallace’s car; I just can’t prove it.”
Mr. Hodges cradled his head in his hands. He would be throwing a party as soon as the last Kirkland daughter graduated; those girls had a talent for being able to get away with schemes without anything more than suspicion touching them.
“What do you know?”
“I saw red spray paint in Kelly’s room last week and my baseball bat from Travel Baseball is missing.” Closing his eyes, “If you look at the handle, right down towards the bottom, you should see ‘B.J.J.’ carved with a year right next to it.”
The officer silently took the bat and examined exactly where Brady had told him to look. He had to look closely at the worn wood. The carving was there but barely. “All this proves is that this is your bat. How do we know that you didn’t let her borrow it?”
“Would I be standing here telling you where to find my name on the evidence if I did that? I know just how faded and worn that carving is; would you have noticed it if I didn’t say anything? Would you even have looked? Savannah played softball freshmen year before switching to track; you could have assumed it was her bat.”
Turning to Mr. Hodges, “There is also a history of assignments and projects going missing without any evidence pointing towards anybody. The only common factor between those cases is the fact that each and every missing assignment belonged to somebody that I dated. In each and every case assignments stopped vanishing after the girl and I had broken up.” Brady paused, “My sister has disliked every single girl I have dated except for Savannah because Savannah was nice and let Kelly tag along half of the time. Then it appears as if Savannah did the worst thing that she could possibly do and break up with me at the Prom, even though we both know that it didn’t happen like that. I know my sister and she is going to want to get back at the person she thinks broke my heart. She is not aware of the real reason I have been spending time in my room; I’ve been messaging back and forth with Hannah.”
The entire time Mr. Wallace was watching Brady. He knew Brady; Brady had been one of his students the previous semester. He knew Savannah; Savannah was a member of his church and that Brady would often join Savannah, and now Hannah, for Sunday morning services. Even he had heard that Brady had been going to Wednesday night Bible Study with first one and then the other girl.
He didn’t know Kelly, except that she occasionally joined her brother on Wednesdays, or sat with Aimee Kirkland, even though he had Amanda as a student a few years before. He remembered the devious plots that the elder Kirkland was capable of doing in order to get out of something or to blame somebody else for a scheme that she had orchestrated.
“Let her go,” he finally said. “Savannah isn’t capable of doing this.”
Brady stepped up, “I’ll talk to my parents. I’m sure they’ll be willing to pay for damages when they find out what…”
“That’s not necessary,” Mr. Wallace interrupted. “I’ve been planning on getting a new car for a while anyway and that one wasn’t worth the trade in. I’ll probably sell it for parts.”
He was the first to leave the office, the SRO left shortly behind him once he realized that no charges would be filed.
“Thank you, Brady,” both Mr. and Mrs. Blake said, shaking his hand as they passed.
“That was brave of you, Mr. Johnson,” Mr. Hodges acknowledged. “Risky but brave.”
“I couldn’t let Savannah get in trouble for something that she didn’t do; especially when I think my sister did it instead. I just wish we could prove it.”
“Me too.”
Pacing the floor in front of his sister, Kelly tracked her brother’s movements with something like panic in her eyes. How was he going to have this talk with her? How could his sister be so cruel?
“You’re lucky,” he started. “You are so lucky that nobody could prove that it was you despite the circumstantial evidence, like the fact that you used MY baseball bat! That I saw you with the spray paint the other day!”
Pacing some more, “You are so lucky that Mr. Wallace declined my offer to talk to Mom and Dad about what you did and have you pay him back for damages! He only turned me down because there was no real proof that you had a hand in damaging his car and the school property! Of you framing Savannah! All because you assumed she broke my heart!?!”
Letting out a rough laugh, “You are lucky that Savannah doesn’t want to file charges of harassment!”
“Brady…”
“No, you are going to listen to me!” Stopping in front of Kelly and staring her in the eyes he took a moment to breathe. “Savannah and I had a mutual break up. We were not working out. We were not a good fit. I do not know if it was because we were not a good match or because you insisted on joining us for half of our dates! There is no possible way for me to be able to tell!”
“Brady, I’m sorry...”
“No, you’re not! You never are! Every single time I dated somebody you didn’t like you did something childish to get her to break up with me!” Grabbing his sister’s face in his hands, Brady refused to let her break their eye-contact. “I have met somebody. Savannah introduced me to somebody and right now I really like this girl. This could be something special and I don’t want you to ruin it for me.”
“Who?”
/>
“Hannah. We’ve been talking for about a month, two weeks before Prom. If you had stayed to listen to me after the Prom instead of jumping to conclusions, I would have told you Savannah had introduced us.”
“Hannah? My new friend, Hannah?”
“The very one. You will not treat her like you’ve treated my exes. You will not do anything to run her off. You can stay friends with her and get to know her. You will allow us, Hannah and me, time to hang out on our own without you having to tag along. If we invite you along, fine, join us, but do not invite yourself into our plans.”
Kelly couldn’t look away from her older brother. Tears started to form in her eyes.
“I know you love me,” Brady stated softly, removing his hand. “I know you just want to protect me against the evils of girls that aren’t worthy of my time, but that is my decision. I like Hannah, I could love Hannah, but I need you to stay out of it. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“She is still your friend. You can still hang out with her without me, but don’t ask either of us for relationship details. If Hannah and I don’t work out then that is between Hannah and me, not you, Hannah, and me. Can you handle that?”
“Yes,” she said with a weak sob.
Brady pulled his little sister into a hug, “I do love you, you know. No matter what, or who enters our lives, you will always be my little sister. I’m going to protect you to the best of my ability. You can stop feeling guilty about my broken arm. That car was speeding and you didn’t do anything to purposely hurt me. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Looking at the piece of paper in his hand, Brady briefly considered the invitation. Holding it up to where Hannah could see it as he walked her towards her Chemistry class. “What do you think?”
Scanning the paper, “David’s throwing a party?”
“Not according to what Kelly is saying,” he paused to roll his eyes. “Aimee manipulated David into hosting the party. I think Aimee is throwing it and using David’s name as a way to get people to come.”
“Figures,” Hannah grumbled. “I wish I knew what she did to get him in her back pocket.”
Shrugging, “I don’t know.” Changing the direction of the conversation slightly, “Do you want to go?”
Looking sideways at her boyfriend, she pondered his question for a moment. “I think I’d rather go to the movies or do something else.” Kissing him quickly on the cheek, Hannah disappeared into her classroom.
A second later his phone lit up with a text, Maybe we’ll go. It might be a good way to go public with our relationship.
Chapter Twenty-Two
David stood back as Aimee and Will prepared for the “Massive Party to End All Parties”, as Aimee called it. All he had to do was provide a location and bribe the neighbors with promises of yard work if they didn’t call the cops.
Will and a few of his football teammates brought in coolers filled with drinks. Aimee supervised as David’s brother, Peter, brought in a keg; he really didn’t want to think about how much Peter had been paid to do that.
All David did was pack up the breakables and photos before locking them in his mother’s bedroom. Hesitating on the stairs, he turned back around and locked all of the doors except the one leading to the bathroom. With the people Aimee was likely to have invited, he didn’t want to have to do any next-day room checks.
Honestly, he didn’t want to have the party at all. David desired having the time to curl up and sleep instead of dealing with the people he called his friends. The mask he wore claimed that he cared about the meaningless, trivial, mundane things that Will and Aimee talked about day in and day out. The face beneath the mask was bored.
He was popular. He was supposed to be happy about that.
He was far from happy.
The sight of Christmas lights and paper lanterns in the trees, on bushes, and around the tree house didn’t cheer him up.
David had only agreed to the party to get Aimee to leave him alone about throwing one. He failed to factor in Drunken Aimee Antics and was now wondering if he could hide out during his own party. He didn’t even imagine taking into account what Sober Plotting Aimee was capable of doing.
Where could he hide?
Maybe Mr. Davis wouldn’t notice if David went over there to hang out in his kitchen. He could picture Delilah’s face if he did go over there to disappear. She would end up reminding him that he had made this particular bed filled with these particular friends and he would have to lie in it.
He could admit that not everybody in his “new” group of friends was all bad; Kyle was always good for a discussion, but the odds weren’t likely that Kyle would be coming to this party. However, it was also difficult to predict Kyle’s actions or thought process so anything could happen.
That was really the problem: anything could happen.
‘Tonight was the night,’ Aimee thought. Tonight she would make David see that they should be together.
She had a lot of celebrate. Nobody had been able to prove that she was the mastermind behind destroying Mr. Wallace’s car. She had successfully ended three of David’s relationships before they had even reached the one month mark. She had managed to do the same with several of Kelly’s brother’s relationships; at least until Savannah and Hannah came on the scene.
She was really proud of getting away with destroying Mr. Wallace’s car. She had to hire a few people and figure out where Savannah kept her spare car key. The car key part of the plan was easy; Savannah frequently accidently locked herself out of her car. Finding people she could pay off had been harder, but it only took a hundred dollars and the agreement that she wouldn’t ask what they were going to do with the money.
Aimee was good at making plans; they never failed. She would get David back if it was the last thing she did.
“Kelly, we need more lights over there,” she shouted from her perch on a chair.
She missed Kelly’s glare as the other girl grabbed an armful of twinkle lights and moved in the direction that Aimee had pointed. Sometimes Kelly really disliked her best friend.
It was all planned out. At some point during the night David would go upstairs and hide out in his room. She would be ready and waiting for him there.
She would give him an hour. Aimee knew that he didn’t want to throw the party but he never could tell her ‘no’ for anything that she wanted. She failed to realize that David found humoring her easier than going against her wishes.
Aimee didn’t take into account the locked bedroom doors. It took longer than necessary to find the right room and time was starting to run out. With only moments to spare, she slipped into his room, relocked the door, and used the time it took David to unlock it to remove all of her clothes.
Who could resist a naked girl in his bed? It was fool proof; those movies that used this tactic couldn’t be all wrong. Why would it be a common plot in those teen romantic dramas – except for that really old one with the whipped cream bikini – if it didn’t work?
Not that Aimee ever paid really close attention to the movies; she was usually making out during them instead.
Apparently they could fail…
“What are you doing?” David hissed, shutting his door as soon as he saw her in his bed. Annoyed, certainly, but mostly he just didn’t need somebody walking by to use the upstairs bathroom – or test the bedroom doors – only to see Aimee naked in his bed and jump to the wrong conclusion.
What would be the right conclusion? he mused silently.
“I thought we could take our relationship to the next level,” she purred.
“We have no relationship!” Turning to face the door, “We broke up two years ago!” Shaking his head, “I don’t want to know how you got in here, but when I get back you better be gone!”
Slamming the door behind him, David disappeared along with all of Aimee’s carefully crafted plans.
Aimee fumed. She’d get him back somehow. Maybe
if he thought she had moved on… Even though the logic of this new scheme was sadly lacking in details… It was still a common element in those movies she never really paid attention to… Not that her first plan had been fool-proof.
“Just stop thinking,” she hissed to herself. The problem with allowing things to begin spiraling out of control is that it was nearly impossible to put oneself out of the spiral once it had begun.
Pulling out her phone, she quickly called Will. “Hey, meet me in the backyard up in that old treehouse.”
It was a weak plan, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and Aimee was feeling desperate. It wouldn’t be so bad if Amanda would answer her e-mails.
Her plans never failed until today.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Delilah stared out of her bedroom window, unseeingly, as the mass of bodies clustered around the drinks moved to the beat of a song she could just barely understand. “Why do people think the louder the music the more of it can be heard?” she thought aloud.
She could recognize a few of the familiar faces. Kyle was watching the crowd as he pretended to drink from his cup; even Delilah could tell that his drink was a decoy. Or maybe she could tell because she was watching everybody who was next door instead of working on the reading assignment for The Great Gatsby.
She could tell from her window that Wesley was standing around beside Kyle. It was obvious that the golden boy was the designated driver for the group that he had come to the party with, especially with Wesley being on his third red Solo cup in an hour and a half. At least he is pacing himself, she idly thought.
She imagined that the girls they arrived with were the same girls trying to decide if they should dance on the picnic table or on the picnic benches. Delilah was torn between the probable show of the table tipping over and breaking, again, or the girls not injuring themselves or others with the evitable table collapse.
It was really difficult to miss the patch job from where they had broken the table by trying out their homemade parachutes when they were ten. At least I was able to convince him not to jump from the treehouse, Delilah mused at the memory.
The Bookworm Next Door: The Expanded and Revised Edition Page 7