Toxic Secrets

by Jill Patten

  Sometimes I thought Kendra knew me better than I knew myself.

  Phillip could charm the pants right off of a nun if they wore them, and I was no better to keep mine on around him.

  She was right, though. I had to stay away from him, but avoiding him in class every day until Christmas break was going to be pretty impossible.

  After our break-up, I spoke with the guidance counselor and had my schedule for second semester switched around so I wouldn’t have any classes with Phillip for the remainder of the year, but I still had to get through this semester first.

  My chest began constricting as thoughts of my next class started creeping in. I had finally got myself to the point of not dreading that class anymore, but, with the psychotic animal having reemerged inside Phillip, those nerves were now back on high alert.

  How was I going to make it through the next three weeks? By us avoiding each other and giving the silent treatment this past month was a godsend, but now, I had a tingly feeling that was all about to change within the next hour.

  After I gave Kendra the scoop on my run-in with Phillip, I was almost late for class once again. Stepping into the classroom, I came to an abrupt halt. Phillip was sitting in the desk behind mine with a smug grin plastered on his face.

  Gah! Could this morning get any worse?

  After our break-up, he convinced one of the girls in class to switch seats with him, but, from the looks of it now, he’d convinced her to switch back. I flashed my eyes at her, but all she gave me was a shrug of the shoulders mouthing Sorry! I was sure Phillip had thrown his smooth charm on her, prompting her to give up her seat without him even having to ask. I hated how people at this school thought he was some sort of God. If only they knew he was a spawn of the devil.

  Rushing to my desk, I made sure I didn’t make any eye contact with him. I could feel him staring right through me, right along with everyone else in class, but I resolutely ignored his presence.

  As soon as I got situated in my seat, his warm breath blew across my ear. “You coming to my game tomorrow night?”

  I kept my head straight watching Mrs. York as she turned on the smart board. Don’t speak, keep eyes square.

  His fingers lightly brushed my skin as he swept my hair away from my neck. “You can’t ignore me forever, Courtney.” His touch sent chill bumps up my arm.

  “I see you still feel something for me… I see the goose bumps on your soft skin. Are your boobs aching for me to touch them?” Everyone sitting around us started smirking and giggling. The heat rapidly rose in my face, and I’m sure it flushed bright red.

  Quickly, I whipped around in my seat to face him and slammed my hand down on his desk, invading his personal space. I was a little closer to the asshole than I intended, but I wanted him to hear me clearly. “Go. To. Hell. Phillip!”

  He looked at me blank-faced. “I take that as a no,” he chuckled, stretching his arms back, folding them behind his head. He reclined back in his seat and stretched his long legs out, resting them past both sides of my desk. It felt like he was trying to trap me in.

  Ignoring the heavy laughter from my peers, I whipped my head back around and raised my hand to get Mrs. York’s attention.

  “Courtney,” Mrs. York said questioningly.

  “Is it possible that I could be moved to another seat, like across the room? I’m having a hard time concentrating on my assignments,” I glanced behind me making eye contact with Phillip.

  “Well, I don’t think it should be a problem. I think a new seating arrangement would be a good change for everybody.” Mrs. York smiled and gave me a quick wink. The rest of the class gave a disgruntled moan. Kill me now. It wasn’t exactly the response I was looking for. I knew Mrs. York was aware of the situation with Phillip and me and that she thought moving everyone would appease me, but, in all reality, she just gave Phillip’s posse one more reason to despise me. I didn’t think I’d ever fit in with the kids here at this school. At least not as long as Phillip was here to influence them.

  “Tomorrow when you come to my class, I want everyone to sit alphabetically according to last name,” she announced, walking in between desks. She held up her finger to stop the next set of groans. “I know it seems childish to hand out assigned seats to juniors and seniors, but I find some of the behavior in here very immature. Don’t think that, just because I don’t say anything, it means I don’t notice what goes on in my classroom.”

  Without missing a beat Mrs. York walked back to the smart board and continued explaining today’s assignment.

  After feeling the loathing stares from my classmates for the duration of the class, I gave a silent prayer of thanks when the bell rang.

  With my book bag in hand, I prepared to make a mad dash out the door, but stopped when Phillip grabbed my arm. I looked at him with an amiable smile. He kept a tight hold on my arm, his fingers digging into the tender skin by my armpit. “Getting yourself moved isn’t going to deter me, Courtney. You know how I love a challenge, so you better just wipe that smug grin off your face,” he warned me in a low voice, staring at me intensely.

  My grin faltered as I realized I just turned this into a game for him, and Phillip wasn’t one to lose so gracefully.

  Phillip side-stepped me, and gave me his signature wink. “Let the games begin!” I heard him bellow in his sing-song baritone voice as he walked into the hallway.

  Chapter 2 ~ Compromise

  It was ridiculous of me to try and cram everything imaginable into my book bag just to avoid visiting my locker for the remainder of the day. Knowing Phillip, though, he would be hovering around like a vulture, waiting to swoop in on me after our little incident. I jetted to my locker, emptying it of everything I could get my hands on, and sent Kendra a text telling her I would meet her at her car just as the last bell of the day rang.

  Lugging my big ass book bag around was killing me. My shoulders and back were in dire need of my mother’s magic fingers. I always told her she missed her calling as a masseuse.

  Impatiently waiting for Kendra in the parking lot after school, I squatted down by her car. My eyes viciously scanned the parking lot in preparation to hide the moment I saw Phillip. I felt like a coward and a complete idiot looking all crouching-tiger-hidden-dragon, and my stance was only putting more strain on my back.

  “Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up,” I kept repeating under my breath.

  ”What are you doing?” Kendra giggled, peeking around the side of her car.

  “Ahh!” I screamed. “Holy crow, Kendra! You scared me to death,” I said in exasperation.

  “Sorry,” she replied, shrugging her shoulders.

  Kendra unlocked her car doors, and I jumped in and slammed the door shut.

  “Easy there, tiger. My car has done nothing to you, so please handle with care.”

  “Sorry…”

  “So, what were you doing hiding behind my car?” she asked, eyeing me curiously.

  “I was hiding from Phillip, and don’t start in on me. We had another altercation in class.”

  On the way home, I rehashed everything that took place in Mrs. York’s class. Kendra listened attentively, waiting until I finished before she handed out free advice. Kendra was a go-getter, don’t-take-crap-off-of-people kind of girl. She was very bold and never sugar-coated things, no matter how upset you may have been. That was what I loved the most about her. She had given me an endless list of advice on my relationship with Phillip over the years, and I rarely ever took any of it into consideration. I was determined to listen this time though. Obviously my decisions were belly flops.

  “Okay are you ready to hear what I have to say about this whole ordeal?” Her eyes flickered back and forth to me and the road.

  “Sure, lay it on me.” I had already decided I’d do whatever she suggested.

  “I think you should go on that blind/double date with Reed, Jaxon, and me.”

  Whoa! Not exactly the advice I was expecting. Scratch that decision I prematurely made.

/>   She cut her eyes at me, and I could see a hint of a smirk trying to appear on her lips. Heifer.

  I rolled my eyes. “My freakin’ morning starts off with this question, and now it’s going to end the same damn way. I thought we were past this?” I was being a little harsh with her, but I was so wound up from Phillip, and I could feel a headache coming on. I didn’t need any more stress.

  “Courtney, I told you this morning I don’t give up, and I’m not going to. Look, if you go out with Jaxon, you know Phillip will hear about it. Then he will know that you have officially moved on. You’ve never showed any interest in any other guy before. He still thinks he has control over which guys at school can and cannot date you, but Jaxon is not from around here. I think Phillip will feel intimidated enough to leave you alone.”

  “What if I do this and, once he gets wind of it, he goes into one of his crazy jealousy antics?”

  Kendra was the one and only person I had told, or would ever tell, about Phillip leaving bruises on me. He had never actually hit me, but he’d grabbed me with iron fingers from time to time, sometimes leaving noticeable marks. Once he got so mad at me for joking around with Reed, he accused me of flirting and jabbed his car key into my thigh as if it were a knife. Of course, all this stuff always happened when no one was around. He couldn’t bear to have any witnesses to ruin his good-guy reputation. After that, Reed was very careful of how he interacted with me when Phillip was around.

  “Then we will make sure Jaxon and Reed give him the ass-kicking that’s long overdue.”

  My face faltered, giving her a serious look. “Kendra,” I sighed, “The guy doesn’t even know me. Why would he defend me? And I doubt he wants to get involved with some little high school kid’s drama.”

  Kendra rolled her eyes at me while staring at the road. “I seriously don’t think you have anything to worry about. You and Phillip are not together anymore, so the opportunity won’t be there for him to lash out at you. You only have to deal with him for one class at school, and, by Christmas break, that won’t even be an issue anymore.”

  “But it is an issue,” I said in desperation. “Did you not hear what I just told you about him making a game out of this? He’s going to harass me until I give him the attention he’s seeking, and he won’t make light of me making a fool out of him by going on some date.”

  “Court—”

  I held my finger up interrupting her. “Let me finish. We have no idea what he’s told people, but, from an outside view, it probably looks like he’s trying to be my friend or rekindle what we had. You know how sneaky he is, I’m sure they are clueless about the mind games he’s playing with me. I just have to figure out a way to beat him at his own game.”

  I really didn’t want to tell Kendra that, even after everything Phillip had put me through, I still loved him. I knew it was wrong to love him, but it wasn’t easy to just turn those feelings off for your first love. Plus, I was afraid of going on this date because, once Phillip found out, he would get revenge and flaunt his newest piece of ass in my face. Even though I was the one that ended our relationship and decided to move on, it still hurt to see him with another girl. If he wasn’t hurting me physically, he was hurting me mentally and emotionally… and to be honest, my heart was almost irreparable.

  “Well, I think you should just go at Phillip open and honest and let him know that you are willing to be his friend and nothing more. Let him know that there is the possibility you may go on dates occasionally, and you don’t want any repercussions if you choose to do so.”

  I let out a brief sigh.

  “By taking this route, you will eliminate the chase, Courtney. If you continue to ignore him, he will continue the game of cat and mouse. If you play nice with him, you will silently beat him at his own game.”

  She made a good point. I was just worried if it were even possible to be his friend without all those emotions resurfacing. My heart had skipped a beat when he’d spoken to me today, and then, when he’d lightly touched me, that was enough to make my skin tingle. I knew I had to do this, though. It was the only way I would ever be able to move on and have a peaceful senior year.

  “Okay. As always, you get your way. I will talk to Phillip tomorrow, and I will go on this stupid date… but this Jaxon character needs to know ahead of time I’m not looking for a boyfriend. Got it?”

  Kendra was grinning so big I thought the corners of her lips might crack. “Yes, I got it, and, like I told you before, he’s not staying here for long, so I seriously doubt he’s looking for any kind of boyfriend/girlfriend connection.”

  “Well, just in case he is, you better let him know this is a friends-only date… or better yet, let him know how you had to practically twist my arm behind my back before I would agree to go.”

  “You are so mean sometimes! I’m not telling him that or he won’t want to go at all. But I will tell him you have recently ended a long, troublesome relationship, and you’re only interested in the single lifestyle right now.”

  As we pulled into my driveway, her phone buzzed with Reed’s name showing.

  Kendra started getting all giddy again, “I can’t wait to tell Reed the great news.”

  “I’m sure you can’t,” I mumbled to myself.

  “I heard that sourpuss.”

  I gave her my best Cheshire cat grin.

  As Kendra picked up her phone and started to text Reed back, I grabbed her hand to stop her. “Hey, I have one question.”

  “Yes?”

  “Before you tell Reed I’m on board, I want to know what this Jaxon guy looks like. I don’t want to regret my decision if the guy turns out to be fugly.”

  Kendra got a devious look on her face. “I’m not telling you because then it wouldn’t be considered a blind date, but I will tell you that he is the exact opposite of Phillip. I promise you won’t be disappointed.”

  Grinning, I tried a different approach. “Does he look like Reed? You know, since they’re cousins and all?”

  Kendra’s lips puckered as she tried holding back a smile. “I’m not telling you a thing, so stop asking!”

  Just like that, my curiosity was on high alert. Reed was a super-hot guy with short, dark brown hair and brown eyes to match, a chiseled jaw, and a tall, athletic body. As cute as he was, I had always saw him more as a brother than someone I could ever be attracted to.

  Getting out of the car, it hit me. “Kendra, one more detail I forgot to mention – do not plaster this all over Facebook, or I will not go, and I will post pictures of you as a kid when you were going through your ugly stage.”

  I closed the car door before she could shoot back a snide remark.

  Not that it mattered; she rolled her window down anyway.

  “You post pictures of me and see what happens. Phillip will be the least of your worries,” she yelled out at me.

  Cringing, I lifted my overloaded book bag onto my shoulder. I was totally bummed to see my mom wasn’t home yet. She must have had to pull a double shift at the nursing home again.

  Chapter 3 ~ Checkmate

  I had to admit to myself, I was getting a little bit excited, and a whole lot nervous, about Friday night. No way would I give Kendra any indication I felt this way though. She would make a bigger deal out of it than what it already was.

  She had already decided she would do our hair, since her mom was a hairdresser, and I would be responsible for our make-up, since I was simply good at it. She also asked if she could pick out my attire for the night. I agreed, knowing she would most likely be raiding her closet to make sure I looked stunning for this Jaxon guy.

  There was nothing I loved more than rummaging through her closet. It was like my own private little department store. Half of everything in it still had price tags. Every now and then, she would send one of those new items home with me, deciding she really didn’t like it after all and would never wear it. I never had a problem accepting anything, either. Of course, I was always thankful, but I saw no reason for her to dro
p things off at any of the consignment stores when I was a perfectly willing participant to put them to good use.

  After my mother got home from her double shift, she massaged my back. She was so good to me and always went above and beyond to try and satisfy me. Since she was the only parent I had, she tried her best to be a mother and a father to me all at the same time.

  As I was lying in bed pondering the day and feeling refreshed, my phone buzzed with a text. Grabbing it off my nightstand, my heart did a little flip-flop when I saw Phillip’s name. I loathed that he could still have that effect on me.

  P: Hey did u decide if u r coming to my game

  Me: Sorry, I can’t. I have to work.

  I wish I had remembered this in class today instead of ignoring him. It might have prevented the whole boob comment.

  Before he could reply, I sent another quick text.

  Me: I need to talk to you tomorrow. When is a good time?

  I was glad he couldn’t see me right now. I was very nervous and my hands were shaking so bad that I could hardly get my fingers steady long enough to text. I was going to need a nerve pill to get my emotions in check, or I would be doomed. Phillip knew me like the back of his hand, and he knew how nervous I could get. Not only did my hands tremble, but my voice would shake like I was in a yodeling contest. Very embarrassing.

  My phone buzzed again.

  P: K sure I’m down wit dat. what about?

  Guys had to be the worst when it came to using proper grammar in a text.

  Me: Just tell me when and I’ll talk about it then.

  I should have added a smiley face, so he wouldn’t think anything suspicious. Who was I kidding? He’d be suspicious no matter what I said or did.