Skin (44 Chapters #1)

by B. B. Easton

  “No,” he said. “I was defending you.”

  Too much. It was too intense. I broke eye contact and took a step backwards, landing on the backpack I forgot was behind me and almost losing my balance. Turning around to pick it up, I took a deep breath and tried to regroup before facing him again. When I did, his ghostly eyes were crinkled at the corners and his mouth was tipped up just slightly on one side. Fucker. He was actually enjoying watching me squirm.

  Smirk still in place, he said, “When I was outside I heard that little shit telling his buddy about the hard-on he had for ‘the little redhead in the fishnets’. Couldn’t argue with him there, Punk. I think you gave every guy in that parking lot a semi.”

  My face was suddenly on fire. Oh, God. I’m blushing! Is this really happening?

  He continued, but his smirk had been replaced by something that made my blood run cold. “When he saw that giant motherfucker’s hands on you he turned into a pissy little bitch.” He spat the last word out through gritted teeth. “Told his buddy you must love taking it up the ass to be wasting your time with that queer.”

  Gulp. Breathe. What??

  “S-so, so you punched him?”

  The zombie-eyed skinhead leaned down toward my ear and didn’t stop until I could feel his hot, venomous breath on my neck. “I. Beat. His. Fucking. Ass.”

  My limbs were moving on their own accord. Legs stumbling backwards. Hands fumbling with backpack straps. “Um, thanks?” I mumbled, eyes darting everywhere but his. “I, uh, have to go...I’m gonna miss my...Thanks again…”

  “Knight,” he announced, as I turned and sprinted for the double doors. “Thanks, Knight.”

  Fuck me.

  “We should sleep out here sometime,” I said, gazing up at the August sky through a tangle of hundred-foot-tall Georgia pines. Juliet and I were lying on our backs in the middle of my most prized possession—my trampoline.

  I had begun begging my parents for a trampoline when I was ten years old. My mom initially said “no” because she thought I would break my neck. My dad said “no” because he thought somebody else’s kid might come in our yard and break their neck and then we’d get sued and lose our house and die penniless in the gutter. But if I’ve learned anything from being an only-child, it’s that all “no” really means is, “You haven’t sufficiently annoyed or inconvenienced me yet,” so I jumped on their bed every night until it broke.

  It took months, but in the end my parents had to buy both a trampoline and a new bed. I think they learned a very valuable lesson about telling me “no” that year.

  Because my parents were still kind of bitter about the bed incident, they referred to my precious as “an eyesore” and set it up way the hell out in the woods behind our house. Which I couldn’t have been happier about.

  It was perfect—my own private little patch of bouncy freedom. When I first got it I used to go out there and jump for hours, but by my sophomore year that weathered old rust bucket just served as a place where I could go to write angsty poetry, smoke cigarettes, and talk to Juliet about boys. (And by boys I mean Lance Motherfucking Hightower.)

  “Are you crazy? The mosquitoes would eat us alive.”

  Juliet did not share my appreciation for nature. She definitely shared my appreciation for cigarettes and boys though, seeing as how she had a solid year head start on me in both subjects.

  “I have to sit up. My neck is fucking killing me,” I said, wincing as I changed positions.

  “Are you still avoiding your locker?” Juliet asked in her naturally bitchy tone.

  “Maybe,” I said, while trying to massage two massive divots out of my shoulders. They were trenches, really, forged from carrying every textbook I owned around on my back for two weeks straight.

  “You are such a pussy! Skeletor isn’t going to eat you. Just grow a pair and go to your fucking locker before you get scoliosis.”

  “Oh my God! He does look like Skeletor!” I squealed. “He has the creepiest eyes, Jules. I can’t go back there. I just can’t. I mean, he closed my locker while I was still putting stuff in there. Who does that? And then he touched me! And he beat the shit out of some guy he didn’t even know over nothing! Knight is off, Juliet. Like, he’s gonna murder somebody one day, and it damn sure isn’t gonna be me.”

  Juliet held her hands up. “I’m not saying he isn’t scary. Dude, the way he just sits by himself at the end of our lunch table, staring at you…I’m not gonna lie. He might be an actual, real life cannibal. I’m just saying you have to go to your locker. Your backpack literally weighs more than you do.”

  “Maybe I can share your locker?” I asked, batting my eyelashes.

  Juliet sat up and looked me square in the eye. “No fucking way. I’ve seen Romper Stomper. If your little Nazi friend finds out where you’re hiding he’ll probably curb stomp my ass.”

  “Maybe not,” I said. “Weren’t the Nazis and the Japanese on the same side in the war?”

  “Yeah, but I’m also half-black, dumbass.” Juliet shoved my shoulder, causing me to flop backwards onto the black nylon. We both giggled like maniacs as I bounced back up into a seated position.

  God, I loved Juliet. She was so genuine and bold and unapologetic. She was the person I always channeled when I wanted to be stronger. Braver. Tougher.

  Once our hysterics died down Juliet lay back down on her side and asked, “What about Lance? Maybe he could go to your locker with you. He’d protect you from Skeletor.”

  “Maybe if he had on an Iron Man suit.”

  Juliet grinned and said, “He carries you to second period every day like some kind of caveman. I’m pretty sure he’d stand up to Skeletor for you. It’s pretty obvious he wants to fuck your brains out.”

  “Shut up!” I could feel what had to be the goofiest fucking grin take over my face, along with a four-alarm flush. “If he wanted to…do that, wouldn’t he have at least kissed me by now? I’m starting to think I’m just not his type. He probably wants a girl with hot pink hair and a nose ring.”

  And boobs.

  “You’re so fucking stupid! Look at you! And if Lance hasn’t figured out that you want his giant cock by now then he’s just as stupid as you are.”

  “Ewww!” I screeched, shoving Juliet’s shoulder just like she had done to me. She screamed and caught my arm mid-flail, pulling me down with her.

  We flopped and giggled and bounced and snorted like wild things until Juliet suddenly yelled out, “Oh my God! I know what his problem is! BB! What if Lance has a girlfriend??”

  My laughter cut off mid-chortle and Juliet grew quiet too, waiting for my reaction. The only sound that remained from our ruckus was the squeaking of the springs as we slowed to a halt. My mind flew through every interaction I’d ever had with Lance, searching for any missed signs of a girlfriend.

  Why would a guy that hot not have a girlfriend? It made perfect sense. I’m sure she’s probably a tattoo model or an exotic dancer or a contortionist/sword swallower at the county fair.

  “I could ask him for you.” Juliet looked at me with concern in her black, almond-shaped eyes, which were rimmed in jet black eyeliner to hide the fact that she’d pulled out most of her eyelashes. She’d pulled out most of her eyebrows too, which she drew in with the same black pencil, and she had a few hidden bald patches on the back of her head. Nobody knew about that but me.

  “No! Oh my God, don’t you dare!”

  “Are you sure?” Juliet sat up, looking dead serious, long black hair swishing around her shoulders. “What if he does have a girlfriend?” she continued. “Wouldn’t you want to know?”

  “Yes...No…Ugh! I don’t know.” I impulsively reached out and plucked a small leaf from her dark mane. I always wanted long straight hair. Like my Barbie dolls. Barbie was the standard of beauty I was raised with, and I looked nothing like that bitch. My hair was reddish and wavy and poofy and wouldn’t grow past my shoulders. My skin was covered in brown freckles and scars from falling down all the goddamned time
and getting bitten by random stray dogs that I just had to pet. And my body definitely didn’t curve like Barbie’s. It didn’t fucking curve at all.

  A sinister smirk played on her tiny mouth. “I’ll ask him tomorrow.”

  “No!” I screamed. “I’ll do it! I’ll do it! Please don’t say anything!”

  “You’re going to ask Lance Hightower if he has a girlfriend. Bullshit.”

  “I will! I swear!”

  As Juliet rolled her eyes at me we heard the unmistakable sound of an antique Chevy backfiring in the distance.

  “I guess you’re not staying for dinner.”

  Juliet beamed as if the vehicle pulling into my driveway was a white limo with a rose-toting Robert Redford hanging out of the sunroof. In actuality it was a faded red 1980 Corvette with flip-up headlights, the one classic sports car that screamed “child molester” instead of “badass motherfucker.”

  And I should know. My dad had devoted his life to drinking, playing guitar, being paranoid, obsessing over the news, polishing his guns, and teaching his only child everything he knew about American muscle cars. By the age of twelve I could tell you the make, model, and year of any American sports car ever made, and more importantly, I could also tell you that 1980 was a shit year for the Corvette. After the gas crisis in the ‘70s they introduced a new small-block engine that year that couldn’t make it up a hill unless somebody got out and pushed.

  The car was old, but not as old as the grown-ass man driving it. I understood that Juliet was entitled to her fair share of daddy issues, but Jesus.

  Although he made me cringe with his patchy goatee and his baggy jeans, Tony wasn’t that bad. I mean, he always seemed super happy to see Juliet, which was sweet, I guess, and he was always willing to give us a ride somewhere, which was pretty clutch seeing as how I lived so far outside of our school district that there wasn’t even a bus I could ride to and from school.

  The only reason I was allowed to go to Peach State High School at all, considering my address, was because my mom was the art teacher at the elementary school. When I was a kid, my mom thought it would be super convenient to bring me to work with her instead of sending me to our neighborhood elementary school—a decision I’m sure she regrets to this day. I was always getting in trouble for sneaking around in the other teachers’ classrooms and stealing their art supplies—which was ridiculous because my mom was the art teacher—and I insisted on coloring my hair with markers so that I would look like Rainbow Brite.

  Flash forward ten years and I was still going to school in that district, only now I was at the high school, which dismissed over two hours before the elementary school. With no bus to take me home, my only after school options were to a) spend all afternoon sitting on the curb waiting for my mom to come pick me up, b) forge a note and ride the bus to someone else’s house, or c) ride home with Juliet in Tony’s molestation mobile.

  Walking to my mom’s school was out of the question. I’d tried it once. I arrived about an hour later drenched in sweat, feet covered in blisters, and sunburned to a crisp. Two and a half miles is a lot farther than it seems when it’s mostly uphill and you’re carrying your own bodyweight in books.

  Juliet and I made our way out of the woods and said our goodbyes. I hugged her tight and gave Tony an obligatory wave before heading inside.

  My parents’ place was more of a box than a house. It was four walls and a simple A-frame roof—no porch, no awnings, no frills. And most importantly to them, no neighbors.

  My parents loved their pot, even grew some on the back porch, so the fewer eyes and noses around, the better. I didn’t get it, personally. I tried smoking weed a few times with Juliet and it just made me feel sleepy and stupid. Diet pills on the other hand, now those were my jam.

  “Beee Beeeeee!” my mom cooed from the kitchen. She had the oldies radio station cranked up and was stirring something on the stove. “I made dinner! You hungry?”

  I walked over to the kitchen entryway and leaned my shoulder on the wall. “Not really,” I lied. “I’m just gonna go take a shower and do my homework.”

  My mom turned toward me with a guilty grin on her freckled face. “That’s probably for the best. We were out of regular milk,” she giggled, “so I used the vanilla almond milk instead.” She burst out laughing, but I was still waiting for the punchline.

  “Is that bad? What were you making?”

  “Tuna Helper!” She laughed so hard tears welled in her eyes. Between gasps for air she managed to choke out, “It tastes…like shit.”

  My dad took that opportunity to shout at me from the back room, where he was probably drinking his dinner, “It tastes like somebody shoved a dead fish into a stale Twinkie and heated it up!”

  I choked on an unexpected laugh while my mom doubled over, tears streaming down her freckled cheeks and into her long, straight red hair.

  Bitch.

  As her hiccups subsided my mom wrapped her arm around my shoulders, kissed me on the temple, and said, “Honey, I’ll order you a pizza if you want.” Then her giggles started back up.

  I patted her head as if she were a Golden Retriever and tiptoed off to the upstairs bathroom to begin my nightly routine.

  I got the water started in the shower and stepped out of my clothes. Unable to help myself I pinched the skin on my belly, gauging its thickness, before stepping onto the scale.

  Shit! I almost forgot!

  I jumped back off as if the wicked machine were on fire and plopped down onto the toilet, pissing out a few last-minute ounces.

  Whew! That was close!

  Before easing back onto the scale, I exhaled completely, hoping that maybe empty lungs weighed less than full ones.

  One hundred and three pounds. Yes! Double digits, here I come!

  I leapt off the scale and landed directly in front of the floor length mirror on the back of door, which wasn’t difficult in that teensy tiny bathroom. Full of hope, I turned sideways to visually assess the situation.

  Still there. Goddamn it.

  I frowned at the sight of my “pooch”—the pot belly that I had been saddled with since birth—and frowned harder at the fact that it continued to stick out further than my tragically flat chest.

  My body looks like ET’s, I thought. All belly and no boobs. If I can just lose five more pounds that should take care of the pooch, and then maybe my boobs will look bigger once they aren’t being overshadowed by this fucking gut anymore.

  Always one to end on a positive note, I praised myself for losing another pound and focused on the empowering, empty feeling in my stomach as I stepped into the blistering hot shower.

  After washing my hair with the fancy salon shampoo I begged my mom to buy because it was supposed to help smooth my frizzy waves, I shaved my entire body. I’d started shaving my legs and armpits in fifth grade because my friends were doing it. Then I started shaving my arms in seventh grade after I found out that Victoria’s Secret models did it. Then I started shaving my pubic hair in eighth grade when I discovered soft-core porn late one night while flipping through the channels on the TV in my bedroom.

  I was fascinated. Not a single one of those women had more than a light dusting of pubic hair (or arm hair, thankyouverymuch), and they were clearly very desirable creatures. I wanted to be desired too, especially by one giant fucking punk rocker with the warmest hazel eyes and most adorable dimples I’d ever seen. Sigh.

  Two years later I was still shaving my entire body and was still no closer to being Lance’s fucking girlfriend.

  Girlfriend…girlfriend…I thought about what Juliet had said earlier. What if he already had a girlfriend? I conjured an image of Lance wrapping his arms around the waist of a tiny manic pixie dream girl. Her super short fuchsia hair would be effortlessly mussed and would match the pink metal gauges in her ears. Her nose ring would be delicate but her eye makeup heavy, and her clothing style would be something in between Bettie Page and Betty Boop.

  I pictured him leaning in for a kiss
, but manic pixie dream girl bites his lip at the last second and smiles up at him wickedly. Her eyes say, “You don’t scare me, giant. I own your ass.”

  Slowly, the face of Lance’s imaginary girlfriend began to morph into my own as I switched the water from the showerhead to bath faucet. I sat down in the tub facing the faucet and scooted forward until my legs had nowhere else to go, then I lifted them up onto the wall on either side of the faucet. The water crashed down on the most sensitive parts of me like a hot, liquid freight train. And like every night, I leaned back onto my elbows and thought of him.

  I show up at school with a hot pink pixie haircut and a brand-new nose ring. As soon as I enter the building everybody stops and stares at me. Everybody. Including Lance. Our eyes lock and something changes in him. His usually playful expression turns hard, and he stalks toward me as if I’ve done something wrong.

  Grabbing me by the hand Lance drags me off down a side hallway and yanks me into the first faculty restroom he can find. My ears barely register the sound of the door locking before I feel a wall against my back, Lance’s lips and tongue against my own, and Lance’s hands seeking an entrance into my dress. Impatient, he rips the tiny garment off me and shoves it to the floor, leaving me in nothing more than my black lace bra, matching panties, and black mid-calf combat boots.

  Lance stops his attack just long enough to appraise me with his eyes, then mutters, “Fuck, BB,” as one hand finds its way into my new super-short hair and the other cups my ass. He pulls my head back just enough to expose my neck, then proceeds to kiss and bite and suck a savage trail from my collarbone to my breasts. He’s so tall he has to kneel before me to continue his journey.

  Grabbing both cups of my bra with his massive hands he yanks down, exposing two tender, aching nipples. Lance looks up at me through impossibly dark eyelashes and flashes me a fiendish smile before gently capturing one with his perfect white teeth. His tongue is warm and wet and slides easily back and forth across the surface of my virginal nipple. Before he can make his way any farther down my body I’m assaulted by a torrent of spasms between my legs that bring me careening back into the present moment.