Scattered Colors

by Jessica Prince

  That night I made sure to leave my bedroom window unlocked, thinking Parker might sneak through since he hadn’t made it in time for our sunset. The more time that passed, the worse my anxiety became. Finally, around eleven o’clock, I got a reply. It was short in nature, but it helped me to breathe a sigh of relief.

  Parker: Sorry about tonight, something came up. I’ll see you in the morning.

  I soothed myself by saying if something terrible had happened with his mother, he would have called.

  Me: Okay, hope everything’s all right. Love you.

  I locked my phone and dropped it on the bedside table. It wasn’t until the next morning that I realized he never told me he loved me back.

  Parker: Can’t take you to school today. Gotta go in early.

  That text had caused my chest to seize the moment I read it. All morning long, my gut screamed at me that something wasn’t right. When I finally made it to school, a sense of impending dread had taken over.

  As I stood at my locker with Stella, I tried my best to appear calm as I scanned each person’s face, looking for Parker.

  “Sooooo, you gonna tell me what special surprise Parker had planned for you last night?” Stella asked with a wide grin.

  “Um…something came up last night. He wasn’t able to come over.”

  I tried to play it off as no big deal, but judging by the way Stella’s brows dipped between her bright green eyes, she hadn’t bought it.

  “Is he okay?”

  “I-I don’t really know. I haven’t talked to him. He texted this morning to say he couldn’t take me to school, but I haven’t seen him yet.”

  It was obvious from her expression that she was just as perplexed as I was. However, being the amazing friend she was, she tried her best to brush it aside. “I’m sure he’ll have a perfectly good explanation. Besides, at least that gave you a chance to drive your new car!”

  “This is true,” I laughed. Just as I began to feel a little better, I caught sight of Parker’s telltale swagger as he made his way down the hall. I let out a gasp at the sight of the bruises that marred his face.

  Not again. I thought as my heart broke for him. I wanted to find his father and beat the ever-loving hell out of him. How could a man lay his hands on his one son? I didn’t have to meet the elder Owens to know that I hated him with every fiber of my being.

  “Oh, Parker,” I sighed as he slowed to a stop in front of me. I lifted my hand to touch his face, but he pulled back at the last second. “Are you all right?” I asked, sympathy heavy in my voice.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. We’re gonna be late for class.” He tried to step around me, but I grabbed hold of his arm, halting his progress.

  “Hey, hold on.” He turned and stared back at me with such impassiveness it sent a chill up my spine. “You’re lying. Tell me what happened, please,” I pleaded.

  “Um…I’ll just leave you guys alone,” Stella said. When I cast my eyes in her direction, they held the same worry I knew was shining in mine. “See you in class.”

  The moment she disappeared down the hall, I turned back to Parker. His face a blank, emotionless mask. “What happened?”

  He ran his hands through his hair roughly and pulled his lip ring between his teeth. We stood in silence, just looking at each other before Parker finally pulled me into a corner out of the way by my elbow.

  “Look…” He ruffled his hair once again. “I just…I can’t.” For one split second, that blank expression dropped just long enough for me to see a flash of emotion cross his face. And what I saw scared me. He looked absolutely devastated.

  “Parker.” I stepped forward and placed my hand on his arm. He squeezed his eyes closed, as if in pain, before taking a step back…away from me.

  “This isn’t working for me anymore, Freya.” His voice sounded thick as he spoke.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I asked in disbelief. “What’s not working for you?”

  “This,” he said as he waved his hand between us. “Us. It’s just not working. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “You don’t want to do this anymore,” I repeated as the weight of his words finally began to sink in, ripping my insides to shreds in the process.

  “Yeah.” He nodded simply, like he hadn’t just destroyed me with seven little words.

  “Bullshit! Something happened and I want to know what the hell it was!” I was making a scene, and for the first time in my life I couldn’t care less that I was the center of attention. I wanted…no, I needed the truth from Parker before he did something that couldn’t be undone. “Please,” I begged. “Talk to me. What happened last night? Why did your father hit you? Talk to me!”

  His eyes flitted around the hallways, looking almost panicked as he scanned the other students’ faces. When he finally looked back at me, the emotion was gone. His brown eyes I’d fallen so in love with were dull and lifeless.

  “It doesn’t matter what happened last night. All you need to know is that I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to be in a relationship, Freya. I’m done. I’m over it.”

  I couldn’t breathe. There was no air in the hallway. Everyone standing around, watching the train wreck that was my relationship, had sucked it all up leaving me choking, gasping for breath.

  “I’m sorry, gorgeous,” he continued. The way he sounded so cavalier sliced another piece of flesh from my bones, making me hate the nickname I’d grown to love. “You’re great and all, but it’s just not fun for me anymore. Things just ran their course, and it’s time to move on.”

  I felt like I was dying. Tears burned my eyes before finally breaking free to run down my cheeks. Parker cringed at the sight.

  “I don’t believe you,” I insisted, refusing to accept his words as truth. I knew the boy in front of me better than anyone. I knew him. He loved me. “I don’t believe you!” I screamed. “What about everything you said, everything you shared with me. You’re honestly going to stand there and tell me it meant nothing? You’re lying! You’re a fucking liar, Parker! Tell me the truth!”

  His chest moved rapidly as his breathing became audible. He stood in silence for several seconds before putting the final nail in the coffin. “It doesn’t matter what you believe. It’s done. We’re done. Let it go and move on.”

  I couldn’t formulate a response. He was lying, he had to be. I couldn’t bring myself to believe a word he’d just said. But as he stepped around me and headed for class, it felt like something inside of me had just died.

  News of the breakup spread through the school like wildfire. Rumors began to spread that Parker had broken up with me because I was bad in bed. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Parker and Cassidy hadn’t bothered to delay in revealing they’d gotten back together. The moment I walked into the lunchroom to see Cassidy firmly planted by his side, clinging to his arm, my stomach roiled. The bile rising up in my throat left a burning trail as I turned around and ran from the room. I barely made it to the bathroom before losing the contents of my stomach.

  Every day after that, the colors Parker had given back to me faded more and more. The more time that passed after the breakup, it became harder and harder to hold out hope that he’d come back to me. Even seeing him with Cassidy couldn’t convince me he was gone for good. Something had happened. There was a reason why he ended things so abruptly. I refused to believe he was happier with Cassidy than he had been with me. I watched him every single day to see those brown eyes, once so full of life, growing duller. She wasn’t making him happy. So why was he doing this?

  Every evening, I made the trek down to the beach, hoping and praying Parker would show up to watch the sunset with me, and every night I walked home alone, my heart tearing just a little more each time he didn’t show.

  As time progressed, Parker appeared to slide back into his role as king of the high school easily, with Cassidy at his side as the queen bee. While life seemed to flow smoothly for each of them, I became a pariah. I could no longer
hope for the invisibility I’d so craved at the start of the school year. Being with Parker for as long as I had had made my name familiar with the entire student body. I was a social leper. With the exception of Stella and Michael, there wasn’t a single soul in that school who granted me a kind word or look.

  At first, I refused to believe Parker knew of any of the nasty pranks played on me on a daily basis, but just watching him among his ‘friends’ made it clear he led each and every one of them around by the collar. None of them so much as sneezed without his say-so. Hatred began to fester inside of me at that realization and, combined with my heartache, just breathing every day felt like an impossible feat. The only comfort I had was the fact that school was drawing to a close and I wouldn’t have to see either of them every day. College acceptance letters had started coming in and with my GPA, I’d gotten into most of the places I’d applied. The idea of having options was a relief even though I still planned on staying close to my dad. My poor father had tried his best to console me but, like I’d imagine any single father to be, he was ill-prepared to handle my emotional breakdowns. But God love him, he still tried.

  Stella was a rock as the months passed. She offered a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen…hell, she even offered up a litany of four-letter words to describe what a spineless asshole Parker had turned into. The day she cussed a blue streak from one corner of my bedroom to another was one I wouldn’t forget in this lifetime. I never thought my Spritely Stella could get so keyed-up. Obviously, I’d been wrong. Not that I faulted her for her reaction. The situation most definitely called for every single nasty word in the English language. I would know; I was the one who lived through it, after all.

  I slammed my locker shut as hard as I could, anger and shame at the pictures someone had taped inside of it causing my vision to cloud with tears. There were no crueler beings on the face of the Earth than teenagers. My locker had been filled with dozens of pictures of men and women having sex. Each image had step-by-step directions on how to pull off that certain position along with little notes in black marker stating that if I studied up, maybe I would be able to please my next boyfriend.

  As soon as I turned away, I caught sight of Parker coming down the hall with Cassidy hanging off his arm, his merry band of sheep trailing behind them. Not wanting to risk further humiliation for being caught crying, I sought out refuge in the girls’ bathroom. I locked myself into a stall, planning on waiting out until the last warning bell rang.

  The sound of the bathroom door opening, followed by girlish giggling, had me pulling my legs up and curling my arms around them in an attempt to keep my presence from being known.

  I could make out Brynn and Cassidy’s voices as they talked about petty things like Prom and what parties to attend, all the while holding my breath to keep from making any noise. Just as my lungs began to burn with the need for air, their shoes started to clack against the floor, growing fainter as the bathroom door opened and shut, leaving me alone once again. I exhaled on a loud whoosh then slowly lowered my feet to the ground and pushed out of the stall. My relief, however, was short-lived as I came to a screeching halt at the sight of Cassidy leaning against the bathroom door, blocking my only means of escape. The smile on her face was purely predatory as she stared me down.

  “It must really suck being so pathetic. I mean, really, did you actually think hiding in a bathroom stall was going to do you any good?”

  I refused to cower to such a mean, heartless person. Clenching my hands into fists so she couldn’t see them trembling, I steeled my spine and lifted my chin. “What do you want, Cassidy?”

  “Oh, nothing much,” she shrugged nonchalantly. “I just thought you should know the truth about your relationship with Parker,” she said, putting air-quotes around the word relationship.

  “There’s nothing I need to know,” I insisted. She couldn’t possibly say anything that could hurt me anymore than I was already hurting.

  “Really? So, you don’t want to know that Parker and I were still having sex the entire time you two were together?”

  Time stopped. The edges of my vision began to blur as I stared in disbelief at the girl standing in front of me.

  No, no, no, no, no. It’s not true.

  It couldn’t be true.

  “You’re lying,” I hissed.

  “Sorry to break it to you, sweetie, but you never meant anything to him. I tried warning you, but you just wouldn’t listen. I told you he wouldn’t stick around. He always comes back to me, no matter what. He used you, Freya. He gave you the sob story about his little brother and mom so you’d feel sorry for him. You were just a game to him.”

  “No,” I whispered as I clenched my eyes against the tears stinging my eyes.

  “We laughed our asses off when he told us how needy and helpless you were, always whining about your long-lost mommy.”

  My eyes snapped open, growing wide at her words.

  “That’s right. He went on and on about how annoying you were, how you bitched and moaned that your mommy died and your dad didn’t love you enough. He even said that if you hadn’t been so pathetic, maybe your dad wouldn’t have ignored you for so long.”

  My whole body was shaking like a leaf. My heart yelled at me not to believe what she was saying, but my mind reminded me that Stella and Parker were the only ones who knew the truth about my parents. Stella never would have betrayed me like that; she hated Cassidy just as much as I did.

  That left only one other person.

  Oh, God. I’m so stupid.

  All those months I’d told myself Parker would come around had been a joke. Any remaining hope fizzled and burned to ash the second those words passed Cassidy’s lips. I’d been such an idiot. I’d loved him and he’d betrayed me.

  “Please move.” I was seconds away from losing it. I was about to break, and the last person I wanted to see me that way was her.

  “Oh, look, she’s about to cry,” Cassidy chided.

  “Move!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. Thankfully, that time she listened. As soon as my way was clear, I ran from the bathroom at a full sprint. Loud sobs broke free from my chest as I rushed down the hall toward the nearest exit. Tears streamed down my face, impairing vision so I barely had time to catch myself from falling after turning the corner and crashing into a large figure.

  “Freya?”

  Why me? I began crying even harder as I jerked my arms from Parker’s grip. I tried to step around him but he cut me off, reaching for me once again.

  “Don’t touch me,” I spit as I looked at him with every ounce of hate I had in me.

  He flinched back but stayed in my path. “Are you all right? What happened?”

  I brushed at the tears on my face and took another step to the side, only to be impeded once again. “None of your fucking business. Move out of my way!”

  “Please, gorgeous, just talk to me.” He reached out to grab hold of my hand, but the sound of my nickname on his lips snapped what little restraint I had left.

  “Don’t call me that!” I yelled.

  “Freya, stop!” he shouted as I fought against his hold. “You’re gonna hurt yourself. Just stop!”

  “I hate you!” I seethed, pouring every ounce of hate and anger into those three words, hoping like hell they hurt him. “I hate you and I wish I’d never met you. I never want to see your face again!”

  Parker stumbled back like I’d slapped him as a riot of emotions played on his face, but I didn’t hang around long enough to see what they were. Ignoring the sound of him yelling my name, I ran as fast as my legs would carry me, not stopping until I reached my car. It wasn’t until I was in the safety of my home that I allowed the flood gates to open.

  The sound of Stella’s voice pulled me back from the memory. I sniffled and wiped the tears away as I looked up to see her pacing my room. “I can’t believe he’d do something like that, Freya. I mean, I know he’s a bastard, but that’s taking it to a whole new level, even for him.”
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br />   “Well, believe it,” I replied dryly. “You and Parker are the only ones I told, so if it wasn’t you…” I drug out, waiting for her response.

  “Of course it wasn’t me!”

  “Then he’s the only one, Stella.”

  She came over to where I sat on my bed and wrapped me in a hug. We sat quiet for several minutes as I continued to cry. Once I felt like I could speak without breaking down, I pulled back and gave her a small, sad smile.

  “I just need to be alone right now.”

  “You sure?” she asked as she brushed the hair from my face.

  “Yeah, I’m sure. I’ll call you later tonight.”

  Reluctantly, she left my house, leaving me alone with the silence. Once I heard the front door shut, I reached over and opened my bedside table drawer, pulling the pamphlet out that had arrived in the mail a few days before. I studied over the papers for the next few hours. When I heard my father’s car pull into the driveway, I slowly made my way down the stairs, documents in hand.

  “What’s the matter, baby girl?” he asked as soon as he stepped through the door, his features a blanket of concern as he took in my tear-streaked face.

  “I need to talk to you,” I answered in a wobbly voice.

  “Come on, honey. Let’s go sit down.” I followed him into the living room and took a seat on the couch next to him, trying to keep from sobbing at the wary look in my father’s eyes. “Tell me what’s going on.”

  “I can’t stay here, Daddy,” I stuttered, losing my fight not to cry. “I know I told you I wanted to go to college locally to stay close to you, but I just can’t stay here anymore. I can’t be happy here.”

  My father’s warm arms gathered around me and pulled me into his comforting embrace. “Shh, sweetheart,” he cooed. “It’s okay. It’s all going to be okay.”

  “I’m s-so sorry,” I choked. “I’m sorry, Dad.”