Chapter 12
Kaley had gone the entire morning without encountering either Eli or Harvey. She was starting to worry she had stepped into another dimension and they didn’t exist.
Thankfully, Harper was there to reassure her otherwise. Although, what she was trying to talk her into was completely out of this world.
“I thought it would be fun,” Harper insisted. “Something we could do together.”
“It’s the dance committee, Harper. Seriously, the dance committee. What part of that sounds like fun?”
“We get to decorate the gym.”
Kaley wasn’t convinced, nor won over. When Harper had announced she had signed them both up for decorating the school gym, she had stared at her slack-jawed. She was yet to find the silver lining on that particularly dark cloud.
“I’m not doing it. I’ve got enough to do let alone make stupid decorations for a stupid dance that I’m not even going to.”
“It’s too late, I’ve already put our names down. We have to sit in on the committee meeting in…” Harper checked her watch. “Now. Come on, pretend you’re having fun. You never know, you might actually have a good time.”
Harper grabbed Kaley’s arm and started dragging her toward the classroom that was doubling up as dance organization central. Her grip was so tight she couldn’t escape.
“But what about lunch?”
“We’ll eat later. Just smile and you’ll feel happy about it in no time.” Harper never shut up the whole way with her inspirational quotes that sounded like they were from greeting cards. “What shows on the outside will affect the inside. Smile and the world smiles with you.”
“If I agree to not run away, will you please be quiet?”
“No offense, but I don’t trust you.”
True to her word, Harper didn’t let go of her grip but she did quit it with the slogans. They reached the classroom and stepped inside, everyone else had already found a seat. They slunk into the back, using their invisibility to their advantage.
Standing at the front of the class was Miss Aberdean, one of the youngest teachers at the school. She was in her late twenties and the boys in her classes drooled over her blonde hair and athletic body.
Kaley liked her for the sole reason that she wasn’t bitter and jaded yet like all the other teachers. Miss Aberdean still believed in the students she taught, she still had school spirit. She taught History which wasn’t the most exciting subject, but she did her best with what she had.
“Thanks for coming, everyone. I’m so excited so many people showed up.”
Kaley looked around, there were only seven people, including her and Harper. She wondered how many people Miss Aberdean was actually expecting – two?
The others in attendance were to be expected – they were the same ones that volunteered for everything. And those people included Abigail and her friends.
“So we have the theme of the dance being sweethearts. So we’re going to need lots of hearts. So many that there can be no doubt about the theme on the night. On the day of the dance, you will then use the hearts to decorate the gym, in addition to other things like streamers and balloons. This is going to be so much fun!”
Miss Aberdean started to distribute cardboard in all shades of pinks, reds, and purples, along with scissors. Kaley started imagining all the other places where she would rather be at the moment. It included pretty much anywhere except in that classroom. She would even rather be having lunch with Harvey. And that was saying something.
“Now, we need all different sizes so get creative and have some fun with it.” Miss Aberbean took her seat at the tables she had arranged in a circle and invited everyone to join her. They were having a ‘fun craft circle’, apparently.
“I think if we sneak out now, we might be able to get away unscathed,” Kaley whispered as Harper pushed her toward the circle.
“Sit and cut, Miss Thorne. We’re here now, we can start having some fun. You can’t be grumpy when you’re cutting out hearts.”
She was pushed into a seat and a pair of blue safety scissors shoved into her hands. The pile of cardboard seemed endless, they would be there all day cutting out damn hearts. Kaley made a mental note to cut out big ones, that would speed things up a bit.
As they got to work, the other girls started talking amongst themselves, mostly about who they were taking to the dance, what they were wearing, and how they were getting there. None of the conversations seemed overly interesting. She turned to Harper instead of listening in.
“Did you get anywhere with Cooper this morning in band practice?” she asked, hoping for some good news. She didn’t think a guy that had been ignoring Harper for years deserved her, but she went along with it anyway. He was the guy she wanted, that was enough for her.
“I pretended to drop my bow and asked him to pick it up for me.”
“You spoke to him, that’s got to be a step forward.”
“Not really, he picked it up and handed it to me without even looking. He was too interested in skanky Sienna on the keyboard. I felt like pulling her plug out.”
“Maybe next time.”
Harper nodded, there would always be a next time. They had four weeks before the dance, that was like three years in high school time. Anything could happen in the interim.
“Now, now,” Harper started, talking quietly so they couldn’t be overheard. At least it made them look like they were having an intensely interesting conversation. “You should be excited for the dance, you’re going to have a date this year.”
“I told you, I’m not even going.”
“So if a certain boy that you went out with last Saturday asked you to go with him, you’d say no?”
It hadn’t even occurred to Kaley that Eli might ask her to the dance. It was way too early to assume he would. But, as she imagined what it would be like to walk in with him and then spend the whole night in his arms, she could see why the other girls were so excited.
It would be nice to go with Eli, as anti-dance as she was. But she wasn’t going to tell anyone that, it would be humiliating if it didn’t turn out.
“He probably won’t ask me. We’ve only been out once.”
“He promised you a second date.”
“Which he still hasn’t arranged. It’s almost the weekend, I think he’s changed his mind.”
“Have some faith. He’s probably busy.”
“Maybe,” Kaley sighed and turned her attention back to the cardboard hearts. It was less painful than thinking about Eli and all the reasons why he hadn’t called her yet.
The fact she hadn’t even seen him at all that day made her think he was avoiding her. Perhaps she wasn’t as smooth on their date as she thought. Maybe he was just too nice to tell her he wasn’t interested in her anymore.
Through the chatter of the other girls, Kaley heard the name ‘Eli’. She instantly looked around, trying to hear who was talking about him. She knew it wasn’t Harper, she was too focused on her hearts – tiny ones at that, she was going to ensure their torture would be long and drawn out.
Looking around, she was certain the word had escaped from Abigail’s mouth. She shifted so her ear was focused on them and tried to block out all the other conversations.
“I know, I can’t believe Eli either,” Abigail said. “He’s so immature.”
Her minion on the left, Macy, nodded in agreement. “He shouldn’t be playing games with you. He should be grateful that someone like you actually gives him the time of day. He’s ungrateful.”
The minion on the right agreed too, Kaley knew her as Madison. “I heard he went out with someone else on the weekend. You know he’s doing it just so you find out and get jealous. As if.”
“He went out with someone?” Abigail fumed but tried to cover it with aloofness. “Who?”
Madison shrugged. “I don’t know, nobody recognized her. Probably just some random loser skank.”
“We should find out who she is and track her down,” Macy st
ated, like that was something they absolutely had to do. “Make her pay for crossing you and show her who’s boss.”
Kaley didn’t like the sound of that. She was happy to be the girl nobody knew the identity of, even though they had sat in the same class as her a million times.
“Get on to that, Macy. In the meantime, I think we need to move to phase three of the plan.” Abigail grinned, it looked evil to Kaley and sent a chill through her. “Eli is going to be mine by the time of the dance. He needs to realize that it’s not easy to walk away from me. He won’t know what hit him.”
Macy and Madison laughed at her side, reminding Kaley of the gargoyles from the Wizard of Oz. How any guy could worship them was beyond her. Sure, they were beautiful, but that was it. Take away their looks and there was nothing but an empty shell of evil.
Perhaps it was true, perhaps guys just bought the book for the cover and didn’t care about the content. It was depressing.
Kaley felt an elbow to her ribs and turned to Harper. “What?”
“You’ve stopped cutting out hearts. We don’t want to be expelled from the dance committee,” Harper whispered to her urgently. “Cut and make it snappy.”
She looked down at her hands, they had indeed stopped mid-cut. She quickly got back to work, trying to cover the horrible feeling growing in her stomach.
Whatever phase three was of Abigail’s master plan, she didn’t want it to be inflicted upon Eli. She considered warning him, but how would she explain?
For all she knew, she was part of his phase one. Maybe he only took her to the pizza restaurant downtown so people could see them together. She might just be a pawn in the plan to make Abigail jealous, just like Madison said.
It was probably the reason why he hadn’t called for that second date. He had already received the desired outcome – Abigail was jealous and stepping up the fight to get him back.
She suddenly lost interest in the hearts, if there had been any interest in the first place. She made her hearts bigger, using more cardboard than anyone else. She watched as the seconds ticked by, bringing her closer to getting out of that dreadful room. It felt claustrophobic in there, if she didn’t leave soon, the walls were going to crush her. She wanted out and she wanted it now.
“Almost done,” Harper said cheerily at her side. She looked at her, trying to focus on her best friend. She was there because of her, perhaps she could go on a bit longer, she just needed to focus on a friendly face and not the voice of Abigail spinning around in her head.
Finally, Miss Aberdean put down her scissors. “Well done, girls. We must have a hundred hearts here. Pack up your cuttings and then you’re free to go. We’ll meet again next week to go through the final decorations in more detail. In the meantime, think about some creative things to do with streamers.”
Kaley was the first out the door, Harper tried to keep up behind her. She didn’t slow down, she headed for the courtyard without looking back.
“What’s the rush?”
“Abigail. Did you hear what she said?”
“No. I was listening to Holly tell Jess all about her weekend plans. They’re going to sneak out and go to that new club – The Bank. It sounded really exciting. I wonder what would happen if we did that?”
“Harper, focus. Abigail.”
“Oh, sorry. What did she say?”
Kaley recounted the entire conversation word for word as best she could. Harper’s face grew more and more shocked the longer she spoke. The words sounded even worse repeating them.
“That’s terrible,” Harper muttered. “I think we should get her before she can get you. I say we do something really horrible to her.”
“Like what?”
“Tie her up and cut off her hair. That would show her.”
Kaley managed a laugh. “Maybe that will be phase three. But seriously, Harper, there’s nothing we can do. I’m no competition for Abigail. If she wants Eli, then he’s going to choose her.”
Harper didn’t even try to argue the point. They both knew that Abigail always got what she wanted. Sure, it would be Eli’s loss for certain, but there was no competing with a pretty rich girl. They didn’t know the meaning of the word no.
“We’d better get to class,” Harper moaned. “We’ll think of something to get back at Abigail.”
Kaley followed her, hoping that perhaps the class would at least take her mind off things. All the thoughts of Eli were driving her crazy, she had never felt so distracted in her life. If that was what one guy could do to her, then she didn’t know if she wanted any piece of it.
The whole thing felt like a rollercoaster.
The class didn’t work. She moved from Math to Spanish and the entire time she couldn’t stop playing Abigail on repeat in her head.
She worried about what would happen if they did work out she was Eli’s mystery date. What did girls do to a girl that was trying to steal her guy? She had never been in a fight before, perhaps they would try to beat her up? Abigail probably wouldn’t do it herself, but Macy and Madison both had some serious nails going on.
When the final bell rang for the day, Kaley raced to her locker. She wanted to get home without any more drama. She changed her books and hurried down the corridor. As she did, she spotted Eli headed toward her.
She stopped dead in her tracks, not sure if she wanted to see him now or not. She couldn’t decide whether he was friend or foe yet. An almost-kiss on her porch could only go so far to convincing her one way or the other. In her dithering, she ended up just staring at him.
Eli didn’t stop to talk, he didn’t even acknowledge her presence. He looked right at her, knew it was Kaley, and yet pretended like she wasn’t even a blip on his radar. Not a nod, not a smile, not a wave, nothing.
He had completely ignored her.
That was her sign. Kaley knew at that very moment in the crowded hallway she was just a pawn in his chess game. He had picked on the invisible girl, one that would jump at the chance to go out with a guy like him. She had been the perfect mark, gullible and eager.
She was so humiliated that she had fallen so willingly for it. Their five hours spent together was one huge act. He deserved to be in the drama club.
Kaley hurried out the corridor, weaving through all the people that didn’t see her. It was too stuffy inside, she needed some fresh air and quickly.
She didn’t slow her pace until she was at the school’s front gate. She leaned on the fence and took several deep breaths.
She waited there for Harvey, in their usual place. She promised herself she wouldn’t ditch him, even though she didn’t want to deal with their awkwardness. Especially now when she was falling apart.
Kaley didn’t want to cry, she didn’t want anyone to see what he had done to her. It was her humiliation and hers alone. For other people to see her like that would make it a hundred times worse. She just stood there, waiting.
Harvey finally approached, shuffling his feet like he was in no hurry. Of course he wasn’t in a hurry, he didn’t just get crushed into a million pieces by the words of a vapid girl. He had all the time in the world to walk home.
“Are you okay?” He instantly noticed something was up.
“I’m fine, I just want to get home.”
“Well, let’s go then.” Harvey shrugged and starting walking toward home.
She followed, staring more at the ground than the other students mingling around them. She almost walked into a few but they didn’t register with her. All she could think of was Abigail and Eli.
If what she said was true, then they deserved each other. They could live their lives together in their bubble of meanness. All that bad karma would eventually accumulate and come back to bite them – hard. At least Kaley hoped so anyway. People like that tended to get away with a lot without karma noticing.
They were halfway home, having walked in complete silence, before Harvey spoke again. “Are you going to tell me what’s got you so upset?”
Kaley was flipping b
etween angry and hurt, but she guessed upset covered it all. She had no intention of telling Harvey the story of her afternoon. It would probably make him happy, like he had expected it to all end that way anyway. She didn’t need to hear it, she knew herself she shouldn’t have been so stupid.
“I told you I’m fine,” she muttered, however it was clear she wasn’t. Fine people didn’t tell you they were fine, they used other words like great or good. Fine was practically a codeword for ‘yes, there’s something wrong but I don’t want to talk about it so leave me alone’. Unfortunately, not many people understood that, especially the people that heard it.
“You obviously aren’t fine, you look like you could kill someone. It might help if you told me what it was. I might be able to help.” Harvey had his hands in his pockets as he walked along. He didn’t look at her, he kept his eyes forward.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Did Eli do something?”
“No.”
“I can beat him up if you want me to.” Harvey’s smile indicated he was joking, however Kaley suspected there was probably some truth to the offer. “I could take him.”
“Thanks.” Kaley couldn’t help but return his smile. “But I would hate to think what a footballer would do to you. I wouldn’t want to be responsible for your premature death.”
“He’s no match for me.” He flexed his muscles, or what he had of them. Eli would have him on the ground begging for mercy in no time. “At least I could outsmart him. It’s not the strongest that survive, it’s the most intelligent.”
“I thought it was the ones most adaptable to change.”
“But you have to be smart to work that out.”
He nudged her with his elbow until he got a laugh out of her. By the time they arrived home, Kaley was already starting to feel the anger subsiding. It left her with a sense of sadness about the whole situation. The humiliation she could probably have dealt with, it wasn’t like anyone in the school knew who she was anyway.
What hurt the most was losing what could have been. She had dreamed of what it would be like to be Eli’s girlfriend and it was sad that it wasn’t going to happen.
Love Songs (Secret Songbook #1) Page 11