When we finally left the car, Sawyer led me to the registrar’s office. The lady at the front desk was Mrs. Daniel’s, the lady who called and left a message for Mom that day I had come home from Sawyer’s all stressed from waking up making out with a stranger.
Mrs. Daniels scowled at Sawyer as she printed out my schedule of classes.
“My mom used to work in this office,” Sawyer explained once we were out of the lady’s earshot. “I’m not sure what was up, but apparently that hag—Mrs. Daniels—didn’t like her. I have no idea why.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what to say to that, but Sawyer didn’t seem to care either way. He studied my schedule, then gave it back to me.
“We don’t have any classes together,” he said.
I glared at the list, wanting a different one. This one sucked. Roosevelt was a huge school. I didn’t want to go to classes alone. I needed Sawyer.
As we walked through the crowded halls, I was amazed how many girls stopped to flirt with Sawyer. And gush about his band. I couldn’t believe it. Hello, we were holding hands. Still, they full-on flirted. It was like I wasn’t even there.
Grrr!
Thank goodness Sawyer didn’t flirt back. He was friendly with the girls, but respectful to me at the same time. Every time we were stopped he would say, “Hey, by the way, this is my girlfriend, Jodi. She’s new.” He always stressed the girlfriend part. He was awesome. But still.
Then we ran into Hanna. The girl from Looks. That was a different story, completely. Unnerving.
“Hey Sawyer,” she said, smiling at him all friendly-like, but then she saw me and paled. “Uh, hi,” she whispered, then bolted away from us—from me, like I was wielding an axe. Seriously.
“That was weird.” Sawyer gave a bewildered smile, watching Hanna as she lunged away from us through the crowd of students.
“Yeah, no kidding. I told you she quit Looks the day after Nora hired me. I think she’s afraid of me.”
Sawyer glanced at me as though I was nuts. “Why do you think that?”
“Because. She acts scared of me. Didn’t she act scared? Like she thinks I’m going to grab an axe and start hacking?”
Sawyer grinned, raising an eyebrow. “Yeah. That’s probably it.”
I was serious. She was scared of me. Maybe she had read about Dad on the Internet, or maybe she had been in New York when the incident happened, saw the story on the local news. Something. Something about me had her spooked and that stuff about Dad, that was spooky stuff. And it was all I could think of. So, I figured that was it, somehow. She knew about Dad.
“Hanna’s just weird sometimes,” Sawyer said. “I mean, she’s cool, but weird. We used to be friends, back in the fifth grade. But then she just stopped talking to me. No reason. Actually, it wasn’t until this last year that she started talking to me again. I don’t even know why.”
Hm.
Sawyer guided me up to the football bleachers where the rest of The Clutch lounged. It was a relief to see familiar faces after the mob of strangers in the hallway.
“Hey Jodi!” Trista called, smiling. I gave her a friendly wave, feeling we were actually friends.
“First day of school, huh?” Zack asked, grinning, and once again I was amazed how nice he was. It was just that sinister look about him. It threw me off every time.
“She’s nervous,” Sawyer said, giving my hand a squeeze.
We sat with the group and Sawyer wrapped his arms around me. Suddenly, I felt … okay. Almost. It was weird thinking back to when I first moved here—only a month ago. I had been frightened, envisioning my first day of school, terrified I’d never make any friends. But more than that, I’d been terrified that Jeremy would laugh at me for being all alone. The thought had made me cry at night. Not that I truly believed Jeremy could be so cruel, I didn’t. But late in the dead dark of the night, I wasn’t so sure. I was afraid maybe he could.
But this morning, sitting there with Sawyer and his friends, my worries seemed to have faded away, almost forgotten. Only not completely forgotten. ‘Cause there was one worry that was always, always, always looming in the back of my mind, always—Kenzie. What if she showed up here? At school? The thought made me hold on tighter to Sawyer.
“Hey, we have a party gig this weekend,” Zack said to Micah and Sawyer. While they talked about Clutch stuff, Trista looked over my class schedule. She smiled. “You have chemistry with Micah and me. You can be our lab partner. Micah’s been stressing about me abandoning him when I move.”
“Yeah, I’m sure being lab partners with me will ease his pain.”
She laughed. “Well, he has been stressing over having to find another lab partner.”
“When are you moving?”
She sighed. “At the end of the month.”
“That soon?”
“Yeah, isn’t it horrible?” She hugged her knees. “Right at the cusp of my senior year. But my aunt is going through a … thing. My parents think we should be near her. So …”
No! I didn’t want her to move.
She grinned. “Don’t look so dejected Jodi. You’re as bad as Micah.”
“Well,” I said, my cheeks slightly burning, “I was planning on us being friends.”
“Oh.” She pursed her lips, seeming kind of taken aback, but only for a minute. Then she flashed a smile. “That would have been nice, really. But you’ve got the band. They’re just a bunch of rowdy boys, but they’re really sweet.”
Jeremy strolled over to the bleachers, holding hands with a blond. Seeing him made me catch my breath. But seeing him with the girl made me let it out, slowly. Just breathe, I told myself. You can do this. Breathe in, breathe out. In … out. Good girl.
Jeremy had been talking with Sawyer and the guys, but he glanced up at me, probably feeling my gaze. His eyes latched onto mine and my heart caught. I quickly skirted my gaze, realizing I’d been staring.
Awkwardly, I tried making small talk with Trista, but still, I could feel Jeremy come and sit beside me, feel his heat.
“Let me see your schedule,” he murmured in my ear, his warm breath making me tremble. He studied my list a moment, then handed it back, crushing my heart. He flashed a sad smile. “We don’t have any classes together.”
I tried to be glad, relieved I didn’t have to see him in a class every day, but deep down I was sad that I didn’t get to.
The bell rang and we made our way down the bleachers in twos. Until now, I hadn’t noticed Zack was alone—Eve wasn’t with him.
“They broke up,” Sawyer said.
Not a good sign. Two break ups in one weekend, and Trista was moving away. Couples didn’t seem to survive with The Clutch. Great.
Sawyer walked me to my first period class, pre-calculus. I held on tight to his hand, wanting him to linger, afraid to go into the room alone—what if Kenzie popped up? What if I grabbed an axe? This whole classroom could be a bloody sea of carnage before the next bell rang.
“You’ll be fine,” Sawyer said, giving me a lingering kiss. “I have to go though, Jodi. I’m gonna be late.”
I watched him as he walked down the crowded corridor. He gave me a wave before turning the corner, disappearing down the hall.
“Go into class, Jodi!” I heard him call. And I smiled. But then a movement caught my attention. I froze, a chill running down my spine. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move.
A black shadow—dark and ominous—crept along the wall, coming toward me.
My heart slammed against my chest.
No, no, no!It’s not real. I grabbed at the rubber bands around my writs, snapping them painfully hard, causing wounds. It’s not real. It’s not. There’s no shadow.
I blinked.
It was gone.
***
At lunch I stood waiting for Sawyer at my locker. The whole area was thinning of students, becoming barren. Where was Sawyer? Thoughts of the shadow creeping along the wall still loomed in my brain, hovering, making me shiver. Being alone now was freaky.
Finally, Sawyer barreled around the corner. “Hey, sorry I’m so late,” he said. “Were you getting worried?”
I fidgeted with my rubber bands. “A little.”
He eyed my wrists, saw the red marks around them, and furrowed his brow. “Jodi …”
I shook my head.
He took a deep breath, seeming to count to ten, yet after still seemed to struggle with keeping silent. “Okay,” he finally said, reluctantly changing the subject. “There was this girl—in my last class—Lindsey.” He unfolded a pink slip of paper. “She left me this weird note—like the one in my car that day. I guess that one was from her too.”
Sawyer handed me the note. It was in the same writing as the perfumed note that had been left in his car—the note that said “I know a secret.”
This one said: “Hey Sawyer, I know something you don’t. Try to get it out of me, k?”
It sounded sort of … slutty. I scrunched up my forehead. “What did she know?”
He shrugged. “I have no idea. But she’s been looking at me weird lately—and coming into the store a lot. And she obviously wants me to ‘get it out of her’ some other way than asking.”
“Duh.”
He grinned. “No, it’s not like that—I don’t think it is anyway. I think she wants money or something.”
“Why?” I raised my eyebrows, my stomach kind of twisting. “What’d you do?”
He shook his head, like I have no idea. “Maybe she’s just playing around.”
In the cafeteria, we got a slice of pizza and sodas, then found the others waiting for us at a table in the back. They were all joking around, talking about classes and weird people in them—and they didn’t mean me. ‘Cause they didn’t know. It amazed me how comfortable I felt around Sawyer’s friends now—almost as though they were my friends too. They were a tight bunch. It was cool being accepted into their group—and I did feel accepted, pretty much.
I was still kind of shaky, though. Lost in thoughts of shadows and what happened before pre-calc. I guess I kind of zoned out for a moment because when I looked up, I saw Jeremy watching me sardonically from across the table. He winked.
My heart went spastic.
But just then another blond, not Chloe or the one from this morning, glided over to our table and practically sat on Jeremy’s lap. She played with his hair while she talked with him, then before she left, they kissed good-bye.
“Are you and Regan becoming a thing?” Zack asked as he watched her skim out of the cafeteria. “She’s hot.”
Jeremy shrugged. “Want me to set you up with her?”
Zack looked surprised. “Yeah.”
I cleared my throat. “You really like blondes, don’t you Jeremy?” I was trying to be conversational. He, of course, had no idea how much courage it took for me to do that—to actually talk to him without a direct reason. But I figured I needed to get used to it if he and I were going to be in the same group. After all, it was his group—I was the outsider.
He gave me a teasing smile. “Don’t go bleaching your hair over it.”
“Yeah,” Micah agreed with a snort. “Remember Amber Murry?”
Jeremy groaned with an impish smile. “Don’t tell her about Amber.”
“She was a blond and Jeremy had no interest in her—zero—until she dyed her hair brown, like yours.”
“Not brown—Jodi’s hair’s not brown.” Jeremy drenched his pile of French fries in ketchup, not looking at us as he spoke, but keeping his eyes on his ketchup-to-fry ratio. “It’s reddish-brown, auburn.”
“Anyway,” Micah went on with the story, like Dude, whatever. “After she dyed her hair, she sort of looked like you. Then Jeremy was suddenly into her. Big time. For a while. And then he went after Holly Bennett.”
“Oh yeah, Holly Bennett,” Zack piped in, the name obviously ringing a bell. “She looked like you Jodi.”
“She didn’t talk like you though,” Jeremy said, flicking his gaze up to me for a moment, then stabbing his fry in ketchup. “She had a really irritating voice.”
“You always say that.” Sawyer stole one of his fries. “It wasn’t that bad.”
“Well, it wasn’t like Jodi’s.”
“He only dated Holly for two days—two days—then he went on to Sara Davis. She looked like you too,” Sawyer said, raising his eyebrows at me, like this info held a lot of meaning, like it aided in getting his earlier point across.
“Yeah, but,” Jeremy paused. He shook his head, like he was thinking about the past and it was strange—even to him. “She–I swear—she tried to talk like Jodi.”
Sawyer grimaced. “Yeah. She was nuts.”
“Well, nuts about Jeremy,” Micah shrugged. “But any girl that likes Jeremy would have to be nuts, huh?” He gave Trista a playful rub on the head.
She just rolled her eyes. “It sounds like Jeremy was the crazy one.” She learned toward Jeremy. “So, why’d you switch to blondes?”
He shrugged. “Because it didn’t hurt so much—they didn’t remind me of Jodi.” No one said anything. Finally, Jeremy gazed up at me, his warm brown eyes tender. He gave a weak smile. “I missed you.”
My heart exploded.
Hearing him say that, I melted. I was suddenly a sopping puddle. Not because of the girl stuff—that was freaky. But that he had missed me. That he said it. It had me ready to cry.
But they had to be putting me on—him, them. All of them. They had to be. Because Jeremy had crushed me. Like a bug. Like I meant nothing to him. He had dumped me too—just like he’d dumped those other girls … only it had taken him over a year to do it. Until my mom sent me off to live with Dad. Then he totally stomped on my heart. Mangled it until it was irrecoverable—until there was no way it could function properly. No way I could ever love again.
My voice caught. “You did?” I meant the question to be about him missing me.
Jeremy sat back, watching my eyes, then nodded. “It was a long time ago, though—right after you left. I was really messed up.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” Zack smirked. “Not much has changed, huh?”
Jeremy gave a wry smile. “Actually, a lot has.”
As if on cue, to prove his point—Regan, the blonde from earlier slid in the seat next to him. “Hi,” she said, handing him a plate of extra large cookies with M & M smiley faces. “I made these in cooking class.”
Jeremy eyed them, a small smile on his lips but a question in his eyes. “Thanks. There for me?”
“Yep, all for you,” she said huskily as her friends tried pulling her away.
“Little self-respect, Regan,” one of the girls said.
Regan gave her friend a dirty look, then turned back to Jeremy all smiling I-want-to-lick-your-face-like. “They’re peanut butter.”
Jeremy winced. He gazed down at the cookies a moment, then raised his eyebrows. “Hey Regan, do you know Zack?”
Zack’s face lit up and he smiled at Regan, like he was thinking this is my chance, but Regan gave him a disdainful look.
“I know Eve,” she said as her friends pulled her away. “’Bye Jeremy,” she called over her shoulder. “Enjoy the cookies!”
Jeremy waited until she was out of earshot, then said, “Here, you enjoy the cookies.” He scooted the plate to Zack. “I hate peanut butter.”
Hearing him say that caused me physical pain. Back when we were together peanut butter had been our staple—our “special” ingredient—we heaped it into everything, on to everything.
But now Jeremy hated peanut butter.
And he was into blonds.
The bell rang and everyone started heading for classes. I was in a baffled stupor. Jeremy had gone around dating girls that looked like me? Sounded like me? He said he’d been messed up. But why? What did he have to be messed up about? He’d dumped me, it wasn’t the other way around. I was the one with the stomped on heart. I was the one that was messed up.
***
Despite the spooky shadow and being scared out
of my wits, the rest of the day went pretty well. Considering.
I was glad Micah and Trista were in my chemistry class. I definitely wasn’t a chem-wiz. I needed all the help I could get.
In class, I took notes like crazy. But it was hard keeping up. The teacher, Mr. Daniels, lectured on and on, non-stop. I wrote frantically, zoning out toward the end. When I came to, I read over my notes and froze, a chill crawling down my spine. I want to do your boyfriend, was scrawled in big, bold print toward the bottom. Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy.
The bell rang.
“You okay?” Trista asked, when I just sat there, frozen, staring at my notebook.
I jumped. “Uh, what? Yeah, I’m fine.” I got to my feet.
Mr. Daniels came over to the three of us—Trista, Micah, and me. “Problems?”
“Nope, none,” Trista said, pulling me towards the door. A girl was waiting to talk with Mr. Daniels, so he let us go without a further look, but I’m pretty sure I heard the girl call him “Todd.”
I glanced back, thinking that was weird. But Trista pulled me along, giving me a knowing look.
“Steer clear of Mr. Daniels,” Trista warned with a laugh. She was talking low enough that Micah didn’t hear us. He was busy gazing through his notes as he strolled distractedly beside us, somehow avoiding the throng of student traffic without even looking. “We have a lot of perv teachers at our school,” she said. “I’ll make you a list.”
She seemed to be only half-kidding.
I probably would have been more grossed out, but at the time I was in a panic. Now Kenzie was writing me notes in class. And she wanted to have sex with Jeremy.
Great.
CHAPTER 13
Immediately when I got home from school I wrote everything that happened today down in my journal—about the shadow and Kenzie. Every detail. I decided to start doing that—find out what happened right before and after any kind of “loony” episode took place. Discover what triggered them. So I could stop them. I was going to beat this. I was actually hopeful.
The Stranger Inside Page 13