Just as I started to drift off to sleep, my cell rang. As promised, Chel answered my groggy “Hello?”
“You missed a wicked party.” Chel raved for several minutes about the party.
I was jealous at first, but my attention began to slip as sleep pulled at my eyelids.
“What was your deal tonight anyway?” Chel asked.
Snapping awake, I took a deep breath and launched into my story, telling her every detail.
“You’re kidding!” Chel’s voice climbed a few octaves.
“Nope. I wish I was.”
“Poor Todd. I’d better call him.” Chel had known Todd since fifth grade.
“Thanks. Tell him I’m sorry. I had no idea Kyle would freak out like that.” Guilt sank to the pit of my stomach.
“Don’t beat yourself up. Todd’s kind of a sissy when it comes to pain, anyway. He’ll probably play it up to get more sympathy from you on Monday,” Chel said.
I wanted to believe her, but his biting voice still haunted me.
CHAPTER 3—Outcast
Monday, November 7
Monday dawned, and I slunk around the corners of every hallway in our small high school. I wasn’t ready to face Kyle. The fluorescent lighting appeared dimmer than usual, and the bricks around me seemed to absorb the overcast day’s gloom. Like Garfield, I wanted to crawl under my comforter until Friday. I wouldn’t even grumble about leftover lasagna for dinner.
Class after class passed, and I wondered if I’d fretted all weekend over nothing. I was so sure Kyle would corner me the first chance he got, but I hadn’t seen him all morning. Usually he walked me to my first class. But it wasn’t just Kyle that worried me. I had to face Todd next period, and that was terrifying.
Entering biology, I nervously scanned the room, my eyes landing on our empty table. Todd was never late to biology, and the tardy bell was about to ring. Reaching my stool, I lobbed my backpack on the table. There was nothing to do now but wait. The bell rung, and the minutes crawled by before Mr. Mercer walked into the room with Todd trailing behind. His swollen lip sported an angry red rip down the center. I winced, catching his eye only briefly before he lowered his gaze back to the floor.
Guilt pelted me like a sandblaster. Kyle had murdered that brief friendship. Mr. Mercer only confirmed my fears when he asked Emily to trade places with Todd as my lab partner. Emily timidly nodded, her large glasses bobbing on her chubby face. Her chin-length, dirt-brown hair only made her face look rounder. She shuffled over to the seat next to mine, never meeting my eyes. Pulling out her text book, she hunched over it as if it were a tiny shield.
It was up to me to break the ice. “Hey, Emily. Guess we’re partners now.” I tried to smile.
She nodded, peering at me from the corner of her mouse-brown eyes.
“So,” I searched for something to say. “How did you do on the earthworm dissection?”
She squirmed on the stool, but didn’t answer, no doubt wanting to be anywhere but here.
Emily’s focus rarely left her work that period, so I stopped trying to make small talk. I cast a few glances at Todd, missing his friendliness, but today he was as introverted as Emily and said nothing to his new partner, Carol. His deflated expression clawed at my heart, leaving behind a festering wound that ached with each breath. Why did I keep losing people I cared for? Was I cursed to be lonely?
When the final bell clanged, I stormed back to my locker and almost ripped it from its hinges as it banged open.
Everything’s so messed up!
I shoved the text books inside before slamming it with a metallic thud.
Swiveling on my heels, I yelped as I smacked right into Kyle. “Hey, Tay. What’s the rush?”
“Just leave me alone.” I stormed off.
“Come on, Tay. Don’t be like that.” His hand slid around my arm and gently pulled me back. “I’m really sorry about the other night.” The corner of his lips tugged up into a sexy, crooked smile. “Why don’t we just forget it ever happened and go for dinner tonight?”
His touch sent tingles rolling through my flesh. My traitorous body leaned into the warmth of his fingers that tickled the inside of my arm like moth wings. He reeled me in and wrapped an arm around my waist.
And I hated myself for embracing it.
Why did he have to be so irresistible? My knees went weak with the sheer amount of muscle wrapped around my waist.
Yes was on the tip of my tongue when my eyes slid pass Kyle to Todd who walked into view behind him—cued to the stage of my life. Our eyes met, and Todd froze instantly, fear etched in his long face. In the next breath, he pivoted and scurried back the way he came, tripping over his feet in his haste. Suddenly, I felt cold and exhausted. I wanted to curl up in my bed and cry this whole situation away.
My gaze fell to the ground at my side. “I can’t forget,” I said and wiggled out of Kyle’s embrace.
The following weeks fell into a rhythmic lull. Everyone at school knew parts of what happened between Kyle, Todd, and me—the joys of a small high school. I’d overheard at least ten different versions, all with Kyle justly in the right and Todd as the villain.
Poor Todd. My stomach twisted with guilt.
Todd wasn’t the only one getting the cold shoulder and awkward glances. When I walked by, the guys averted their eyes and the girls shot me dirty looks. On top of this new outcast status, Kyle took every opportunity to corner me. No matter how many times I refused to date him, he wouldn’t drop it. It was like he was trying to break me into submission by turning the whole school against me, but it only made me more determined to stay far away from him.
By the time winter break rolled around, I had memorized Kyle’s classes and could navigate through school accordingly. The break was a nice reprieve from my constant Kyle vigil. It wasn’t necessarily relaxing with Cammie and Sarah at each other’s throats and Aunt Lily’s mood swings, but it was without Kyle and that was enough. On one of Aunt Lily’s better days, she took us to the Buffalo Bill Museum for their annual Christmas celebration. Even Chel and Grandma Jonas came. We all enjoyed the large display of Christmas lights and the live music.
But I was glad when school started up again in January. As much as I love my cousins, I didn’t think I could handle another day in the same house with them. Chel helped me scout out Kyle’s new class schedule, and I resumed sliding shadow-like through the hallways. I’d hoped during the three week break that Kyle would fixate on some other girl, but Chel caught him threatening my new anatomy and phys lab partner, Jake, that he’d better not do anything more than borrow my notes if he wanted to live. Since then, the poor guy had barely spoken to me. The more I ran from Kyle the harder he followed, killing any new opportunities for escape.
CHAPTER 4—Crushed Petals
Tuesday, February 7
It was now February, my least favorite month, even surpassing my painful dislike of October. But today was the seventh, the blackest day of them all. My buzzer screeched for the gazillionth time, and I smacked it silent. I was still unable to force myself out of bed. My heart felt like lead in my chest. Images flashed through my mind like a waking dream. The news reports, the shattered plate that slipped from Aunt Lily’s frozen hand, and the phone call confirming Uncle Stan’s death in the coal mines that sealed my aunt’s catatonic state.
Uncle Stan had been like a father to me, and our old apartment had felt like a hollow shell without him. It was like all the laughter in our home had wafted away on a heartless breeze the day he died. Aunt Lily immediately sank into a deep depression. She’d just sit in her rocking chair in our old living room in Charleston and stare out the window for days at a time, refusing everything, even our hugs.
I told myself everything would be all right after Aunt Lily had time to grieve. For months, I’d taken over her household duties and tutored my cousins’ homeschooling courses while keeping up with my own. At fifteen, I’d learned the true meaning of the word exhaustion: force-feeding my aunt and keeping my five and
nine-year-old cousins from ripping each other apart.
My chest knotted remembering those dark months. There’d been little time for me to mourn between crawling exhausted into bed and before crying myself to sleep. After two months, Aunt Lily’s depression plummeted so severely that she thinned to bare bones, and I caught her dumping her daily protein shake—the only thing I could get her to eat—down the toilet. I’d been so scared I would lose another mother that I disregarded our family pride and begged Grandma for help. She’d flown down and put Aunt Lily in grief counseling, and all of us were immediately enrolled into Charleston’s public schools.
Slowly, things improved, until Aunt Lily started acting paranoid, saying there was a strange man stalking our apartment. We’d tried convincing her it was probably just a bum—we were in a city after all—but she still locked us in the house for a week until the moving van came. I’d hoped a fresh start in Cody would transform me into the carefree teen Uncle Stan had known, but it didn’t. I still felt different. Older, I suppose, than the other seventeen-year-old girls at Cody High, making college the perfect fix-all. But I was still over a year from graduating.
The high-pitched whine of my buzzer jolted me from my depressing memories once again, but I didn’t turn it off. I almost embraced the pain ringing in my ears and welcomed the annoying sound like a protective blanket around my shoulders.
Seconds later, my bedroom door flew open and sixty-two-year-old Grandma Jonas stormed in. “Where is that thing? I’ll smash it with my boot!” Grandma’s blonde tipped, coffee-brown hair was matted from a restless night’s sleep. She rubbed her red-rimmed turquoise eyes, and I realized her usually springing step was slower. Locating my alarm clock in the next breath, she ripped the cord out of the wall.
I watched her cautiously as the silence lengthened between us. I’d asked her to spend the night, since I wasn’t up for caring for Aunt Lily on my own. Grandma slumped on my bed with the power cord in hand and sighed heavily.
“Sorry, Tay. Lily finally fell asleep. And if anything wakes her, I’ll lock myself in the bathroom.”
My first impulse was to apologize, to comfort her, but instead tears trickled from my eyes, and I wanted nothing more than her arms wrapped around me. I was tired of being the strong one. I grasped at something happy, anything. A deep longing ripped through my heart as images of a future me—carefree, at Northwest College—flashed in my mind. But guilt quickly wiped it away—guilt that I wanted that vision to be true. Surely Aunt Lily would be better in a year, and I’d just be thirty minutes away, close enough to come home if she lost it again. Time and time again, I hashed the same argument, knowing I couldn’t leave unless I knew they’d be okay, no matter how tempted I was to run from my suffocating life.
Grandma’s eyes flicked toward me as I rubbed my tears in my comforter, but she knew. “Oh, TayTay.” Dropping the alarm clock with a thud, she repositioned herself by my head and rubbed my back as tears tumbled down my cheeks. “Shh. Everything will be all right.”
But everything wasn’t all right.
When I finally quieted my sniffles, Grandma shifted. “Are you going to be okay? I need to see if the girls are up for school today.”
I nodded, and she stood. I caught her arm. “Thanks Grandma, for, you know…everything.”
Grandma brushed my hair out of my face. “Lily is strong enough to beat this if she’ll just let go of the past.”
I swallowed. I was still working on that myself.
“I wish there was more I could do for you.” Grandma raked a hand through her spiky hair.
“You being here helps.” I squeezed her arm to convey my appreciation before releasing it. “How’s Mom doing?” I asked.
“Oh, she’ll be fine in a few days.” Grandma opened her mouth to say something else, but thought better of it.
I knew what she’d say. It was an old argument anyway. Grandma understood why I called Aunt Lily, Mom, but she still believed my mother was out there…somewhere. Even if she was, I wasn’t sure I’d call her mom after she’d abandoned me as a baby. Aunt Lily was the one who’d kissed my bruises, tucked me in, and shared my sorrows. But I couldn’t lie to myself. I still distinguished Aunt Lily as my aunt when she wasn’t around. Maybe I still held some hope that my biological mother still wanted me.
“You’re tough. It’s what I love best about you.” Grandma kissed my forehead and left without another word.
With Grandma’s kiss still warm on my face, a new wave of tears rolled down my cheeks. I didn’t want to be strong, not today. I just wanted to be a grieving teenager for once. But I had to get up. There was no making up assignments in Mrs. Lannic’s class, and I refused to flunk my British lit presentation after all the effort I put into writing it. School was my life-line. It gave me hope that I could make something of myself. My one rock since Uncle Stan died, but with Kyle, even that wasn’t as sturdy as it used to be.
My whole chest ached with grief as I hurriedly threw on yesterday’s outfit—the only semi-clean one left—and raked a brush through my tangled hair. I grabbed my keys and dashed out the door, hoping to beat the bell.
Just as I dashed through the front doors, the shrieking tardy bell tolled “no such luck—no such luck.”
As if to top off my rotten morning, I was late to honors British lit. Mrs. Lannic had zero tolerance for late students, especially on presentation days, and slapped an extra dry reading assignment into my hand. With puffy eyes, disguised under hastily applied concealer, I wordlessly accepted it and jetted to my seat. Natalie snickered as I slunk by her desk, but I ignored her, shoving my hands deep in my hoodie’s pouch.
She thought she was Miss Perfect, always fifteen minutes early, with every silky hair in place. Even with my attempts to push Kyle away, she still hated my guts. I slouched in my chair. Could this day get any worse?
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Chel whispered across the aisle to me.
“Crappy morning.” I leaned closer to Chel and dug in my backpack that was in the aisle between us.
“Your aunt?”
I grabbed hold of the notebook with my presentation in it. “That’s only the start of it.”
Mrs. Lannic called on Chel before she could ask the questions brewing behind her eyes.
After Chel was finished speaking and Mrs. Lannic focused on some other poor soul, I discreetly flashed my cell at Chel. She nodded, and I texted her the details.
Really bad this time? Chel texted. She sometimes helped with Aunt Lily when Grandma Jonas was off painting her wolves.
Yeah. Had to call Gran, was all I had time to text before Mrs. Lannic picked on me next. I groaned just loud enough for Chel to hear. She gave me a sympathetic smile. Even on my best day I hated public speaking. Natalie snickered and tried to trip me with her heel as I walked by. Luckily, I was ready for it and added a quick step.
Focusing on my scribbled notes, I was grateful I could read it word for word from my notebook or I might have forgotten the whole thing. I started my presentation on the prejudices found in the classic novel, Tarzan—my assigned book. At least I didn’t have poems from Edgar Allan Poe like Chel. That man’s stuff really gave me the shivers.
I never looked up at the class as I spoke. I heard Mrs. Lannic’s pen give me a big fat zero for eye contact, but I didn’t care. All I wanted was to scurry back to my chair. I became a robot, reading the words at super speed, with little inflection. Then it was over. I unclenched my spiral binding and plopped in my chair, all too ready to watch others sweat in front of the class.
After two more presentations, I struggled to pay attention. I felt slightly detached from my body, as if my soul was numb, but my flesh forced me to continue the day. It was stupid to think I could handle school. Why didn’t I have Grandma call me in sick, like she did for Sarah, who refused to get out of bed? Maybe, subconsciously, I was trying to be more like little Cammie who gladly scampered off to school this morning. She was too young to fully comprehend the sorrow today represented.
I walked in a haze to world history and clumsily ran into someone. His hands gripped my shoulders, overdramatizing the collision.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, head down. I attempted to walk around him, but he didn’t let go. My gaze flew up.
“Are you drunk?” Kyle chuckled. So did a few of his friends.
“Let go.”
Kyle’s lips curled into an inviting smile, looking amused. “Anyway, since I have you here, I wanted to ask you something.”
I slumped in defeat, held upright almost entirely by Kyle’s arms. Here came his repetitive plea.
“Be my prom queen, Tayla.” He slid his hands down my long-sleeved shirt to hold my hands, and my legs wobbled under my exhaustion. “Say yes.”
Prom? It was months away. I must have been delirious. But his fingers were warm and inviting, comforting as they slowly drew me in. I wanted to cry. Why did this have to be so complicated? My hollow heart ached to be comforted by someone. But not from Kyle. His price tag was too high. Before I could collapse into his embrace, I shook my exhausted head and numbly stumbled toward history. Thankfully, he released me without a fight.
“You’ll say yes,” Kyle’s sultry voice floated down the hall after me.
“In a casket, maybe,” I grumbled under my breath. Would this ever end? Or would I be trapped in his twisted game forever? I shivered.
Finally, what felt like days later, the last bell chimed. The word tired was a gross understatement to how heavy my limbs felt. With effort, I lugged my heavy backpack over my shoulder and trudged from Mr. Chase’s honors anatomy and physiology class. By now, my head hummed from all the information tumbling around in it. Taking all honors classes this semester was definitely overkill. I was surprised my advisor let me. I was only a junior after all, but I was ahead of my peers thanks to the strenuous pace Aunt Lily set during my years of homeschooling.
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