by Callie Hart
“As a heart attack,” Alex growls, stepping in front of me. He’s stood his ground, letting me handle the situation until now; I know he held back in order to try and rein in his anger, but Jake’s shocked statement has tipped him over the edge. With bared teeth, he prowls forward, a biblical rage burning in his dark eyes. “It kills you, huh? You wanted her so bad, you took her against her will. And when you couldn’t break her, you decided you’d do the next best thing and kill her. You failed at that too, though, Weaving. Silver’s stronger than you, and you know it. You’re never going to best her. And you’re never gonna fucking own her, either. She’ll never belong to you now.”
What the hell’s happening here? Jake’s eyes shine, wet and glassy looking. He downs his drink, swallowing down the whiskey in his cup—I can smell the powerful, sharp tang of it on his breath from where I’m standing. His nostrils flare as he puffs and blows like a wild, angry horse. Out of nowhere, the cooler-than-cool attitude he was affecting when he strolled over has vanished and he comes alive with fury. “Stupid fuck. You think you own her ’cause you slipped a ring on her finger?”
Alex pushes out a sharp bark of laughter, loud over the pounding music. “That’s the difference between you and me, isn’t it, Jake? I’ve never tried to own her. I want her to be free. You only wanted to crush her to your will, regardless of how you accomplished it.”
“God, back off, Trailer Trash,” Kacey groans. She studies her nails, angling them under the white lights that strobe on and off overhead. She can feign boredom all she likes, but I can see that she’s sizzling mad from the impatient, repetitive tapping of her heel and the way her mouth has flattened into a straight line. “The grown-ups are talking, okay? You’re embarrassing yourself. You’d be better off keeping your dirty mouth closed, sweetheart.”
Oh, shit. Alex is three seconds from exploding like a goddamn IED. On the outside, he’s perfectly calm. Anyone would be forgiven for thinking he was absolutely fine. He isn’t though. Not even close. I take his hand, as he took me by mine before, and I try to get him to look at me, but it’s no good. He’s too far gone to be reached.
“You,” he says quietly, addressing Kacey. “I’m confused by you. You’re so weak. There’s absolutely nothing remarkable about you. You’re uninteresting to look at. Below average intelligence. Your obsessive struggle for power has ranged well past the border of pathetic and is you’ve now officially hit pitiful territory. Somehow, you’re still trying to best the girl who adored and doted on you, even though you know you can’t. You know you lost to her a long time ago. You know she’s better than you in every way imaginable, and yet…you keep on trying. He calls her Second Place Silver,” he says evenly, jerking his chin in Jake’s direction, “but in your heart, you know she’s first place. She’s all he cares about. He can never love you as much as he hates her. She consumes his entire fucking being, doesn’t she? He’s so determined to despise her, that there’s hardly any room left inside his head for you at all. You’re always going to be second place.” Taking a measured step forward, he tips his head to one side, shaking his head slowly, like he feels sorry for her.
“I get what it’s like to feel worthless, Kacey. You’re right. I lived in a trailer park, and I come from poor stock. That doesn’t really set a guy up to excel in life. I see all of the things I used to hate about myself in you, and my heart breaks for you. But I swear to god,” he says, leaning into her face. “Call me Trailer Trash again, and I’ll make you wish you’d never been fucking born. I don’t care if you’re a girl. I haven’t forgotten that bullet in the library, Winters. Now, you close your mouth like a good little girl now, or I’ll happily slam my fist into it.”
Kacey pales. The haughty expression on her face fades and dies as she shrinks into herself a little. “You wouldn’t. You wouldn’t hit me. Your dumb masculine pride wouldn’t let you.”
“Oh, believe me. You grow up in the places I grew up and things like pride are a luxury you can’t afford. Do not doubt me. I’ll break your fucking neck if you piss me off again. And if you do or say anything to hurt Silver, then god help you, Kacey Winters, because only he will be able to save you.”
“All right, senior students of Raleigh High! Is everybody having an amazing time?” An overly cheerful voice on the PA cuts over the top of the music. The DJ stops the track, and a strained quiet falls over the gymnasium. No one’s paying attention to Susan Foyle, class president, who’s apparently commandeered a microphone from somewhere. All eyes are on Alex and Kacey. All eyes are on me and Jake.
“It’s that time of the night, guys! The votes have been counted, and the candidates have been weighed. I’m delighted to announce that this year’s Raleigh High Prom King and Queen have been selected by you, the people, and we are ready to unveil their identities to the world!” Susan claps enthusiastically up on the stage. No one joins her.
At any moment, this place is going to go up in flames. The tension’s so thick, you could cut it with a dull knife. Jake grabs Alex by the suit jacket, pulling him close. I can see his mouth working, hard words being spit out of his mouth as he snarls something at my boyfriend, but I can’t hear what he says, because Susan starts speaking again.
“Okay, okay. Not quite the response I was looking for, but hey. Tradition is tradition, people, and we are still excited to have our Raleigh High senior coronation. If everyone could please look this way, we’ll call our new king and queen up to the stage and then everyone can get back to dancing. Yaaaaayyyy!”
Poor Susan. She’s trying to inspire some sort of excitement in the crowd, but her Raleigh High pep is falling on deaf ears. Alex shoves Jake away, a hard, murderous light in his eyes. He turns his back and walks away from the other guy instead of hitting him, though. Alex isn’t going to try and kill Jake in front of two hundred witnesses. Thank the fucking lord.
“It’s okay. It’s over,” he whispers, ducking down to place a kiss against my cheekbone. “Come on. Let them parade themselves around in front of everyone all they like. I wanna get you a drink.”
Whoa.
The deadly, quiet rage that was oozing out of him just now has gone. I’ve never seen such an immediate turnaround in him before; it’s miraculous that he’s so suddenly so calm. “Really?” I search his face, looking for any tell-tale signs that he’s about to lose it and start throwing his fists, but when his eyes meet mine, all I see is frustration and weariness.
“Yeah. Come on. We’ve had enough of this shit to last us a lifetime. Zander’s got some tequila in a flask somewhere. We should find him.”
“Okay. Sure.”
Kacey still looks stunned, white as a sheet, as Alex pulls me away through the crowd. I don’t look back at her, or at Jake, as we walk across the gym, cutting a path toward the emergency exit.
“First things first,” Susan projects through the PA speakers. “I’d like to thank everyone for helping to decorate the school for tonight’s event. These things take work, and we’d have been lost without you guys—”
“Get on with it, Susan!” someone yells in the crowd. “Get off the fucking stage!”
Susan blushes furiously, shuffling a bunch of pages in her hands. She obviously wrote an entire speech for tonight’s proceedings, and she’d planned on more time with her audience. With crimson cheeks, she flicks through the pages, her hands shaking nervously. “Okay, okay. I get it. This is a party. We all wanna get back to the festivities. In that case, let’s proceed to the matter at hand. Our prom queen this year didn’t win by a landslide. In fact, just to make the rest of you girls feel a little better, she only won by three measly votes. Honestly, we were a little surprised when we finished the count. Anyway, anyway…I’m getting side-tracked. This year’s prom queen…” Susan looks around, searching for someone. “Can I get a drumroll, please?”
“Here.” Alex hands me an engraved silver flask, smiling softly. “I’m sorry, Argento. I shouldn’t have let that bitch get under my skin. Take a hit of this. Should make you feel better
.”
Since there’s no live band in the gym, the DJ obliges Susan and plays a drum roll for her, while I place the mouth of the flask to my lips and tip it back, wincing as the liquor sears the back of my throat with a welcome burn. God, I fucking needed that.
I still have a mouthful of tequila when Susan’s chirpy, high-pitched voice blasts out of the speakers again. “This year’s Raleigh High prom queen is none other than…Silver Parisi!”
I spray tequila at the back of Micha Williams’ head, splattering his bald cap with liquor. What the fuck did that girl just say? “No. Uh uh.” I shake my head, turning to Alex. I’m panicked. Totally, utterly and desperately panicked. “No. I’m not the fucking prom queen.”
Alex laughs a little as he holds his hand out toward the stage. “Seems like your fellow classmates have all voted otherwise, Argento. Better not keep your public waiting.” He is fucking loving this.
“Haven’t you seen Carrie?” I hiss. “If I take one step up onto that stage, I’m getting drenched in pig’s blood.”
“You honestly think I’d let that happen? You don’t think I’ve already made it very clear that nothing bad is to happen to you tonight, on pain of very agonizing death?”
“Come on up here, Silver! Where are you?” Susan booms into the microphone. She’s already got the damn crown and a bunch of red roses in her hand, and she’s scanning the faces of the people in front of her, looking for me. “Get up on the stage, girl! Come up here and claim your crown!”
“I’m not claiming shit. No fucking way.” I attempt to back away. The emergency exit’s only a couple of feet from me, and the chaperones who were guarding it before are nowhere to be seen. Wouldn’t be that hard to make a run for it, slam through the double doors and flee barefoot out into the night. Alex has other ideas, though. I crash into him, my back colliding with his chest, and I suddenly have nowhere to go. It’s like trying to go through a brick wall.
“No way, Parisi. This is your ‘fuck you’ moment,” he whispers into my ear. “This is the moment you get to look down on every single one of these motherfuckers and let them know that you’re still standing strong. They voted for you, for fuck’s sake. Doesn’t matter how many votes you won by, either. They chose you. So, go take that fucking crown. It’s yours, damn it.”
It’s a nice thought, that there are actually people at Raleigh who want me to be their prom queen. I just can’t swallow the idea, though. Even if there are people here who feel badly about how they treated me, they wouldn’t vote for me as their prom queen. It makes no sense. I don’t trust this moment, and I don’t think I should get up on that stage.
Alex is so damn adamant, though.
I look back at him, and there’s a devilish, wicked smile on his face that speaks volumes. “You did this, didn’t you?” I hiss. “You rigged it so that I’d win.”
He shrugs nonchalantly. “I might have accidentally found out that Kacey was planning on coming back tonight and claiming her crown. It sounded like a vulgar display of power. I might have fiddled with the votes a little to make sure she didn’t get what she came here for. Now seriously move. Kacey’s head looks like it’s about to pop.”
God, it does. She’s gone so red, her usually perfect, creamy, flawless skin is all blotchy and uneven. If she could only see herself now, she really would explode.
My feet carry me to the steps that lead up onto the stage. I’m numb down to the very roots of my soul as Susan shoves the flowers at me and places the crown firmly on my head. It’s all so damn surreal…
I’ve never imagined this moment. Never. Kacey was always going to be crowned queen of prom, there was never any doubt. The fact that I’m standing up here in front of the whole school instead of her is bewildering. I can’t make any sense of it.
The round of applause that follows my coronation is sounds real enough. There are even a couple of loud whoops and catcalls, cheering out my name. Zander and Halliday, by the sounds of things. Horrified, I realize that there’s no way Alex would ever have doctored the votes to make sure he was crowned prom king alongside me. It’s just not his style. Which means…
Oh god, no.
Surely not Jake.
God, please no, not Jake.
Susan beams at me as she holds the microphone up and makes the second part of her announcement. “My fellow Raleigh Rebels, tonight we have not one but two surprises for you! Our prom king is also an unexpected surprise, but one I personally could not be happier with. It’s my great honor to share with you all that our new prom king is none other than my friend Gareth Foster!”
Gareth Foster?
Captain of the Chess Club?
Gareth Foster?
What the fuck?
I should have known Alex wouldn’t put me in a position that brought me anywhere near Jacob. He did doctor the votes for prom king, and he didn’t give himself the crown. He gave it to the captain of the chess club, a nerdy guy, who was perhaps the person least likely to be nominated. It’s so bizarre and so sweet of him, that I almost don’t mind as Gareth comes bounding toward me across the stage and plants a wet kiss on cheek, screaming, “Hey! Wife For The Night!”
Oh boy. This is gonna be interesting. Bemused, I try to hunt down Alex’s wretched, grinning face in the crowd but typically he’s nowhere to be found.
40
ALEX
“Outside. Fifteen minutes. Just me and you. Let’s end this once and for all, Moretti. Unless you’re too chicken shit to face me without your girlfriend ’round to protect you.”
The words Jake spat into my ear were filled with violence. They still ring inside my head as I hurry out of the emergency exit, glad that I slipped out unnoticed as Silver ascended the stairs.
She’s going to hate me for this. She might never forgive me for what I’m about to do, but there’s only so much a person can take, and I’ve just about had enough. Not for myself, but for her. She’s stronger than me. I don’t think there’s an end to the amount of abuse she can take if she has to, but I can’t stand by and watch it happen anymore. I’ve allowed it for long enough. It’s time I stood up and finally said enough on her behalf. I should have done it a long fucking time ago.
Snowflakes float in the still night air, hauntingly suspended in place as I follow the channel of footprints that have cut a path through the labyrinth of looming snowbanks covering the basketball court behind the school. There’s no wind to speak of, but the cold still knifes through my suit, sinking its fangs into my bones. The sky’s clear overhead, and the waxing gibbous moon—a shining smudge of light in the vast, sweeping midnight blue—casts long shadows from the naked trees.
There’s death in the air and I can feel it. It tries to seep inside me, just like the cold, as I hurry around the back of the gymnasium, keeping a sharp eye out for Jacob. The prick has no honor. I expect him to jump out of a fucking tree and lynch me—it’s definitely his style—so I’m surprised when I turn the corner around the building and there he is, waiting for me in an open clearing. His hands are in his pockets. Fog clouds on his breath when he opens his mouth and speaks.
“Well. Didn’t think you were this stupid, Moretti. Gotta say I’m surprised.”
For fuck’s sake. What an asshole. “You got me all wrong if you think I’d ever be afraid of facing you, man. You’re nothing special. I’ve taken down bigger guys than you and I didn’t even break a sweat.
“Nah.” Jake shakes his head, laughing as he looks down at his shoes. His hands are still in his pockets. “Nah, I know you’re not worried about facing me. I didn’t mean that. I meant that I didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to come out here on your own.”
Snow compacts, creaking under the soles of boots, as two…no, three other guys come into view, appearing around the other side of the gymnasium. My old friends Kyle, Naseem and Lawrence. Jesus. What did I just tell myself as I walked out here? Jake has no fucking honor. It’s no surprise that he told me to come out here alone, and yet made sure he’d have an entire
crew of guys with him. This is on me; I should have known he’d never have the stones to go toe-to-toe with me in a fair fight.
“Coward.” I toss the word to him like a pebble, but Jake flinches like I hurled a boulder at his face. He recoils, scowling deeply, as his friends come to stand by his side. They remind me of hyenas, laughing moronically, skulking through the shadows to stand behind their pack leader.
“I’m not a coward,” Jake snaps. “I’ve dealt with shit you can’t even imagine.”
“Right. Sure. Daddy confiscate your Ferrari? You actually had to buy groceries and make your own lunch once? Tough life, Jake.”
His grimace deepens. With the moon casting warped shadows across his face, he looks like a grotesque gargoyle, eyes sunken and cheeks hollow. “Having a drug runner and smuggler for a dad’s not as fun as it might sound,” he says. “Thugs and criminals at the house every night of the week. I’ve seen people beaten. I’ve watched people get shot and die on my living room floor. I listened to my mother cry herself to sleep every night between the ages of seven and thirteen. Nothing in my house was easy, you dumb piece of shit.”
“Aw. Condolences.” I laughing scathingly down my nose. “Sounds like a fucking summer camp to me, but hell. What do I know? I had to watch my mother blow her own brains out when I was six, so I’ll never know how hard it must have been for you to hear your spoiled, rich, Percocet popping mommy sniffle into her pillow when she went to bed at night. Must have been hard. Christ, you really do think you’re the only person in the world who’s ever had to deal with hardship, don’t you? Well your brand of hardship looks an awful lot like privilege to me. I’ve literally been fucking tortured, and I never used my shit as an excuse to hurt and defile people weaker and more vulnerable than me. Only a sadomasochist does something like that.”
Jake chuckles, winking at me playfully. I want to ram my fist into his fucking face so hard that his skull bursts like a motherfucking balloon. “Ahhh, Alex. You been speaking to my therapist? You and he sound an awful lot alike. Y’know, you’re brave, I’ll give you that. You’re about to die, but you’re not about to let a small inconvenience like that prevent you from saying whatever dumb shit is on your mind, huh?”