Jaded

by Tijan

  walked along his empty side. I trailed behind, which caused Bryce's arm to fall behind with Corrigan on my other side. I caught him glancing up and down the hallway and asked, "Looking for Logan?"

  Corrigan cast a sharp, cautious, glance my way, but sighed as he saw genuine curiosity in my own eyes, "Yeah."

  We had stopped at Bryce's locker and I leaned against his neighbor's locker when I remarked to Corrigan, "You should have her come over today. I'm sure my mother will be gone house hunting with her boy."

  Bryce looked up at that and commented, "I'd rather hangout at Corrigan's."

  I looked sharply at him and breathed in relief. I was still in his plans after school.

  "Sweet. I'll tell Logan," Corrigan said quickly before anyone could change their mind.

  I said flatly, "No Chantal."

  Bryce shrugged and remarked, "No movie star."

  "Fine."

  "Fine."

  "Fine," Corrigan piped in and wrenched me aside as Logan approached the group. With the handcuffs, I got a good grope under her shirt as Corrigan greeted her like a long-lost lover that had been separated and held hostage by warring neighbors.

  "Okay." I tugged my hand back and commented, "No more of that until we're not actually handcuffed together."

  Corrigan and Logan parted at my words.

  Logan was flushed, speechless.

  Corrigan just grinned and replied, "Deal." He let go of Logan.

  Bryce raised our hands as Miss Connors walked through the hallway. He remarked, "See, Miss Connors. Handcuffs."

  "That's very nice, Bryce Scout," Miss Connors commented, politely, as she continued down the hallway.

  Corrigan punched Bryce in the shoulder when she disappeared, "What was that, idiot?"

  "What?"

  "Nothing like telling her that we figured out how to get out of the handcuffs," I remarked.

  Bryce cast a shrewd eye over me and shrugged, "Whatever."

  Logan surprised everyone and asked me, "How are things with your mom?"

  Bryce and Corrigan didn't say a word.

  Neither did I.

  No one asked about The Mother.

  "That's a loaded question," Corrigan commented and eyed his girlfriend in pity.

  But—new leaf and all—I said, calmly and even a little bit nicely, "She's…hopefully gone pretty soon."

  Corrigan suddenly laughed and suggested, "We should have a sleepover at your place tonight, Bryce."

  I grinned and commented, "AnnaBelle Scout would pray the whole night with a Bible on her lap."

  Bryce rolled his eyes, but I caught the slight quirk at his lips.

  "Why?" Logan treaded onto uncharted waters once again. She asked, "What's your mom like?"

  The pause wasn't so obvious this time and Corrigan answered easily, "AnnaBelle hates Sheldon."

  "And she loves Corrigan. Corrigan's a saint in AnnaBelle's world," I added.

  Logan kept quiet, which was wise.

  Bryce muttered as the four of us moved towards my locker, "She'd go after Miss Connors and the school would lose a good counselor."

  "She said she got everyone's permission for this thing."

  "She called my dad, not my mom. The school knows to call my dad for anything real about me. They call mom if they want her to volunteer for a food drive or something." Bryce rarely talked about his dad and he couldn't hide the bitterness from his tone as he did now.

  Logan glanced at me. Corrigan quieted, skimmed an eye over Bryce and turned to me.

  I watched Bryce and he looked up to find my eyes on him.

  "Don't even," he bit out.

  I grinned, "What? You think you're the only one who can have a screwed up family?"

  The second bell rang then and Corrigan asked, "What class are we going to?"

  Mandy Justice approached us at that time. She gave us each a handout and said what the title read, "We're doing a candlelight vigil for Leisha tonight. It's nine in the tabernacle at Holy Mount."

  Holy Mount was the local Christian college.

  "Who's we?" I asked.

  "Me. A few others. Becky, Jill, just…the regular girls."

  "You guys didn't even know Leisha."

  "No, but Carlos did and Becky wanted to do this for him." Mandy shrugged. "Your fight's not with me, but it's a good cause."

  "You should get some of her friends to do it." And why would Becky want to do this for Carlos?

  Mandy flinched. "Look, no one else is doing it so…just show up, okay?"

  Mandy left before I could say anything.

  Bryce nodded and stated, "We're going." It went without saying, but Bryce had already said it.

  The final bell rang and I stuffed the handouts in my books.

  Chapter 21

  Compared to the normal hustle and bustle, all three of us spent a boring afternoon at Corrigan's. Bryce and Corrigan played video games, laughed, and punched each other. I curled on the couch for awhile and then moved to the bedroom.

  Katrice came down a few times. The first time she brought a tray of crackers and cheese. Her second trip consisted of cookies that she'd baked that afternoon. The entire house was filled with the aroma of chocolate chip cookie dough. And her third trip was with hot chocolate and tiny marshmallows.

  Corrigan and Bryce ate it up—literally.

  I accepted the hot chocolate and curled up on the couch afterwards.

  Logan hit the doorbell around seven and Bryce gave me his phone to call my house. I didn't ask for it. He didn't offer it. He simply dropped it in my lap with my number already on the screen.

  I called, but there was no answer and I didn't leave a message.

  Logan sat on the opposite couch and we watched the boys play their games. I sat up once for a round of Guitar Hero, but my blanket called my name after I was done.

  For a group that was generally known for their action and immorality, we were saintly and boring that afternoon.

  Katrice brought another round of sandwiches and then announced dinner.

  Corrigan asked if we could eat downstairs and so dinner came to us. We were served lasagna and garlic bread.

  Logan smiled politely and Katrice adored her instantly.

  For a moment, I watched with a faint grin. I wondered if Katrice was relieved that I wasn't Corrigan's girlfriend.

  Maybe Katrice would've turned into another AnnaBelle if Corrigan had become a Bryce.

  Bryce's phone rang and jumped in my hand. I had held onto it after my empty phone call and now saw that it was AnnaBelle.

  Bryce looked over, saw my expression, and said flatly, "Ignore it."

  I glanced up and Bryce saw the devil-may-care glint in my eyes because he straightened and said further, "Leave it, Sheldon. I mean it."

  I stood up and answered it in a sweet purring voice, "Hello, Bitch." I grinned in satisfaction as I walked from the room.

  Annabelle caught her breath, but I heard a moment later, "I knew it. I just knew it. Bryce hasn't been returning my calls and he hasn't stayed at home since I found you in his bed."

  I cocked my head to the side and returned, "Well, he hasn't been in my bed." He had, but only for an afternoon so it wasn't technically a full lie.

  Annabelle laughed. It was full of contempt and my back straightened in indignation.

  "I give up," she chuckled to herself. "I give up. You can have him, but I promise you, Sheldon, you won't hold him. No one's going to hold my boy because he's going to the professionals next year."

  I frowned and stopped moving down the hallway.

  His mother continued, self-assured, "He's going pro and he's going to leave you behind. You might want to start looking for a replacement pretty soon, another big guy that'll protect you and stay up at night worrying about you. My boy won't be that guy anymore. He's going pro and the world is going to notice him."

  The phone rattled, just slightly, as my grip clenched tighter around it. "What are you talking about?" I turned and looked down the hallway.

>   I was far enough so they couldn't hear, but Bryce stood in the hallway. He watched and I saw that he knew. I couldn't see anyone else. The hallway cut off my vision of Corrigan, his perfect girlfriend, and the perfect doting mother.

  A look of exhausted resignation came across Bryce's face.

  "He 'has to work,'" I quoted Bryce's words to his mother.

  "Yes, he does and he's going to be noticed and you'll be in his dust. Mark my words. You'll be gone."

  Bryce took a step and said, "Hang up."

  "He didn't quit soccer because a college scholarship wanted him to, did he?"

  AnnaBelle laughed. "He quit because the pros don't want him to get injured before their trainers can work with him."

  Bryce stopped just before me and he said again, softly, "Hang up."

  My fingers gripped tighter and I breathed, "Where?"

  "Far far away."

  It was wrong for a mother to enjoy a daughter's torment. It didn't matter whose daughter stood at the end of that torment. That person, that soul, was someone's daughter.

  "Sheldon," Bryce breathed.

  Broken, I whispered, as her words whipped inside of me, "If I had a daughter and her eyes were his…would you want them to be crying?"

  AnnaBelle stopped abruptly.

  Bryce cursed.

  He took the phone from my numb fingers and turned away as he quickly murmured into it. I saw the tension in his shoulders. I saw how stiff his back was.

  When he hung up, I breathed out, "You're leaving."

  "Sheldon."

  "Why are you leaving?" I cried out. "This was before I messed up."

  Bryce closed his eyes and I saw the turmoil inside of him at that moment. It raged inside of him and I slowly, in awe, pressed my palm against his chest. Bryce sucked in a breath at my touch, but didn't move. Neither of us moved.

  "You can't move," I whispered.

  His eyes opened, slowly, almost lazily, and he whispered, "I don't want to."

  I closed my eyes at his words.

  "Hey," Corrigan called out from around the corner, ignorant, and unaware. "We should get going. Mom wants to do something before we head to the shindig tonight."

  My eyelids snapped open and I looked up.

  Bryce watched me and I saw an answering ache.

  Bryce turned to the side. My hand fell away. And we walked back to find Corrigan and Logan snuggled close together on one of the couches.

  Bryce and I sat on a second couch. We didn't sit at the ends, but there was an easy breathing space between us. I sat back and Bryce leaned his elbows on his knees.

  Katrice came back down the stairs a final time with two bottles of wine and five glasses in her hand. She uncorked one and poured the first glass.

  To my surprise, she turned and handed it to me. Warmly, she murmured, "It's a toast to Leisha Summers."

  I took the wine glass and felt the smooth fragile contour between my fingers. The wine was a deep red and it screamed of texture.

  "Thank you," I murmured, surprised and quieted.

  Katrice smiled warmly and I knew in that moment that she wouldn't have been another AnnaBelle. She would've been someone I'd never known if Corrigan had been Bryce.

  Katrice nodded and turned to me, heartfelt and unaware of how startling a person she was, "She was your friend. Corrigan told me. He said that you liked her and there aren't many that you like." She smiled again, sparkling, "This is a toast to your friend, Sheldon, because I know that she'll be missed by many if she passed the tests to your heart."

  She poured four more until all of us held a glass of that textured wine.

  Corrigan raised his and said, "I didn't know, but…I remember her crazy outfits. And she had some wild hair. I remember that."

  Logan giggled before she drank to his toast.

  Bryce glanced at me and I knew a temporary truce had been called. His eyes were clear as he said clearly, "I liked her. She put up with our crap that one day and…I don't know…I liked her. She seemed like a good person."

  Numb, I watched as he drank to his toast.

  They all waited for me now.

  "She…wanted to be cool," I spoke the truth.

  Corrigan, Bryce, Logan grew somber as they heard what I said.

  It was the truth and it made the moment even more heartbreaking.

  "She…did what I told her to do because she wanted to be popular. She wanted to be liked and I knew that. She skipped class one day and she never would've done that except that I asked her to. She only did it because…I was popular and she wanted to be popular. She put up with our stupid games."

  I cut off, for a moment.

  "I—what kind of person does that? Willingly lets someone…I never would do that. I would never go along for the ride, knowing that I might be humiliated by the people I'm with."

  "It wasn't about that," Bryce spoke up. He shifted closer. "We invited her to go with us and she did. She sat at a table with you all year. She started to get to know you."

  "Yeah. She…," Corrigan spoke up. "She was your friend, Sheldon. You looked out for her at the end. That's what we get because we're your friends. You look out for us. You're loyal even if it makes you a bitch."

  "And besides," Bryce grinned softly. "This isn't about how horrible you are, whatever you're thinking right now—this is about Leisha. And she seemed like a right chill girl."

  "Yeah, but…"

  "No buts," Corrigan said firmly. He scooted to the edge of the couch and leaned towards me. "No buts, Sheldon. Leisha saw in you what we all see in you and that makes her okay in my books."

  I grinned, "She wrote swear words in her notebook when she was mad." I laughed, "I thought that was hilarious when I saw it because…" My smile died. "I wouldn't have done that. I would've just told the teacher what I thought. I wouldn't have been…she was nice."

  "She was," Logan spoke up, timid at first. "I had Spanish with her and I thought she was always really cool—kinda like you, actually."