He nods. “What is it, War Paint?”
My scabs are almost gone, but it makes me grin he’s still calling me that. With my back to Arthur, and the fans blotting out most of the sound, I’m consumed by all things Red or Rose or Skill or whatever you want to call this model of a man. When his rosewood spice hits my nose, all I can think about is ovens and buns and how this bad boy bakes. Flashes of him fighting the GTO cannibals come flittering back. Followed quickly by him sucking face on Vicious and Jackess at the same time. That dirty little secret clears my head.
“Duke and Victoria,” I say.
“What about them?”
“They broke up. Because of you.”
He smirks, “No, they broke up because of Victoria. Can I help it if she’s into me?”
I glare, “Do you realize how arrogant you sound?”
“Just the right amount.” His cocky chocolate eyes and lush lips flicker with amusement.
“No wonder you have two girlfriends.”
“I have more than that,” he chuckles.
“Listen to you!” I goggle, “You’ve got more manwhore in you than twenty manwhores put together!”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Don’t,” I snort.
“Why are we talking about this?”
“Because Duke ambushed me and ordered me to fix things. I told him I’d start with having you neutered.”
“You did?” he chuckles.
“I should have,” I laugh. “It would solve everyone’s problems.”
“Except yours,” he practically purrs.
“What?!”
“If you neuter me, you’ll die a lonely old woman, childless and forever unfulfilled.”
“Wait, what does neutering you have to do with—”
“Me filling you?” His sexy smirk is patently absurd and painfully obvious, but it looks devilishly delicious.
I roll my eyes simply to break my gaze away from his mouth, otherwise I might send the wrong signal.
“We should do something about that, War Paint.”
“About Victoria?”
“No, filling you.”
“Would you stop?!” I mistakenly swat his chest. Mistakenly because touching him is the last thing I want to do. I fist my fingers and hold both arms stiffly at my sides. Do! Not! Touch! This! Boy! But that isn’t quite the right word. This boy is more man than I’ve ever had.
“You started it, War Paint.” He arches an eyebrow. “You never told me what happened to your face.”
“You never asked. You were too busy kissing Victoria and Jacqueline’s asses.”
He grins, “I wasn’t kissing their asses. I may’ve been grabbing them, but I wasn’t kissing them.”
“Ew. Anyway, you were letting them walk all over me and treat me like dirt.”
Skill runs a muscled hand through his scarlet red hair. Like Arthur, he wears a Castle Hill polo shirt and slacks. Unlike Arthur, Skill’s arms are toned with sculpted muscle, and his polo shirt is tucked in tightly over his rippled abs, which peek through the material just enough so you know they’re there.
“Sorry about that, War Paint. Rob told me about Prince and the shoe kiss. That’s the way it rolls around here. Doesn’t matter if it’s guys or girls, the Fundies treat us work-studies like slaves.”
“You didn’t have to back them up. You literally told me in front of them that Victoria’s gum wouldn’t pick itself up. That was really mean.”
He sighs, “If I stood up for you, no, even if I hadn’t said anything and kept quiet, Jackie and Vicky would’ve blown their ass-tampons over me not backing them up.”
“What?!” I snicker at the image of exploding ass-tampons, which is fitting.
“If those two think for a second I like you even a little, they’ll go out of their way to fuck with you every chance they get. If that happens, picking up their spit out gum’ll be the least of your worries.”
“Oh.”
“You know how it is around here, and you’ve been here, what, a couple weeks?”
I nod. I know he’s right. Vicious and Jackess, are terminally vengeful.
“This place has a hard hierarchy and we’re at the bottom of it.”
“What am I going to do about Duke and Victoria? He said if they don’t get back together, he’ll send me back to jail or juvi or whatever.”
“He can do it too.”
“That’s what he said,” I sigh.
Skill nods and combs his fingers through his scarlet hair, thinking. “I’ll talk to some people and see if I can’t figure something out. If they get back together, you owe me.”
“Owe you what?”
His chocolate eyes smile, “Whatever I want, War Paint.”
We both know what that is.
I laugh, “That costs extra.”
“I already paid you extra.” That he did.
I still have his $2,320 buried in my backpack at the back of my dorm wardrobe. I giggle, “I mean, extra extra.”
“Name a number.”
“It’s not about money.” It really isn’t, but I am curious how much he actually has. More than me, that’s for sure.
“Then what is it about?” He leans into me until his polo-shirted chest tickles my gray blazer and blouse beneath.
“Um,” I bite my lower lip. “Can we work this out later? I have to get to trig class and lunch is almost over.” I back up slowly, eyes locked on his.
“Name a number, War Paint,” Skill calls over the humming computer fans. “I’ll make it worth every penny.”
“For who? You?”
“No, War Paint. You. I’ve always been a giver. You know that.”
I do. Giddy, I spin around because I’m blushing and head for the door. Oh, Red Rose William Skill, you’re going to thrust your way through my defenses if you try even a little bit harder.
Chapter 21
You know what the first sign is that someone is gaslighting you?
It’s that creepy feeling that things are off, but you can’t exactly pinpoint how. You just feel it, that greasy sensation of intrusion into your life that won’t go away no matter how much you ignore it or tell yourself you’re imagining things. You know better. You know someone is fucking with you. You don’t know who, or why, but you know they’re doing it.
Or you’re going effing crazy.
That’s the whole point.
They want to make you, the victim, worry that you’re losing you mind. If they secretly drive you crazy, and you have no idea who’s doing it, you can’t fight back, can you?
If they succeed, and turn you into a miserable puddle of impotence, a pathetic blob of human jelly that doesn’t even have the willpower to beg for mercy, they’ve got you. If they gaslight you just right, they own you, body, mind, and soul.
You’re theirs.
If they can manage that, you will do anything and everything they tell you, and you’ll think you’re doing their bidding of your own free will. They will replace your desires with theirs and you won’t even know it.
That’s gaslighting.
<(—)>
I find myself in a mad panic the day I figure out Azzie is gaslighting me. After coming back to my room after classes one afternoon, I realize something is amiss, but it takes a few minutes to figure out what.
When I enter Azzie and my shabby little room, the air feels thicker somehow. It’s not a smell. It’s a sensation. A tickling of the skin, an ancient mammalian awareness that danger lurks near. A cloying sludginess to the air I can’t pin down.
Is it Azzie’s perfume?
I don’t remember her wearing any.
Does her alter-ego Elizabeth wear it? I don’t know. Maybe? Did she sneak in here when I wasn’t around to change in or out of her Elizabeth attire? Is that how she does it? Portrays herself as two different people? I know she said they’re twins, but that is a freaking lie! I’m living with Eliza-bitch Morgan-Hearse, the platinum blonde angel of death!
I have to giv
e her credit. “Azzie” plays the part of the demure nobody to a T. Even though we’re roommates, we rarely talk, keeping our conversations to a polite bare minimum. The only sensible explanation for her quick change routine is she does it somewhere else for two reasons. One, I’ve checked her wardrobe. It doesn’t have any of the fancy Elizabeth clothes hanging in it. Two, she couldn’t change here in our room because other work-study girls would see her coming and going from the Convent. I suspect she might do it when she cleans the East Wing (she told me), which is presumably where “Elizabeth” has a second fancier schmancier dorm room.
Anyway, I don’t smell anything specifically amiss in my room right now. I just feel that feeling.
I set my book bag on my bed.
Stand in silence and listen.
Outside my room, I can hear the laughing, talking, walking work-study kids coming back from class. Inside my room, it’s a loud silence I strain to identify.
What am I missing?
What is out of place?
My wardrobe.
Where I keep my old backpack with my journal and my parents’ rings. I open the wardrobe slowly, expecting someone to jump out screaming, or slashing with a butcher knife.
Nope, none of that.
At first glance, everything is where it should be.
Still worrying, I pull out my backpack and sit on the bed with it. Unzip it and pull things out, setting them on the bed. Old clothes, my copy of The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf, and more until I find the frayed velvet box with my parents’ rings.
I open it expecting the worst.
My heart sputters as I pry the box open.
Both rings are there like they should be.
Phew.
Next, I pull out my journal. On first inspection, it appears fine. Flipping through it, I see my poetry, song lyrics for the band I’ll never have, drawings that will never hang in any gallery, tattoo ideas that I will absolutely wear with pride when I finally get them, a dark and rambling multi-page fantasy tale about a deliciously dangerous man I will never meet or marry, and most importantly of all, my innermost thoughts and dreams. It’s my very own illuminated manuscript, meant to shine a light on my gloomy life.
Normally, leafing through it is grounding, now I barely notice the contents. For several anxious seconds, I can’t find the picture of my parents kissing over ice cream and I start to panic. I flip through the journal’s pages three times before I find the photo where it always is.
Silly me.
Was I imagining things?
Probably.
Oh, wait! My money! The cash Skill gave me! Almost forgot! Since moving in with Azzie, I haven’t once looked at it. I don’t want her stealing it. I claw through my clothes to find where it’s hidden inside the legs of an old pair of jeans, half the money in each leg. I count it meticulously. It’s all there. Or is it? I’m about to count it again when I realize this is how they make you crazy. Of course it’s all there. I don’t need to recount it.
Rolling my eyes at myself, I pack my things into my backpack. The last item is my copy of The Voyage Out.
I frown.
What happened to the dog ears?
I’ve had this book like forever, and the corners are all bent, the cover scuffed, the pages faded. Except they’re not.
Hmm.
That’s weird.
I turn it over in my hands. Everything’s the same, except it isn’t as old as I remember.
What?!
I laugh to myself. That’s ridiculous. The only way a book can get younger is if someone replaces it.
Azzie.
Effing gaslighter.
I check inside the front cover for the library stamp. On the very last page it should say Lincoln Middle School Library, which is where I checked it out and never checked it back in.
The stamp isn’t there.
Did someone tear the page out?
No, because Azzie took my book.
Replaced it with an almost identical copy.
Why?
To gaslight me, obviously.
Shit. Do I count my money again?
No! I’m not falling for her head games!
Screw her! She probably didn’t even find the money, stupid bitch.
She can try and gaslight me all she wants, switch out my stuff till the cows come home, but I won’t let her switch out my journal, my parents’ rings, or my ice cream photo of them, and there’s no way I’m letting her take my money.
Backpack in hand, I march down to Mimi’s room and knock on the door.
“Mare Bear!” she smiles when she opens the door.
“Hey, Meems.” I walk inside.
“You ready to study?”
“Erm, yeah. In a sec. I forgot my school books in Azzie’s room. Before I get them, can I keep my backpack in your room from now on? Azzie is messing with my stuff.”
“Oh, totally. You can keep it in your old wardrobe where it’ll be safe.”
“Thanks,” I smile and set it inside myself and say a silent screw you to Azzie as I do. Now all I have to do is keep one eye open when I’m sleeping in Azzie’s room. Who knows what she might do to me at night. Eh. I’ll deal. I’ve lived with—
((((pitch black))))
((((pain))))
((((it hurts!))))
((((please not again!))))
—far worse.
Azzie is nothing I can’t handle.
Too bad Mr. Ralston took Grayson’s knife away.
I really need to get that back.
<(—)>
“You want to watch a water polo game after we eat?” Mimi asks on Saturday after we finish working. We’re getting lunch in the Convent Commissary.
The work-study kids call it The Cave because that’s what it is. Dark, no windows, a few bare lightbulbs. Even during the day it’s dim. It’s the dreariest place I’ve ever eaten. Hopefully I’ll get used to it. The tables are splintery old wooden picnic tables placed end to end in long rows.
Can we take our food outside and eat in the sunshine? Nope. Against the rules. Too many complaints from the Fundies about having to watch us savages gnashing away at the shoe leather and soggy cardboard we call food.
“Water polo?” I snort while spooning something slightly gray and very sloppy (I think it’s gruel, like actual gruel) from the cafeteria trough and onto my tray. “Why would I want to watch that? Isn’t that a horse thing?” I ask because I know about the equestrian center and how some of the Fundy sports involve horse riding and jumping and vaulting or whatever they do, not that I know a thing about horses other than you have to be a rich Fundy to own one and if you’re a poor work-study kid, you have to clean the stables for them. Luckily for me and Mimi, that’s something the boys do. Rumor has it the girls also did it long before Mimi and I got here, but that changed when the Fundy girls realized some of the work-study girls were sneaking horse rides on their horses, and liking it. Gasp! Anyway, now just the work-study boys handle the horses.
“No,” Mimi giggles then whispers, “water polo is boys in bathing suits fighting over a ball.”
“Whose balls?” I quip. “Their own? Or each others’s?”
Mimi laughs, “No, the water polo ball.”
“Sounds boring.”
“Their bathing suits are tiny.”
I stop. “How tiny?”
Mimi holds up her thumb and finger so close together they’re almost touching.
I bite my lower lip, “Which boys?”
“Prince and Chase are on the team.”
“Hurry up and eat,” I laugh, slopping green mush onto my tray, which at one time may have been peas.
We make it to the pool stadium before the game starts. It’s like an Olympic stadium, it’s so big and futuristic. Mimi and I get in for free because we’re students. The crowd is light, so we’re allowed to sit close to poolside. Mimi explains when the stadium is packed, work-study kids have to sit in the back. What else is new?
When the teams walk onto the pool dec
k, I gasp.
“Look at those Speedos,” Mimi marvels.
“Are they even wearing any?” I titter, crinkling my eyes like I’m looking hard. “I can’t see any.”
Mimi laughs.
We both stare at the lithe and muscled bodies of the boys on the Castle Hill team. They’re an explosion of tight abs and tighter asses. Prince and Chase immediately stand out as the tallest and tannest and having the best bodies on the team.
At one point, Chase catches us staring, he turns around and stretches his arms over his head, tightening his abs and thrusting his package right in our faces.
“How many abs does he have?” Mimi whispers giddily.
“Every single one,” I answer absently, transfixed by his physique.
When he finishes tormenting us, I mean stretching, he flashes us a cocky grin and turns around to focus on the coach, who is jabbering away about gameplay.
Mimi and I tear our eyes away just long enough to gawk at each other and gasp.
“Who needs football?” Mimi snickers.
“Right?” I titter. “What’s not to love about water polo? Who knew it was my favorite sport ever?”
“Totally,” Mimi laughs.
For the next hour, we watch Prince and Chase both attack the ball, moving through the water like they were born to it, scoring goal after goal on the visiting team. Prince is constantly hollering orders at his teammates, keeping them on target the entire time. Everything about him screams leader. Chase is his right-hand man, often assisting Prince in some impossibly fast passing and scoring.
“They are so good,” I say to Mimi at some point.
She says, “I heard their coach coaches the Men’s Olympic team every four years.”
“It shows,” I say, watching the yellow ball sail across the blue water of the huge pool as someone passes it long.
When the buzzer signals the end of the game, the players climb dripping wet out of the water. I swear they go in slow-mo. That might be the rush of my adrenalin that is surging through my body with the help of my pounding heart.
Prince doesn’t notice us as he passes on the wet pool deck, but we notice him. Every dripping inch.
Chase notices and chuckles to himself before blowing us a kiss.
Rich Boys vs. Poor Boys (The Cruel Kings of Castle Hill Academy, Book 1) by Devon Hartford kd103 Page 17