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I sat in my assigned chair at the table I shared with Troy Bleecher. As with most days, he did not acknowledge me. He'd already opened his textbook and was searching for the assigned page.
I wasn't usually the one who started our conversations, I left that up to Troy, but that day was different. I needed to talk to him. But no one could ever accuse Troy of making things easy.
I'm not saying anything, I thought stubbornly, leaning down to unzip my back pack. Glancing up, I saw that he wasn't facing me. In fact, the way he was turned, it looked like he was concentrating on ignoring me. I took my binder and text book out to begin the reading assignment as the burn of resentment welled up and I decided he could go fuck himself.
Half way through the second page, Troy had the nerve to lean in. Not much, but just enough for me to know he was going to speak.
"Why did you bother telling me if you weren't going to let me do anything about it?" His voice was so quiet, I could barely hear.
I didn't turn, but effectively glared from the corner of my eye. "Your doing is the reason I'm in this situation. How's your girlfriend?"
Troy had been dating this bitch named Rosa on and off since the previous summer. I suspected, from a fight that had taken place in the girls bathroom earlier that day that Rosa was trying to use Angel to get to me, and from the blank look on Troy's face, I knew the rumors were true: they were back on.
"Good news travels fast." His tone was flat, barely audible.
I cast a quick glance at Ms. Shine before drawing my loaded gaze back to Troy. "Why?" I asked, truly curious, but sounding forceful. I wanted to sound as if I were talking about the assignment instead of our secret, non-existent relationship. "Why did you go back with her?"
Troy shook his head the way he always did when he sensed I might want something from him, like common courtesy or respect. It was his way of warning me that I should lower my voice and the bar of expectation.
"It's not like you don't have your own things going on."
I acknowledged with a tight nod. "You can lock your window from now on."
"I will." He turned back to his book.
For some reason I couldn't unearth, I liked that douche bag. He really was a terrible person and I couldn't stay away from him. Troy was an absurd contradiction of cocky and sweet, smart and stupid, funny and lame. And I had been sneaking out two or three nights a week to see him for the past several months. Even though we would meet in different places-the street outside his house, the park down the road from his place, or sometimes at the stop sign at his corner-it seemed I always ended up sneaking into his bedroom (it's not like anything in Carlisle was open after nine) and letting Troy do whatever he wanted, before walking myself home as if it never happened.
Once, I didn't leave his place until four in the morning. I lived over two miles away and he didn't even get out of bed.
Another time, I left around one in the morning and as I was walking myself home, I noticed a guy on a BMX bike following me. I walked faster, but the strange boy kept peddling, slow as could be, like he was trying to keep pace with me, but also stopping here and there to tie his shoe or light a cigarette-which kept him a creepy half-block behind me the whole way.
When I was nearly home, the boy suddenly sped up beside me. That was when I got my first real look at him. He was about my age-seventeen or sixteen-with extremely thin lips, straggly blond hair, and acne scars. He also had a long scar across the bridge of his nose that curved down to his lip and over part of one cheek. It wasn't an ugly scar, but was thin and long, as if someone had slashed him with a pink marker.
When he spoke, he started with an apology for scaring me. I told him he didn't, but it was a lie. The boy asked if I lived close by, because he had just passed his own house and wanted to make sure that I'd get home safe before he went on his way. It was the first time in my life that anyone had ever worried about me. I was blown away-a kindness being offered without expectation? Did people actually do that-give without taking?
Troy certainly didn't.
I had never seen the boy before and decided to test the waters. I told him that I was walking home from my boyfriends' house. He said my boyfriend was an asshole to make me walk in the first place, and a total dick for making me go alone, in the middle of the night. He recommended that I dump his sorry ass.
That made me smile. I told him not to worry, that I was almost home, anyways. Then I pointed to my house.
He nodded. "I'll watch from here, until you get inside." On any other night, it might have freaked me out, but that night I felt safe.
That nice boys' face came back to me just then, as I sat in the middle of chemistry, right beside the person that a complete stranger had so aptly labeled.
"You are an asshole."
Troy's gaping mouth, along with surrounding murmurs told me I spoke the realization a little too loud. I looked up at the white board to find Ms. Shine staring at me. And she wasn't alone. As I searched the room, everyone else seemed to have their eyes locked on me, too. Ms. Shine walked down the aisle, dropping a pink slip onto my open textbook.
"I know the drill." I said, gathering my things.
Troy's face took on that dead look, the one he used when other people were around. It only came to life when we were alone, which only happened in his bedroom.
"Never again," I whisper-yelled, rising from the chair and trying to hide the utter shock of my eyes blurring. He was a horrible person; so not worth crying over. But that didn't matter. The melancholy fit came on against my will, emptying me completely.
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