“She’s lying! All that bitch does is lie!” I shout, knowing I sound crazy, but I can’t seem to stop myself.
Thunder booms outside, and a crack of lighting throws the room into a stark flash of light and dark. My phone buzzes in my backpack, making it clear the guys have noticed the weather outside.
“I know you feel very strongly right now, but please take care with your language and try to calm down,” she instructs firmly.
Felix scrambles to his feet, and once again puts himself between me and Mrs. Cartwright. “She’s right,” he entreats, then rubs at the back of his neck. “I mean, she’s tone deaf and blind, because seriously, lady, who keeps talking when a student looks like this? But you do need to try and calm down. Town go boom, remember?”
My eyes lock onto Felix like a life preserver in the frozen seas, and I try to stuff it down. I want to flee back to the detached part of my mind, but it’s no longer safe there.
“Call all the guys down here,” I beg, desperate for all of their strength and their voices added to mine. “Nolan Campbell, Kaleb Ward, Connor Lopez, and Donovan Alvarez. They saw everything that happened this morning. They’ll tell you that Gina did this, not me!”
“Uh, maybe not Connor,” Felix interjects, with a pained expression. “Remember, we told him to take a nice long wolfy run, so he doesn’t murder Gina and half of the administration. He’s eighteen, and I imagine prison would be hard on a shifter. No fresh air or trees to pee on.”
I bark out a laugh, but it sounds somewhat unhinged to my ears.
Mrs. Cartwright raises a dubious brow, unaware of Felix’s nervous rambling about fresh air and trees. “They saw Ms. Reyes place the pamphlets in your locker?”
And there it is. The trap snapping around my neck.
A cold burn spreads through my chest, like I’ve been stabbed with a dagger made of ice, and my teeth clench so tight my jaw aches.
“No, they didn’t see her put them in my locker,” I grind out. “They were there when I opened my locker and all of the paper fell out.”
“Does Ms. Reyes know the combination to your locker?” she asks, but her tone implies she already knows the answer.
“No.”
She lets my answer hang in the air like a proverbial noose. Her face says it all. Just like I told the guys this morning, it’s easier to believe I did this to myself than that the popular rich girl no one has ever accused of bullying did this to me.
“Holy shit,” Felix breathes, smart enough to understand what this all means.
This little conversation isn’t simply about who stuffed my locker with suicide pamphlets or dumb rumors about me spread through the school. Gina’s neatly ensured that everything she does to me from here on out looks like I’ve done it to myself, and anything I say or do against her is evidence of my obsession to ‘take her down.’ Instead of casting suspicion on her, she’s become the victim in all this.
“Fuck you,” I hiss, so angry my vision blurs. With each word, my tone gets louder until I’m once again screaming, “Why bother asking me, if you weren’t going to actually give me the benefit of the doubt? That’s the problem with people like you. You all think you know, but you don’t know shit!”
My necklace burns my flesh, reaching its threshold, and the window shatters.
Mrs. Cartwright gasps as the glass explodes onto the floor behind me, and her eyes are so wide I can see the white completely around her brown irises.
“Are you alright?” she asks with real concern in her voice, getting up from her chair to investigate the damage.
A glare is my only response— I’m too scared to open my mouth again.
Felix looks surprisingly relieved. Probably because I smashed a window opposed to blowing up half the town.
Once Mrs. Cartwright makes her own assessment that I’m not physically harmed, she sighs, her shoulders slumping. She walks back to her desk and pulls out a yellow notepad. “I’m sorry, Callie. I’d hoped that we could have a mature conversation about this, but it looks like you need time to think about what you’ve done, and the proper behavior to deal with your actions. Tomorrow, you have after school detention, and I’ll be calling your aunt. I hope once you’ve had time to think, we can discuss your behavior and how we can work together to overcome these issues.”
“Whatever,” I mutter, sounding like the sullen teen she thinks I am, but I’m too pissed off and scared to care.
It was a window this time, but if I don’t get this binding spell off, we might not be so lucky next time. Though, with what my aunt told me about spirit witches, I don’t know if it’ll be any better for the town when it’s off.
Felix seems to come back to himself, when I snatch the detention slip from Mrs. Cartwright’s hand and head for the door. I slam it as hard as I can when I leave, because what the fuck does it matter? If I’m polite or a complete bitch, they still won’t believe me. No one listens. No one cares about what’s true. Only what’s easier to understand.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers as he follows me toward my last class of the day, Jewelry 1. “I couldn’t help. If it was one of the other guys with you, then maybe…”
“It’s okay, Casper,” I reply with a weak smile. Even though the last period of the day has already started, I try to keep my voice low in case a random person walks by. “There’s nothing you or I or anyone could’ve done. Her mind was already made up.”
He opens his mouth to respond, then thinks better of it, shaking his head instead.
