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“I can walk from the school to my house by myself just fine, thank you.”
“You’re welcome, but it ain’t a matter of if you can walk, but more about if you should.”
My fists clenched. “Well, if you’re so worried, you could always offer me a ride.”
“No can do,” Bishop spoke up. “Car’s full up.”
I looked at them incredulously, staring at the back where there was a perfectly empty seat beside Kace.
You know what, on second thought, I don’t need that ride. I wouldn’t take it even if they offered.
I turned away, nose up. “You’re such assholes.”
“Oh-ho.” Misael laughed, grinning broadly and ducking down a little so he could meet my gaze through the driver’s side window. “She swears! Your mama didn’t teach you how to do that, I bet. See, Bish? She is starting to fit in.”
I stiffened. The nerve of this—
Clenching my jaw, I drew in a deep breath through my nose. Misael wasn’t exactly wrong. I almost never heard my mom swear, although I’d heard my dad let loose with plenty of colorful language—usually through his closed office door when some business deal
hadn’t been going how he’d wanted. And maybe I’d started to curse a little more often in the past couple weeks, but I’d die before I admitted that to the boys in that car.
So I said nothing, holding onto my resolve to ignore them all. I didn’t have much farther to walk anyway, so I could put up with them for the last few blocks. I thought they might get bored and drive away, but they didn’t—the car rolled along at a snail’s pace beside me as they started joking among themselves about school and chicks. I rolled my eyes and left them to it. I was sure they were doing this just to annoy me, and even though it was working, I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of seeing me snap.
When we got to the house, I paused at the end of the walkway, looking furtively back at the trio. Misael winked at me.
“Have a nice evening, Princess.”
All three of them laughed, and Bishop peeled away in the car, zooming off down the street—seemingly just for show, since they screeched to a stop again in front of the house I’d seen Kace coming out of the other day. I watched them pile out, unable to stop myself, until Kace turned and looked back at me. We stood there a moment, gazes locked, but I refused to be the first one to turn away.
I wasn’t quite sure why I insisted on doing it. Maybe just to show them that I wasn’t some little flower they could trample on.
Kace’s lips tipped up in an almost feral grin, and he finally broke eye contact when he walked up into the house with Bishop and Misael.
He’d broken first… but something in my gut told me that wasn’t exactly a win for me.
Eight
Mom said nothing about the loss of the car.
I think, somewhere inside, she cared. But these days she was so listless, so non-reactive, I could have told her that a meteor had decimated half of Baltimore, and she probably wouldn’t have said a thing.
It was becoming unnerving; Mom wasn’t the most talkative woman, but she’d never been so completely non-emotive as she was now. Worry and resentment grew side by side, battling for dominance in my mind. I was afraid that I’d lose my mother entirely to whatever depression or darkness she was sinking into, but I was also angry that she wasn’t even fighting to make the best of our situation. Dad would know what to do to make her feel better; he’d always handled her perfectly, always knowing the perfect thing to say. I’d have to ask him to give me some pointers the next time he thought to call us.
Another night of homework and a microwave dinner came and went, and the next morning, I walked to school. I would have to see about getting a bus pass before the end of the day, but until then, I didn’t really have any other options. I left a little earlier than usual, remembering how long it’d taken me to get home the day before. Part of me wondered if I’d have company again, but I saw no sign of the Lost Boys on the way to school.
I honestly didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
Having left the house too early, I arrived early. It wasn’t like the students of Slateview High were clamoring to get to school more than a half-second before the first period bell rang, so the halls were fairly empty. It was nice, actually. Maybe I’d skip the bus pass and just walk to school every day if it was always like this.
The halls at Slateview always seemed overcrowded—not necessarily because there were too many students filling the space, but because everyone was always jostling, yelling, pushing or shoving. I hadn’t realized how tense it made me, how much it felt like walking through a battlefield, until I could traverse the hallways in peace.
But just because there weren’t many people here early, it didn’t mean I was truly alone. And it was stupid as hell of me to forget that.
I was on my way to my locker to deposit the books I wouldn’t need until later in the day when suddenly, rough hands grabbed my arms. I was pulled off to the side down a hallway near my locker.
Before I could even register what was happening, a boy I didn’t recognize had me pressed up against the wall, his knee between my thighs and his hands on either side of my head as he leered down at me. My books fell out of my hands, and he pressed closer when I futilely tried to pick them up.
“Uh uh uh, none of that.” He grinned widely, showing off a slightly chipped front tooth. His dark green eyes glinted with something malicious and gleeful—like a cat batting around a mouse before it goes in for the kill—and he smelled like cheap cigarettes. “You’re that sweet little rich girl, huh? New kid. I’m Logan. You could say I’m the welcoming committee.”
