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CHAPTER1
BECCA
“Lilly, you can go over there.”I popped a fry into my mouth as I watched her moping over Scarlett. She was eating alone again. It was the third time this week, but I couldn’t find it in me to care. Lilly, on the other hand…
“Just go over there already. I know you’re dying to.”
She blew out a frustrated breath. “No way. What she did to you, to us, was so wrong. I’m Team Becca all the way.” Lilly nudged me with her elbow, smiling.
“I appreciate it, I do,” I said. “But you don’t have to cut her out for me. It’s cool.”
She glanced back over at Scarlett and her pity party for one. “She just looks so…”
“Pathetic?”
“Becca,” Lilly scolded, and I took that as my cue to leave.
Kicking my legs over the bench, I rose and said, “I’ll catch you later. If you want to go say hi to her, go. She looks like she could use a friend.”
Her wide doe eyes darted back and forth between us, and I knew by the end of the day she’d no longer be just Team Becca. But it was okay. Lilly had been Scarlett’s friend first, and although I knew Lilly felt some betrayal over what Scarlett did to me, she would give in eventually. Because as I’d been reminded enough times since arriving at Credence High, I wasn’t one of them.
Maybe I never would be.
“Call me later.” Lilly’s parting words floated through the air as I headed inside the main building. I kept my head down and my pace quick as I joined the steady stream of kids moving from the lunchroom to their lockers. Their lockers to the courtyard. A couple of girls snickered as I walked past them, but I didn’t give them the satisfaction of a reaction.
I was done hiding.
I’d given myself the rest of the week. Three-and-a-half days of wallowing—although Mom thought I was sick—and two days of mentally psyching myself up to return to Credence High as if nothing had happened.
But it had.
No amount of pretending in the world could erase the memory of walking into the school to find my face plastered on lockers and walls. The whispers, the stares—my biggest secret laid bare for all my classmates to see.
Well, exceptthatsecret.
No one knew that, not even the person who had pinned the photo of me and Kane to the back of my locker. The look of satisfaction on Kendall’s face as she watched me flee from school was imprinted on my mind. And although she’d outed me and my privileged past to our entire school, she still didn’t know the truth. She couldn’t. So even though things seemed crappy now, I knew they could be a lot worse.
Besides, since that day, she hadn’t so much as looked in my direction. There’d been no smug glances and no snide comments as we’d passed in the hallway.
Nothing.
She’d crushed any hopes of me having a normal life at Credence High, and now she had moved on.Good for her.
Lost in my thoughts, I didn’t see the person step out of the boys’ bathroom until it was too late. My foot landed on a dark scuffed boot, and when I looked up, my gaze settled on a face I wanted to forget.
“Becca.” Evan rubbed the back of his neck, looking all kinds of awkward.
“I’m not doing this,” I said flatly and immediately changed my direction to move around him, but he caught my arm.
“Please. Just give me a chance to explain.”
My eyes traveled over his face. The guilt shone in his eyes, swirling with regret and something else I refused to acknowledge. Because, for as much as the expression on his face was somber, it was still the face of a liar.
“Goodbye, Evan.” I barged past him and kept walking. Because if I stopped, if I gave myself time to think about things, I would break.
And this time, I would shatter beyond repair.
* * *
