Wicked Lies

by Mae Doyle

  “You just don’t get it, do you?” Brett’s eyes were wide. “You can’t just explain that you want to stay and then expect that everything will be fine.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m planning to do.” A fire rose in my chest and threatened to consume me. I had to focus to keep from burning up under their gazes. The three of them were focused completely on me and it was disconcerting. “Tell me who I need to talk to, and I’ll do that.”

  A laugh escaped Kaleb and he shook his head. “You’re crazy, Rose. Seriously. You’ve been told to leave, and you need to do that.”

  “So this has happened before?” Hope flared in me. It was a small flame of it, to be sure, but the fact that maybe someone else had dealt with this in the past made me think that perhaps there was a way to get out of this. A way to ensure that I could stay at Taylor Prep without having to leave – without having to sacrifice my future.

  And, possibly, without having to withstand bullying every single day.

  “It’s not that easy.” Jackie’s voice was the most calm of the three. “Rosita, you can’t just override something like that.”

  “And yet, I am.” I glared at the three of them. “Besides, when did you guys start to give a crap about me? If I remember correctly, you’re working with the harpies.”

  The three guys glanced over my shoulder to where the harpies were still laughing and enjoying themselves. I couldn’t bear to look, knowing that I would see all of the students talking about me.

  Well, almost all of the students.

  An arm looped through my left arm while a hand took my right. I wasn’t surprised to see Harper and Maggie on either side of them. Woods and Everett had disappeared, but they gave me encouraging smiles.

  “We’re going to walk you to your room.” Maggie pulled on my arm. “You shouldn’t be here right now.”

  I wasn’t done talking to the rogues, but the way my friends faces looked told me that I needed to wrap it up. “Just a minute,” I told her, pulling back a bit to hold my ground, but she shook her head.

  “No, Rose. Now.”

  Chapter 23

  “You want to tell me what’s going on?” Harper had her arms crossed and was standing with her back against my door like it would prevent people from trying to get through. Maggie was on the bed next to me, trailing her fingers along my arm. She had grabbed my hand as soon as we got into my room and hadn’t let go.

  I took a deep breath and opened my mouth to try to tell my friends what was going on, but as soon as I tried to speak, I found that I didn’t know what to say. That there was a secret bunker in the woods? That the rogues had hidden me instead of turning me over to the lynch mob of our classmates? That I’d kissed not just one of them now, but two of them?

  My face burned and I dropped my head into my hands, moaning a little. Maggie started rubbing my back, but she still didn’t say anything.

  “I don’t know how to explain everything.” My voice was muffled from speaking into my hands, but neither or my friends tried to move me. “I just can’t leave, you guys. I can’t. Not after everything with my dad. I mean, this is where he wanted me to be, and I can’t just walk away from that, you know?”

  There was silence for a moment, then I heard Harper walk away from the door. She knelt in front of me, gently taking my head in her hands and lifting it so that she could look me in the eyes. “Rose, we’re just so worried about you.”

  “We totally understand about your dad,” Maggie interjected, “but you have to be smart about this. It’s only going to get worse if you don’t leave.”

  I jerked my head up to look at them. “But why? Why in the world would people put up with this at their school? And who’s behind it? Who gets to be the person who decides who gets to stay and who has to go? It’s a load of crap, and I think that you two know it.”

  “It sucks,” Maggie agreed, “but it’s not something that I think we can just…change, you know?”

  Harper nodded. “It’s how it’s always been at Taylor Prep. If you get asked to leave, then you leave. Most of the time, people leave without making a big fuss. It works out better for them and it’s also nicer for the school, so it’s what’s preferred.”

  “And what happens when people don’t just turn tail and run?” This was the most information that I had gotten from my friends. Even when I had asked them before about the bullying and what was going on at Taylor Prep, they’d been surprisingly close-lipped. Now, though, they seemed as tired as me.

  “They get forced to leave.” Maggie’s voice sounded incredibly sad and quiet, and I looked at my friend. Her face was drawn and pale, and I just started to realize how much of an effect this night must have had on my two friends as well. I’d been worried about me, but at least I had the rogues looking out for me. They had nobody but each other and the boys.

  A memory of being in the bunker with Jackie flashed through my mind and I bit my lower lip. I didn’t know why the three of them were suddenly trying to take care of me and help me out, but it was nice to have other people on my side.

  It just didn’t make any sense, and I didn’t like it when I couldn’t understand things.

  After a moment lost in my own thoughts, I realized that Maggie was talking. I focused in on what she was saying. “…even though a break will be nice, you need to understand that things are not going to magically get better while you’re gone. In fact, they’re probably going to get worse.”

  “What do you mean?” Secretly, I’d been hoping that we’d all go home for Christmas break, feel the Christmas spirit, and come back to school nicer than before, but the look on my friends’ faces told me that that was a pipe dream.

  “She means,” sighed Harper, taking my hands in her own and squeezing them, “that nobody ever comes back after break if they’ve been asked to leave. This is only going to get worse in January, and it won’t stop until you leave.”

  I shook my head. “No. If I come back, then I’ll show them that I’m serious. That I’m not going anywhere. That I can handle my own.” I opened my mouth to say more, but my phone started beeping. Maggie snatched it off of my pillow and handed it to me.

  My jaw drops open as I scroll through the messages on my screen. They’re all from numbers that I don’t recognize since I never thought that it was important to put the numbers of the kids who were tormenting me into my phone.

  Leave now!

  Stupid gutter slut, you should go.

  Take your dried up pussy back home to the slums.

  My stomach twisted as I read them, and after a minute of scrolling, I turned my phone off and tossed it back behind me on the bed. I didn’t need to read any more. I knew what they were all going to say.

  Leave. We hate you. Get gone.

  But I wasn’t going to, and there wasn’t anything that they could do to make me. Nobody here really understood what being at Taylor Prep meant to me. It was more than the fact that this was a great school and was sure to set me up for some major success.

  No, Taylor Prep to me was more than just a stepping stone. It was a stepping stone that my dad had laid out for me. He wanted me to be here because he couldn’t be. My dad wasn’t around any longer to guide me and help me make good decisions, and there was no way that I was going to let the harpies and the rogues take the one thing from me that he’d wanted me to have.

  “I can’t leave.” The resolve in my voice made both of my friends look up. “I don’t care what everyone here thinks or what they want me to do. I can’t, and I won’t.”

  Harper sniffed and I noticed that she had tears forming in the corners of her eyes. “We don’t want you to leave, Rose, but we want you to be safe!” She grabbed my hand, squeezing it hard, and Maggie leaned against me. Her weight was comforting, and I sighed, enjoying the warmth from my two friends.

  “I love you guys. But I can’t leave. I’ll be back after break.” Even as I said the words, I felt them weigh heavy in my heart. Break was in just a few days. As long as I could make it, then
I could rest and rejuvenate at home. The thought of eating mint chocolate chip ice cream and curling up with my mom to watch an old movie gave me hope.

  “We’ll be here for you.” Maggie sat up and looked me in the eyes. “Okay? No matter what happens, Harper and I will be here for you.”

  “Thanks guys.” Talking to them made me feel better, but it didn’t totally erase the sense of unease in the pit of my stomach. Before I could say anything else, though, there was a sharp rap on my door. I stiffened and felt my friends do the same on either side of me.

  “You expecting anyone?” Maggie jumped down off of my bed when I shook my head and walked to the door. She rested her hand on the knob until I nodded, then she unlocked it and swung it open. Even though I had an idea who would be outside the door, my stomach still dropped when I saw the rogues.

  Brett ran his hand through his dark hair, his piercing brown eyes sweeping past Maggie to lock onto me. He was flanked by Kaleb and Jackie. None of them looked happy to be outside the door, waiting to talk to me.

  “You’re here. Good.” Brett pushed past Maggie and the other two rogues followed. It immediately felt like all of the air in the room had been sucked up. They were too big, too demanding, to be in my room like this. I pulled my knees up to my chest and looped my arms around them, resting my chin on one knee.

  “What do you guys want?” Harper stood up to come between me and the boys, but Kaleb moved to block her, and she sat back down.

  “We came to pass on a message.” This time it was Jackie who spoke. He walked over to my other side and looked down at me. I had to tilt my head back to look up at him. He was gorgeous this close up, and I chewed my lower lip while I waited for him to say something.

  Anything.

  “You can stay through the end of this semester. That’ll give you a few days to pack up and leave, but when we all come back from break, you had better not be here. Do you understand?” I looked at Brett when he finished speaking, but I couldn’t bring myself to answer him. “Rose? Do you understand?”

  I shook my head. “Not a chance. I’m not going anywhere. I have my math test to take and the vocal competition. I’m doing them, I’m going home, and then I’m coming back.”

  Jackie turned to Brett. “I told you she was stubborn. There is no way that this is going to work without more people getting involved or someone getting hurt.”

  “And I told you that nobody is supposed to hurt her.” Brett’s nostrils flared when he responded to Jackie.

  “Hey, I’m right here.” I dropped my knees and stood up, but I didn’t take into consideration how closed in I would feel by all of them. There wasn’t any room for me to move around with the three of them this close to me. “You don’t have to talk about me like I’m out of the room.”

  “Oh, but Rosita, you should be. You should be far, far away from Taylor Prep. Run back to your little whore of a mommy and the gutter that spat you out.” Jackie brushed a lock of hair back behind my ear. Shivering at his touch, I tried to step back, but there was nowhere for me to go. The backs of my knees knocked into my mattress.

  “Trust us, Rose, it will be worse for you if you come back. Now, can we tell the council that you’ve wised up and will stay away?” Kaleb looked bored as he spoke.

  The council? This was the first that I had heard of them, but I didn’t have time to dwell on that. I lifted my chin and looked each of them in the eyes. “No. You can tell the council to go to hell.”

  Brett ran his hand through his hair. “Brave words, Rose, but not smart ones. You have one more chance to change your mind. Wise up. Make a good choice.”

  Anger boiled up inside me. I couldn’t believe that I’d actually felt something for these guys…that I’d actually thought that they may be good people. That they could care about me. I glanced down at their hands. They each had the same leather bracelet on. I knew that they wore them, hell, I knew that my friends wore them, but seeing the bracelets on their wrists, in my room? It was almost enough to make me crazy.

  I had thought that the rogues could care for me, but I was wrong. They were no different than the harpies. And the council, apparently. Whoever that was.

  “You tell the council that I’m not going anywhere.” I paused, thinking fast. “In fact, you can tell them that I’m coming for them.”

  Thank you!

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