Dare

by Hannah Jayne

  Everyone is blaming me, everyone is judging me.

  Her ears strained, listening to the familiar refrains “total druggie,” “overdosed,” “suicidal,” “crazy,” and Brynna tried to steel herself against it. When she saw Lauren cutting through the crowd, a lightness went through her. Lauren knew what happened; Lauren didn’t judge her. Lauren was her friend.

  She stopped in front of Brynna, her dark eyes glazed in fury. “I can’t believe you.”

  A crowd of students chattering around them went immediately silent, all eyes turning toward Lauren and Brynna.

  Brynna blinked, genuinely shocked. “What are you talking about?”

  Lauren’s eyes narrowed to dagger-thin slits, and every inch of her oozed hate. “How could you do that to my brother?”

  Her voice cracked on the last word and something peaked in Brynna. “What are you talking about? What’s wrong with Evan? Is he okay?”

  Lauren rolled her eyes and huffed at Brynna.

  Darcy walked up alongside, and Brynna turned to her, her eyes imploring. “Darcy, please tell me what is going on. I have no idea. What’s wrong with Evan?”

  A sputter of laughter came from down the hall then the unmistakable sound of a body crashing against metal as someone was shoved up against a locker. Brynna craned her neck to see. “What’s going on?”

  “Fag!” The word cut down the hall and cut Brynna in two. It was Meatball—the letter-jacketed thug that Brynna had met her first day of school—and his gang, and they were striding forward, cutting through the kids, yanking the papers that were taped to the fronts of nearly every locker.

  “What are those?”

  She could see the hard press of Lauren’s jaw as she gritted her teeth. Her eyes were beginning to water, tears building up on her lower lashes. Darcy leaned over and carefully removed one of the full-color flyers, handing it to Brynna. She held on to the edge, shooting a look of pure disgust at her.

  “Oh my god,” Brynna breathed. “Who did this?”

  It was a mock-up of a magazine cover, and someone had photoshopped Evan’s face onto the body on the cover. He was surrounded by meaty men in underwear looking up longingly at him, pawing across his chest. The title of the magazine was written in with a thick black marker: Today’s Gay. There was a fat black arrow pointing to Evan, and a myriad of horrible slogans written around him.

  “This is awful. Who would do this? Who did this?”

  The last thing Brynna remembered was looking from Lauren to Darcy, whose eyes were wide, blank orbs, before she felt Lauren’s hands on her collarbones. Her balance was thrown off as Lauren lunged, and Brynna stumbled over her own feet, her leg crumpling as she fell to the ground. Her elbow struck first and then her hip as she gripped Lauren’s fingers, trying to rip them from her shirt.

  “You told the whole fucking school he was gay! He trusted you!”

  Lauren was yelling and huffing, and Brynna was trying to process the spiderweb of pain shattering her elbow, Lauren’s fingers digging into her flesh, the throb of students chanting “fight, fight, fight!” around them.

  “I didn’t say anything. I didn’t do that,” Brynna tried to manage, tried to roll Lauren from her, but the girl was bigger and her thighs were clamped hard around Brynna’s waist. She winced when she felt Lauren’s nails dragging across her face.

  Someone stepped on her hair.

  The chant had gone from a throbbing, single-voiced rhythm to screeches and yells.

  “What the heck is going on here?”

  And then it was over.

  Brynna was still lying on the linoleum floor, breathing hard, when Mr. Fallbrook yanked Lauren off her. The surrounding students scattered like roaches in light. The only two faces that remained, looking down at her with a combination of pity and hate, were Darcy and Teddy’s.

  “Where’s Evan?” Brynna winced at the fresh blood that flooded her mouth from a cut lip but climbed to her feet anyway.

  “Leave him alone, Brynna,” Darcy said, her voice soft.

  “Either someone tells me what happened here, or we’re all going to the principal’s office.” Mr. Fallbrook’s eyes were hard, sharp pinpricks as he looked from Brynna to Lauren and back again.

  “It was her,” Lauren said with a low snarl. “Ask her what happened.”

  Mr. Fallbrook held one of the hateful flyers in his hand. “Did you make this, Brynna? This goes beyond bullying. This is a hate crime.”

  Brynna stepped forward, her cheeks flushed, her palms feeling raw from where they rubbed against the concrete. “I didn’t do it.” She looked toward Lauren. “I didn’t make that. I would never make something like that.”

  Lauren looked at her, her face a mask of white-hot rage.

  “And you two? Why were you fighting?”

  Brynna cleared her throat and took a tiny step forward, glancing back at Lauren, then back to Mr. Fallbrook. “It was a misunderstanding. Please don’t punish Lauren, Mr. Fallbrook. It was my fault.”

  Mr. Fallbrook sucked in a long breath as he looked from Brynna to Lauren. “Is this true?”

  It looked like it took all of Lauren’s strength but she nodded curtly. “Everything’s fine,” she said, teeth gritted.

  The bell rang and Mr. Fallbrook set them loose. Brynna spun on her heel and headed for Evan’s locker. He was there, piling books in his bag. He froze when he saw her, the same hateful look that Lauren had washing over his features.

  “What do you want?”

  “Evan, please,” Brynna said. “I have no idea what happened. I just walked on campus and Lauren came after me. She attacked me.”

  Evan’s lips actually cocked up in a smirk, and Brynna could feel the lump growing in her throat. “Evan?”

  He slammed his locker shut and stood in front of her, legs akimbo like he was getting ready to fight as well. “What did you expect, Brynna? That everyone was going to throw me a parade or something?”

  “Evan, you can’t believe that I would make these things.” She snatched them off the lockers around them, crumpling them into a ball.

  “Yeah, Brynna, you go gather up all the print ones. I’ve still got this one for my scrapbook.” He whipped out his tablet and thrust it at her, the Hawthorne High webpage popping up, boasting a big, grinning picture of Evan. Written across the shot in a jabbing, angry red scrawl were the words “Guess who’s gay?”

  “That’s awful. You think I did—?”

  “Who else, Brynna? I told you. Just you.”

  “It’s not like it wasn’t obvious,” Brynna spat back.

  Evan stared at her, his whole face contorted in pain, surprise, and biting anger.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said in a low, even voice. “I told you.”

  “Evan, why would I do this to you? What would I have to gain? Seriously.” She reached out for him, but he shrugged her hand off violently.

  “I don’t know why you would do this, Brynna. I’m beginning to think I never even really knew you at all.” Evan spun, his back to her.

  “I didn’t tell anyone, Ev. And what’s the problem anyway? Being gay is no big deal. It shouldn’t even have been a secret in the first place.”

  Now Evan spun back toward Brynna, his every feature alive with fire. Anger rolled off him in waves. “That’s not your decision to make. Being gay might not be a big deal to you, but it is to me. It doesn’t matter if people ‘figured it out’ on their own. I needed to be the one, Brynna. I needed to be the one to tell people, not you!”

  He turned and stomped down the hall, but Brynna couldn’t move. She could hear the reverberating sound of his footsteps fading as he walked away from her and finally disappeared around a corner.

  She knew she should move, but her feet were rooted to the glossy hallway tiles. Her body felt heavy, and her blood seemed to thrum, to pulse over the ache in the jagged skin of h
er torn palms, and she could taste it at the corners of her mouth. Faint. Metallic. It made her stomach ache and filled her nostrils with that fresh meat smell.

  She swallowed down bile.

  She felt the sting of Evan’s words on her cheeks as if he’d slapped her, and for once, she didn’t want to numb the pain. She let Evan’s anger sink into her.

  It didn’t take long for the news of Brynna’s betrayal to overtake the news that Evan was gay. Immediately, she was a pariah, and classmates who’d never noticed her before were glaring, staring, studying her, and whispering. They avoided her when she walked. They left the bathroom when she entered. Their malevolence traveled in a thick cloud wherever they went, but Brynna didn’t mind it. It felt better for people to be angry with her than it did for them to avert their gazes only to glance back with pity in their eyes when they thought she wasn’t looking.

  There was no follow-up from Erica either.

  Brynna waited, holding her breath each time her tablet chimed, each time she logged into her email. She hadn’t told anyone about Evan, and no one else had taken responsibility. It had to be Erica.

  But Erica is dead. The refrain kept ringing in her head.

  •••

  After the final bell, Brynna sped down the hall, head down, watching her sneakers against the scuffed hallway’s linoleum. She spun when someone wound their arm in hers, and when she looked up, Teddy was there. Her heart stopped mid-beat, and she waited for him to say something, for his expression to crack and give her the tiniest clue as to what he was thinking, what he was feeling. Instead, he tugged her down the hall silently then ushered her into the empty choir room.

  “Hey,” she said softly.

  Teddy sat on a desk, his eyes locked on hers. “Hey.”

  They were silent for a beat before Teddy went on. “What’s going on, Bryn?”

  “I didn’t—I didn’t out Evan, I swear.”

  “You don’t have to convince me. I know you wouldn’t do something like that. Besides, it’s not exactly like it was the secret of the century. So, since you didn’t do it, do you have any idea who did?”

  Brynna pinched the bridge of her nose. “Meatball?”

  She knew it wasn’t Meatball, but she threw it out there anyway, hoping to see what—if anything—Teddy knew.

  He shook his head. “Doubtful. Meatball likes to torture Evan in person. And besides, have you seen the meat hooks on that guy? I don’t think he types so much as just mashes a bunch of keys together.” Teddy mimed apelike hands mashing at a keyboard, and Brynna smiled in spite of herself.

  The whole school was mere feet away, but Brynna felt comfortable in the room with Teddy. He was warm and concerned, and when he smiled, everything bad about Brynna’s life melted away.

  She wanted to smile as easily as he did. She slid up on the desk next to him. “You know how in movies the person always says, ‘now you have to promise me you won’t think I’m crazy’ before they tell the other person something crazy?”

  Teddy nodded, but his eyebrows were raised. “Yes…”

  “I’m not even going to say that because you’re going to think I’m crazy regardless.”

  He smiled and gestured for her to go on.

  Brynna sucked air through her teeth, her stomach burning, heart thudding in her chest. “I think someone from my old school might be after me.”

  Teddy’s relaxed expression went to concern. His lips tightened, and his eyes widened. “What do you mean, ‘after’ you?”

  “I think someone is trying to hurt me. Or scare me at least.” She swallowed, kicking her legs underneath the table. “I think that person wrote the headline about Evan. I think that person was in the pool with me the night that you found me.”

  “The night you wouldn’t let me go to the police.”

  She nodded slightly, watching her legs swaying under the table. “Yeah.”

  “Brynna, you could be in real danger. You need to tell someone. We need to tell someone.”

  Her lower lip started to tremble, and the classroom swirled in front of her. “I can’t go to the police. I’m chasing a ghost, Teddy.”

  Teddy pulled Brynna to him, and she cried into the crook of his neck. He stroked her hair softly, and she cried out the tension of the last few hours, weeks, months.

  “It’s going to be okay, Brynna,” he murmured softly. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll go to the police or your parents.”

  Brynna breathed in the clean soap scent of Teddy’s soft skin. “Can we just stay here, like this, for a while?”

  Teddy nodded, resting his chin against her head.

  Brynna prayed that they could stay that way forever.

  •••

  When Brynna got home that Friday, all she wanted to do was sleep, to spend the entire weekend underneath her covers, waiting for time to pass.

  It was Saturday afternoon, and Brynna was flopped on her stomach in her room, reading, when she heard the echo of the doorbell. She paused, holding in a breath, when she heard the murmured conversation of both her parents and a guest. Interest piqued, she peeled out of bed and pinched the shade up an inch, her stomach falling into her shoes.

  “Honey,” her mother said, rapping on the door before poking her head in.

  “Teddy’s here.”

  “Right.” Her mother’s smile faltered. “You didn’t tell us the dance was this weekend.” She looked Brynna up and down. “Did you forget?”

  Truthfully, Brynna had. But she also had no reason to think about it, since her friends weren’t speaking to her. “Why is Teddy here?”

  “I’m assuming to pick you up for your date. He’s wearing a tuxedo and he has a corsage and everything.”

  Brynna could see that absolute joy in her mother’s eyes, and guilt stabbed at her. She probably thinks I’m all better, Brynna thought sadly. She probably thinks I’m normal again.

  “Can you send Teddy up here, just for a second?”

  Her mother raised a brow but nodded, and a few seconds later, Teddy was standing in her doorway.

  He looked handsome, his rented suit midnight black and pressed to razor-sharp edges. His hair was pushed back—enough to look like he’d made an effort, but not so much that he looked like he was trying—and Brynna grinned without meaning to.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Teddy held up the corsage. “Uh, going to homecoming, I thought.”

  “You still want to go with me?”

  He glanced down at the carpet and kicked softly. “You told me you didn’t make those flyers and I believe you. You told me that it wasn’t you who outed Evan and I believe you.” He dropped his voice. “I can’t believe that you won’t let me go to the police about the person you think is stalking you…”

  Brynna pumped her head, hoping to drop the subject.

  “So are we going or not?” Teddy asked.

  “Let me just get dressed.”

  Teddy went back downstairs while Brynna raced into the shower, giddiness flipping her stomach. She didn’t pause to think about Erica, to breathe deeply through the belting water. She didn’t think about anything but Teddy and her and homecoming, until she went for the garment bag in her closet, unzipped it, and stopped.

  It was still Erica’s dress.

  In all the fuss, her mother hadn’t returned it. Brynna hadn’t thought about it.

  There was nothing else in her closet except hoodies and jeans, so Brynna slid the dress from the bag and closed her eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Erica,” she muttered. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  She stepped into the blue dress, the mounds of frothy fabric swirling around her. The bodice—tight, sparkly—fit her exactly the way all of Erica’s other dresses fit her—slightly tight across the bust, a few inches shorter than she was comfortable with. She blew out a shaky breath, feeling heat surge thr
ough her. This wasn’t just like Erica’s dress. It was Erica’s dress.

  Brynna’s parents took the requisite paparazzi photos of Teddy and her, and Brynna tried to feel comfortable in Erica’s dress. Teddy complimented her, and all she could do was smile thinly and nod, thinking of Erica, thinking of the way she held the dress in front of her and twirled.

  “It’s incredible, right? It’s, like, the color of the ocean.”

  They were in Erica’s room with the lights on and the radio softly playing. Brynna’s hair was in a sloppy ponytail, and one eye was dressed with a sparkly, smoky eye shadow while the other waited for the next look Erica wanted to practice. All at once, Erica stopped dancing and Brynna felt her hackles go up, her skin tightening.

  “Did you hear that?” she asked Erica.

  Erica went to the window, squinting into the blackness outside. She yanked the cord and the blinds came crashing down. “It’s probably my creepy stepbrother. He’s been lurking around.”

  Brynna stared, wide-eyed. “Christopher? Isn’t he, like, twenty-five?”

  Erica nodded. “Something like that. And he’s not supposed to be within eight hundred feet of here.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He’s got some crazy obsession, Brynnie.” Erica pushed her hair back over her shoulder and twirled again in the mirror. “So, how do I look?”

  A shock wave zipped through Brynna and she straightened. She had forgotten that night, buried it back under memories of the beach, that night, the dare.

  Erica had a stepbrother.

  “Are you okay, Bryn?”

  Teddy cocked his head to look at her, his ice-blue eyes catching the streetlights in the darkened car. She studied him, suspicion crashing over her as she scrutinized.

  No, Brynna thought to herself. That’s ridiculous—unless Teddy was almost thirty, pretending to be a kid.

  “It’s nothing,” she said hastily, shaking her head. “I’m just looking forward to going to the dance.”

  The Hawthorne High School parking lot was packed, but Teddy found a spot near the back. He killed the engine and the car fell into silence. Brynna went for the door, but he stopped her with a hand on her forearm.