by Bella King
I swallowed and grabbed my cloth napkin from my lap, dabbing my pink lips with it and looking across the table. “I don’t have a problem with sorting mail. It’s Atlas I’m upset about.”
“Atlas?” my father asked, looking amused. “His father owns the business.”
“And he works there,” I said, my voice dry with resentment.
“That would make sense, yes,” he said, nodding along as though nothing were wrong with that.
“Dad, he’s a jerk,” I said, placing a flat palm on the table just a little too hard.
I received a frown from my father. “Be nice, Virginia. I’m sure you can get along with him. You probably won’t even see him.”
“I’m not the one that needs to get along. He is,” I said, poking a steamed carrot with my fork.
My father sighed. “You’re going to have to deal with it until you graduate. Work hard, get good grades, and you can go to Granite Hills University with no issue.”
“I’m getting that scholarship,” I said, popping a carrot into my mouth and rolling it around.
“That’s my girl,” my father responded, his tired face turning back to a smile.
Damn right, I was getting that scholarship and getting the hell out of this place. I didn’t work my ass off for the past three years only for some dickhead like Atlas to ruin things for me. I had a future ahead of me, and that couldn’t be changed by Atlas. He may have been cruel to me, but he wasn’t stronger than I was. He hadn’t been through the same pain I had been through. That shit changes you.
My father couldn’t understand why I had so much trouble with Atlas, but I didn’t expect him to. I had to suck it up and work at H & H so that I could make up the difference from my father’s pay cut and stay in school long enough to get a scholarship to pay for college. It was a tight game, but I played to win.
I scarfed down the remained of my food before my father was even halfway through with his.
“You must like that, huh? You want me to get you some more?” My father asked, perking up as I got out of my seat.
Cute, but I wasn’t actually hungry. “No, thank you,” I said, giving him a sympathetic look. “It was really good though.” At least I didn’t have to lie about that part.
My father smiled and nodded. “I know you like carrots.”
That was true. I probably only liked them because they were one of the sweeter vegetables you could get a hold of, and I was a total sugar nut. I didn’t like anything without a decent helping of sugar in it, and that included vegetables. I took my coffee with so much sugar that you would have thought it was syrup if you took a sip.
I was under the firm belief that my sugar consumption was the only thing that kept me from losing too much weight when my mother had died. I used it as a coping mechanism, getting a nice dopamine hit every time I overdid the sugar. I understood the science behind the addiction, but I didn’t have the strength to stop it right now. At least I didn’t cut myself anymore.
I smiled at my father one last time before heading up to my bedroom. It was an attempt to show him that I wasn’t that upset about having to work for the Montgomery family at H & H because I didn’t want him to blame himself. It was hard enough for him to admit that he couldn’t pay for my school on his own anymore. I wasn’t trying to put more pressure on him, so I sucked it up and kept the fumes inside.
Chapter 2
The cold is better for us than we realize.
It was shockingly cold in the morning for how late into Spring we were, but I still had hoodies that I hadn’t packed up with the winter clothes. The strange thing about Granite Hills was how cold it always was, despite being in a region that was normally quite warm. It seemed to always be a few degrees cooler than the neighboring towns.
I was born into the cold, so it shouldn’t bother me. That’s what my mother always said when I bitched about the weather. I was a November baby, and I reminded myself of that when I stepped outside for a second time after having to go inside and grab a black hoodie out of my closet.
All the self-talk in the world couldn’t save me from the cold, though. I didn’t like it, but I hoped it didn’t warm up too much during the day. If so, I would be sweating like a sinner in hell, wearing a black hoodie, and refusing to remove it because it covered the scars on my arms.
Typically, I wore makeup on my arms in the summer, which was enough to cover the marks. I had been stupid enough to put them in a visible place, which was what landed me in therapy in the first place. Now, I no longer had a therapist to help me work out my problems. They were too expensive, and god knew my brain was too fucked for a cheap one.
My therapist had got me off the cutting craze that nearly ruined my arms for good after my mother had died, but the scars took a long time to fade. It had been years, but they still shimmered a paler white than the rest of my skin in the right light. I didn’t want people asking questions. They were entirely too nosey here at Granite Hills.
I had put on makeup this morning, anticipating another warm day, but the hoodie I now donned would be rubbing off the makeup by noon, and that meant I had to keep it on. I had caked on my deodorant enough to keep me from drenching myself with sweat if it did get too hot, but that didn’t mean I would be comfortable.
I took a sip of the cold cola I had snatched from the fridge on my way out of the house. My father didn’t like me drinking soda in the morning, but I didn’t see what was so bad about it. It was basically the same thing as coffee with how much sugar I used in mine. It just had less caffeine. That was good, right?
I’d like to think so, but at 19 years old, my health wasn’t exactly my top priority. Everyone who was older than me said that I would regret a diet of pizza and soda in my youth, but that’s what being young is for. When else can you get away with eating like that?
As long as I was off the blade and not going too deep into a depressive episode, I didn’t care much what other people thought of my habits. I did what I had to in order to cope with the life I had, and few people were qualified enough to speak on it.
I had learned early on not to voice my cynicism about my life to strangers. They assumed that because I lived in a rich neighborhood and went to a private school meant that my life was just peachy. How could a girl like me possibly be sad when she has the latest and greatest phone? That was all there was to life, right?
I laughed at their naivety but hoped they would never learn the way I did that no matter what you have, life can whip you blind in a second. All it took was a car wreck, and things would never be the same. It could happen to anybody, but you never think that anybody would be you.
Those were the cards I was dealt, and it was a tricky hand to play. You can’t complain when you’re wealthy. Nobody will listen, and if they did listen, it was only to find weaknesses in you to bring you to your knees. I didn’t let myself be vulnerable anymore.
I looked around at the new blossoms on the trees leading up to the school. They were light pink, beautiful against the new grass that now occupied the front of the school. Granite Hills was a dream school from the outside, painted in all white and glowing in the morning sun, but on the inside, that place was hell.
I suppose all high schools were that way, but not all of them looked this nice on the outside. It was an illusion, but one that had fooled me when I first came here. There I was, thinking that life would be easier because I was among the rich and happy students that attended a private school. God, I was so wrong.
I instinctively sped up my walking pace when I heard the laughter of the jocks as they rounded the corner of the school. They were here before anyone else was, practicing throwing around some stupid leather ball for hours. I never got the point, but the school seemed to think it was worthy of a few million dollars in funding.
New bleachers, new uniforms, private buses out to rival schools. Granite Hills didn’t skimp on treating their team well. I just wished they put that much effort into the swim team I had joined last year. We had a nice pool,
but we had to buy our own swimsuits, and those things weren’t cheap, especially when they were custom branded with the Granite Hills crest.
I could always quit the swim team, but I had made up my mind to keep doing it. I needed something to help with the stress, and exercise was recommended by my old therapist. Plus, I didn’t think about much when I was in the water. My mind was clear, like the water itself. That was nice.
Even the scars on my arms didn’t bother me when I was in the water, even though they were more visible when I was cold, turning a light pink against my white skin. I was in the water most of the time, so people did see them, and I would wrap a large towel around myself immediately upon getting out.
I had some friends on the swim team too, so I didn’t want to leave them. Jessica Welton was a good friend of mine and had been the one to get me into swimming in the first place. She always told me not to worry about the past. It was the future that I had to deal with.
Oh yes, but my anxiety didn’t let me forget about that either. No. I thought miles ahead into the future, anticipating every disaster before it could happen. I thought, maybe if I could predict them all, I could prevent something terrible from happening to me again.
That wasn’t how life worked, but my brain tried to convince me otherwise. It was a constant battle against it just to function normally, but things were starting to improve. I still missed my mother, but the sharp emotional pain was fading into a dull throbbing one. It still sucked, just not as badly as when it first happened.
I’m sure it was worse for my father, but he did a good job of hiding it. Maybe the stress of keeping me in a private school was distracting him from the death of his wife. I could be that it was better that way. Maybe he welcomed the struggle as a distraction.
I tried to look at the good side of things. Life had been far too gloomy over the years for me to get sucked into self-pity. I had come into womanhood much stronger than your average young adult, and that was the final gift my mother had been able to give me. I was fierce. I had faced extreme loss, and now not much bothered me.
Except for Atlas.
“Hey, Virginia,” a deep voice called from behind me before I could dash up the concrete steps to the school entrance.
Every cell in my body screamed at me to run, but I froze. I always froze.
“Wait up,” the voice said, quickly moving closer.
I took a breath and turned around, meeting Atlas at the foot of the staircase. “Hi,” I said, pursing my lips in a fake smile.
“You forgot to say good morning,” Atlas said, putting at me mockingly. His lips were a peachy color, almost feminine against his rigid facial features. He looked like his whole body was carved in stone except for his lips.
“I didn’t forget, because I didn’t want to,” I replied.
Atlas chuckled, as though we were old friends just messing around. We were anything but that. “Hey, what’s up with the hoodie? You cold?” Atlas asked, tugging at the bottom of my hoodie with his large hand.
I pulled away. “Yeah, it’s frigid.”
He shrugged. “I’m pretty hot.” He was wearing a white t-shirt and a pair of blue jeans, classic attire for a man, and the look fit him well. Not that it concerned me. I didn’t think he was handsome just because he knew how to dress.
“Haven’t you been running around the field all morning?” I asked, keeping my eyelids low enough to signal my disinterest in the conversation.
“I was at practice, yeah. Still, it’s not that cold. Maybe you’re just embarrassed to show some skin,” he teased, pulling at my hoodie again.
I rolled my eyes. “I’m on the swim team, dickhead. I show plenty of skin.”
“Maybe the swim team should switch to bikinis. Then you would really show me what you have underneath those baggy clothes.”
“Gross,” I spat, turning away. I didn’t want Atlas within ten miles of my exposed body. Anything he derived pleasure from disgusted me.
“Hey, where are you going?” Atlas asked, jogging up in front of me and walking backward as I entered the building.
“I have class,” I said impatiently, craning my head and looking for a way around him. He was walking too slowly.
“So do I. The bell doesn’t ring for another six minutes, though,” he countered. “Besides, I want to talk to you about something.”
He stopped walking, towering in front of me like a giant, leaning in with a slight frown marring his flawless face. I wondered if this was about my new job at his father’s company.
“When do you start work?” He asked, cocking his head to the side, his frown deepening.
That confirmed my suspicions. I rolled my eyes. “Now of your business, Atlas.”
“It most certainly is my business, babe. My father owns H & H,” he replied.
“Why don’t you ask your father then? And don’t call me babe,” I snapped, still searching for a way around his large body. The hallways were wide, but Atlas stood with his hands on his hips, arms poking out to take up half the space in the hall. Students were moving on either side of us, giving me no real escape route.
“Just fucking tell me, you dumb cunt. I shouldn’t have to ask twice. I can get you fired, you know?” Atlas said, his face turning red.
He had anger issues, his language was appalling, and he was prying into my personal business. I wasn’t going to give in to his lie about getting me fired. If he could do that, he could also find out when I was working. Bluff called.
“Get me fired then, big boy. I’m not telling you shit,” I said, jumping into the throng of students to his left side and floating through the current away from him. I didn’t bother to look back to see if he followed me. I knew he didn’t by the sound of his fist banging on the metal lockers that lined the walls. What a dolt.
Chapter 3
Who needs friends when you have enemies?
Atlas wasn’t the only guy at Granite Hills that I was tired of. I had another moron who had been following me around the halls, bugging the ever-loving shit out of me since we broke up two months ago. His name was Jared.
Jared wouldn’t give up on me even after I told him that things were over. Our relationship had been short and explosive, ending in a similar fashion. Jared seemed like a well-meaning guy at first, but we all know that most men aren’t. He turned sour after the first two months, and I shut him out quickly after.
Some guys don’t like taking no for an answer, and Jared fell very hard into that category. He always whined about sex, like I owed it to him after barely two months together. I didn’t roll that way. I demanded some amount of respect and commitment before giving it up, but Jared acted like he owned me. Not anymore.
That didn’t stop him from bugging me in class. He never dared do it in the hallway between classes because he was under the very wrong impression that Atlas was into me and that he would beat the crap out of him if he saw Jared talking to me. I found it funny, but never corrected him. It kept him away from me except when we had class together. Then, he would pass me notes and beg for me to take him back, sighting any number of lame excuses and reasons.
Today was no different. I sat in the front because I was a good student and wanted to hear what the teacher had to say. It was harder to get distracted by other people if you couldn’t see any of them, but Jared still managed to grab my attention.
A noted folded up like a football landed squarely in my lap within the first few minutes of class. I didn’t even look to see who had thrown it. I already knew that it was from Jared. I didn’t care for what he had to say, so the second the teacher’s back was turned, I chucked it in the waste bin in the corner of the room.
If Jessica was here, I would have heard a loud thwap as she hit Jared on the back of the head for bothering me, but I got no such pleasure. Jessica wasn’t in many of my classes. I mostly just saw her during swim practice and after school. She was a great friend, siding with me against any guys I didn’t like, but she wasn’t often there to help me. Most of the tim
e, I was on my own against the boys of Granite Hills.
I returned my attention to the teacher, a tall, thin woman in her late 30s with very little tolerance for rowdy high schoolers. I wondered why she even taught them if she was so bothered by their loudness and lack of attention span, but I’m sure the school paid her well. They had better, with how much they were pulling in from the students every year.
I tried very hard to pay attention to her classes. She was much harsher when handing out grades than any of the other teachers, and my grades were the only thing that would get me into Granite Hills University. Everyone else bought their way in. I couldn’t afford that.
I sat up straight as she continued her lecture, but I heard Jared from diagonally behind me folding up another piece of paper to toss at me. If he didn’t stop that, I would get up and punch his lights out. Grades be damned.
The note he flicked to me slid off my desk and onto the floor just a foot from the teacher’s feet. She paused, frowning directly at me as she crouched down in her red pencil skirt to pick it up. She squinted at me as the room fell silent.
“What is this?” She asked.
“Jared threw it,” I replied, my words sharp and matter-of-fact.
“I didn’t ask you who threw it. I asked you what it is. Are you passing notes in class?” She asked, the sweetness of her voice betraying her mood.
“I wasn’t passing notes. Jared was,” I said, keeping the blame on him. I wasn’t going to cover his ass.
Jared stayed quiet behind me. He knew better than to interrupt a conflict between the teacher and me if she didn’t pull him in. So far, it didn’t matter what I said about him. I was the one responsible in our teacher’s piercing green eyes.
“You were receiving notes, though,” she said.
What did it matter? I frowned up at her, beginning to get ticked off. I was going to shank Jared after class if I got in trouble, and I was dangerously close to it with the heat that was rising in my stomach. I didn’t like being accused of things that I hadn’t done.
