Is it really this easy? Say hello, sit down, make instant friends?
I look up and realize none of them are looking at me anyway; they’re all looking at Jackson and seem to be having some kind of silent conversation. That’s more like it. Smiles one minute, weird looks the next.
They exchange a few nods and mouthed words. The Asian boy notices me looking now, and he stops, wide-eyed. He clears his throat.
I raise my eyebrows as the other guys look to him, then to me. One of the white boys begins to blush. I still have no idea what’s going on, but I’m sure it’s about me.
This moment takes the awkward up about ten notches, and it was pretty high to begin with.
I sit there in silence for a few seconds, pretending not to notice their silent conversation. The dragon shirt kid’s eyes are big, and he looks across the lunchroom like there’s someone watching us or something.
One kids shrugs like he doesn’t care one way or the other and just shoves a huge piece of pizza into his mouth, and the last boy shakes his head.
“I can leave,” I say.
Jackson cocks his eyebrow. “Come on. They’re just being weird.”
I have no idea what’s going on, but I do know that I’m not very comfortable.
I’ll have to take his word for it. “Okay. But I need to get some mustard for my pretzel.”
Eyes follow me as I cross the room, and I have an urge to jump up on a table and scream “food fight!” or something stupid so I’ll actually deserve the looks.
When I make my way back to Jackson’s table, I stop when I hear the hushed voices.
“Dude, seriously,” the boy with the jersey says. “I get you like the charity shit and all, but you don’t need to drag us into it.”
I stop around two feet short, unsure of what to do. No one looks at me.
Jackson stands, leans forward, and puts his hands on the table. “When I say she’s cool, I’m not just blowing smoke. She hasn’t even spoken a word and you want nothing to do with her. What does that say about you?”
“That I’m human, dude,” the football player says, sending a glance across the room.
I follow his gaze and see a group of kids watching us. The cool kids, maybe? Is there really such a thing?
Then the football player sees me. His eyes flicker to mine and grow larger, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Guys,” Jackson says. He hasn’t seen me behind him, and that fills me with a warmth that takes me by surprise. He’s not saying these things for my sake. He means every word. “You can’t listen to these rumors. She’s just the new girl. What does it matter?”
“How do you know they’re just rumors? Maybe she really is a drug addict or just got out of juvie,” the dragon T-shirt kid says.
“Yeah, and maybe she was abducted by aliens, or the Soviets. Maybe she’s really a Russian spy.” He straightens his shoulders. “Besides, didn’t you go to juvie last year?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“Yeah. So worst case, she’s just like you.” He looks around the table. “Like all of us.”
His friends are silent at that. What would they say if they knew those “rumors” are just watered-down versions of the truth? If they knew that the things they’ve done pale in comparison to my past? If they knew I was really a hooker…well, let’s just say his friends might have every right to look at me like I’m Bigfoot.
I make up my mind then. I turn and walk away. I’ll see Jackson later. I’m not sure what he wants out of this, what he expects to get for being so nice to me, but I need to get out of there before things get worse.
When I look back, Jackson’s watching me go, a look on his face that I hate. Sadness. So I wave and smile to let him know it’s okay. He cocks his head, confused, but nods, seems to get that the world hasn’t ended just because his friends were jerks.
I find a table in the middle of the cafeteria that’s empty. I sit and pick at my pretzel and sip on my Gatorade and pretend I’m fine being alone. But then a tray clinks down in front of me, and I see a girl sitting across from me.
She smirks. “Do you mind?”
I shake my head. She sits and dips an odd-looking crinkly french fry into a cup of ketchup. She’s pretty, but the kind of pretty that tries to hide it. Choppy short hair, dark eyeliner, and an eyebrow piercing.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Alex.”
“Oh, hi Alex,” I say.
She waves goofily.
She looks too old to be a freshman. Maybe even my age. “What grade are you?” I ask. I’ll be jealous if she’s a senior. That should be me. Except, you know, I’m technically stuck in the ninth grade.
“That’s up for debate.” She smirks.
I blink. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I’m sort of a junior, but most likely I won’t graduate with that class.”
“Why’s that?”
She shrugs and bites off a piece of one of her odd-looking fries. “Failed a few important classes.”
“Like what?”
“Like gym,” she says and laughs.
I’m oblivious. I have no clue if she’s joking or not. “Gym? Isn’t that a ninth-grade class?” I’m surprised I haven’t seen her in gym with me.
“No. I mean yes, I’m in a freshman gym class because I’ve skipped a few too many times the last two years. But no, it’s not one of those important classes. You only need two of them to graduate.”
“Oh.” Guess I just don’t know how this all works.
“I failed English freshman year. I want to just leave, but my parents won’t let me drop out. I figure if I fail enough classes, they’ll just give up and let me get my GED.”
That never even occurred to me. All I have to do is give up on good grades and I’ll get out of here for good?
“Maybe I should go that route, too,” I say.
She nods.
I see a girl walking slowly down the side aisle close to us with a tray in her hand. I recognize her. She’s Jen, the girl who’s supposed to tutor me. She looks even shier out here in the wild than she did in the library—which is saying something.
“That’s Jen,” Alex says, head lowered like it’s a secret or something. “She slept with Marissa Larson’s boyfriend a couple of weeks ago, so now everyone hates her.”
That sounds familiar. But looking at this lanky shy girl, shuffling her feet, I can’t imagine she’s very much like me.
“Everyone?” I ask.
“Well, almost everyone. Marissa is Miss Popular and thinks she owns the school. Unfortunately, she kind of does. If anyone even thinks about being Jen’s friend, Marissa and her friends make their life hell. Which apparently scares everyone enough that they won’t talk to her. Losers.”
“Who’s Marissa?” I ask quickly.
Alex stands and looks around for a moment, then points to a table toward the front of the cafeteria. “Curly brown locks,” she says.
I stand to see. There’s a group of girls and boys about my age, the same ones Jackson’s friends seemed nervous about. Yeah, definitely the cool kids. How lame is that?
I recognize Marissa from the “curly brown locks” Alex described her by. She’s sitting next to the girl who said that nasty thing about Jackson this morning.
“So what, they’re like the popular kids?”
Alex snorts. “Hell no. They’re just mean to everyone and it makes them think they’re cool.”
Jen’s slow steps bring her past our table. Her head’s down. I guess she doesn’t expect to find help any time soon. Is it like this every day? I notice a hint of red in her eyes as she finally passes us.
Screw this. I stand. “Hey, Jen!”
The shy girl whips around so fast her apple falls off her lunch tray.
I smile and look down at the empty chair beside me. “You can sit here,” I say.
Alex’s eyes grow wide, but I see a hint of a smile.
Jen pauses. She looks at me, then at Alex. Then he
r eyes dart to the “popular” table and she says, “Are you sure?”
“Can’t get much worse for me.”
“I’m not sure about that,” she says, but she sits anyway.
Alex no longer hides her smile.
The lanky girl looks down at her plate. She doesn’t eat any of it. “You’re coming to my house after school, right?” I ask her. She’s supposed to come every day after school, but yesterday I wouldn’t leave my room, so my parents canceled the appointment. Good times.
“I didn’t realize you knew each other,” Alex says.
Jen takes in a deep breath and drinks a small sip of her milk. “I’m her tutor.”
Alex raises her eyebrows, and I just shrug. Is it embarrassing that I need a tutor? I think I’ve got bigger problems than that.
After a few moments of silence, Alex asks Jen, “Was it good at least?”
“What?” I ask, but Jen’s wide eyes give me a pretty good clue. Alex just raises one thin eyebrow.
“I was drunk, he wasn’t.”
Apparently this wasn’t what Alex expected to hear. She doesn’t speak.
Of course, it wasn’t what I expected to hear either, but I guess you don’t have to go to New York for a guy to take advantage of you.
I find myself looking over at Jackson’s table. He glances at me, just long enough to catch my eyes and smile, like he’s checking up on me.
The popular kids are watching us with hate in their eyes, Marissa especially. I have a feeling I made the wrong kind of enemy here. But it kind of feels good, to be honest. I’m not a victim anymore. I chose this. I’m in control here.
Besides, it’s a hell of a lot better for them to hate me for their random high school drama than for them to find out the truth.
Chapter Thirteen
I open my front door to see Czar, the dog, staring at me. His tail twitches slightly, but mostly I’m just impressed that he’s not barking or growling at me. Guess he knows I’m not a threat now. I mean, I did sort of lose it right in front of him.
My mother stands behind the kitchen counter reading a magazine. Not sure why she’s not sitting down or something. I hear the oven counter go off and realize she must be baking.
“Hey, Mom.”
She looks to the oven first, then to me. “Hey, sweetie. How was your day?”
I take a long breath. Exhausting, but… “I lived.”
She places a baking sheet into the oven and looks up. “Oh! I should have told you. You aren’t supposed to go through the front door. I’m surprised that dog didn’t eat you alive.”
“Yeah, I keep forgetting. He didn’t do anything today though, guess he’s used to me now.”
She looks skeptical. “He doesn’t ‘get used’ to people, sweetie. He’s ferocious. Goodness, he almost bit off my hand just for trying to fill his water yesterday.”
If the dog’s been here for three years, I kind of can’t blame him for being easily agitated. I at least had the chance to run away. Imagine if I’d been chained up in the backyard. A prisoner.
Mom smiles. I’ve seen that look before, but after that glimpse of concern I saw from her the other day, I have to wonder if she’s as naive as I always thought. Maybe she knows something’s wrong but is just trying to make the best of it.
Maybe she’s a prisoner, too.
“Just use the back door, okay?” she says. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
I’m not sure that avoiding the dog in general is going to make it any better, but there’s no point in arguing. Besides, I don’t know if I’m willing to push things with my dad just yet.
“I’ll have brownies ready in a few minutes. If you want some.”
I attempt a smile. “Maybe in a little while. I need to get ready for my tutor.”
I head to my room and hide for a few minutes before Jen comes over. I’m kind of eager for the distraction, but she won’t be here for at least a half hour.
I look through my drawers and come across my old diary. It looks untouched, but I have a hard time believing they didn’t read it when I went missing. Did they read about how I had sex for the first time at thirteen? Did they read about how I sneaked out and spent the night with my older boyfriend when they told me I couldn’t go to the movies?
If they’d let me have a life, even just a little bit, maybe I’d never have left. I’d be a completely different person. Looking at colleges, doing my homework, going to choir practice (really, I was pretty good).
But the more I fought for freedom, the more my father came down on me. Sometimes with more than words. I rub my arm, like I can still feel the bruises. And my mom just let it happen. The more I pulled away, the more disappointment I saw on their faces.
Until I couldn’t take it anymore.
I flip to the last diary entry I wrote before I ran away.
Mrs. Brown made me eat lunch in her room today, which I guess is better than eating in the cafeteria when you have no friends, but still, it sucked. She told me she was going to talk to my parents if I didn’t start doing my homework again. Said she’d tell them about the rumors going around school. Like that I was pregnant, and had herpes and slept with the gym teacher. None of them are true, or even close to it, but that won’t stop my dad from freaking out.
He’ll call me a “loose girl” and tell me I’m going to hell. I don’t think I can handle that, even one more time. How he looks at me, talks to me. The way my mom ignores my tears. Pretends she doesn’t see me at all anymore. She doesn’t care so why should I care about them? I swear, the next time he tells me how disgusting and horrible I am, the next bruise... I’m leaving. I’m going to do it. I’m going to hop on a train and go to New York where no one will tell me what to do again.
Pretty clear map to where I was going. They had to have read it. Probably why my poster was all over NYC. Doubt they put it up that many other places; they knew I loved it. I always wanted to go, but it was just another thing that my father thought was “evil.”
One day I should ask him to define it, “evil.” How is everything in the world evil? That doesn’t even make sense. Although I’m not in much of a position to defend my stance anymore. I’m sure New York is even more evil to him now. It corrupted his sweet baby girl.
Yeah, right. I sit down at my desk. I used to have a computer here. That was the one thing I did have—they didn’t really realize how much a computer could do. I remember the moment I opened it up, took out the Visa gift card they gave me for my birthday, and bought a one-way ticket to the city of my dreams.
I left a week later and never looked back. Even after I was raped, even after Luis had me sleeping with his friends for money, I never considered returning home, mostly because I knew that I’d only made myself worse in their eyes. More broken. A worse fit for this family than ever.
But here I am again.
I hear the dog bark, deep and loud—that dog is seriously scary shit. Then I hear a scream.
I run out into the hall and see Jen pinned up against the wall. The dog is crouched down, growling at her. It’s that scary growl again, not the kind you hear from a friendly dog just defending itself. This dog is terrified. Why wouldn’t it be? You can only get hit so often before you think any raised hand is headed your direction. I would know. It’s a fear I’m no stranger to.
I see my mom frozen in shock, big eyes and a hand over her mouth.
“Martin isn’t home yet…” she says, as if this means anything.
She reaches out her hand, like she wants to help but isn’t sure what to do. I step forward. I’m not sure what I can do, but I figure this dog likes me better than my mom.
My mother’s frightened eyes flicker toward me.
“Czar,” I say calmly. The dog doesn’t react. He probably doesn’t even know his own name.
I take another step forward, and this time I see his eyes flicker to me. I plan on stepping between the girl and the dog. It’s less likely he’ll attack me.
I slowly walk around and take a big s
ide step so that I’m between Jen and the growling dog. I keep my hands up in surrender and pray that this isn’t a huge mistake. But it’s the least I’d want, someone to take a chance and be patient while I figured out they weren’t out to hurt me.
I keep my voice and gaze steady. “It’s okay. It’s all right.”
Czar’s eyes dart around the room, but his stance relaxes enough for me be confident he’s not going to pounce on me. I tell Jen to inch past me, and I wait until she’s past the reach of the chain before following her.
Czar just watches us go.
When I’m about to take another step, my father walks through the front door.
“Martin!” my mother calls.
The dog’s head whips toward him.
My father takes one look, and in a single quick motion he pushes the dog to the ground and hits him with an open hand across his head. My guess is that this isn’t the first time he’s treated the dog this way. Czar doesn’t fight back at all. That beautiful dog falls to the ground and takes the hit with only a wince.
“Dad!” I say as he raises his hand to swing again. “Hitting him isn’t going to help.”
“He needs to know who’s boss!” His hand lands on the dog’s head with a loud smack. I wince and turn away, only listening to the sounds as he drags the dog out the door, nails scratching the hardwood floor on the way, as I take deep breaths to keep calm.
I’m just lucky Jen’s here, or else he might be dragging me down the hall, too.
Once I reach the kitchen, my mother is in the corner, rubbing Jen’s shoulder. I only have a moment of jealousy before my mom sees me and gestures to come closer. When I’m close enough, she takes my hand.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
“For what?” I ask, taking a page out of her book and pretending nothing is wrong at all.
“Everything.”
I blink and consider asking her again. Does that mean what I think it means? Is she sorry for letting my father get away with hurting me for so long? Even when he didn’t hit me, it hurt. I’m not sure which pain was worse.
My mother’s calm facade is back in an instant, and I know my moment has passed. She’s covering up her emotions again. “Anything to drink, Jen?” she asks.
Naked Page 8
