by Mina Thorne
I could have him in my life, forgive him and move beyond this.
And I loved him a little more for sharing his vulnerability with me.
Chapter 48
The next day at school was uneventful. Becca seemed to give me a wide berth after I dumped green smoothie on her and Barrett seemed to settle back into classes in spite of being dumped by the football team.
I decided we needed to work on that though, getting him back onto the team. Mason was such a piece of shit he didn’t deserve to be the team captain. Not after what he did to Barrett, and not how he’d treated me.
After school there was football practice so I convinced Barrett to come with me and speak to the coach and Dr. Adams.
He reluctantly agreed, but only when Whitt prodded him with me.
“Mason’s a dick and a shitty player,” Whitt told Barrett. “You need this, dude. The team needs this.”
“See?” I said with a smug smirk. “I told you Whitt didn’t want him on the team, nobody does.”
“I don’t think there’s much anyone can do about it at this point,” Barrett grumbled.
“It’s worth a try,” I insisted.
He finally gave in and we walked to the office where I asked to see Dr. Adams.
Dr. Adams never seemed that thrilled to see me, he vacillated between viewing me as a colossal pain in the ass and a potential source of funding from my Dad.
That was another perk of being well off that I’d never considered, how fast people would kiss up to you if they thought you would contribute money to build a new gymnasium or re-do the seating in the stadium. Dr. Adams was just like this, walking that fine line between booting me out for being low brow trash from California, and feeling the urge to suck up to my family for fundraising.
“Miss Montgomery,” he said when he came out of his office. “Now what exciting new piece of drama do you have for me to today?”
“No drama, just a proposal,” I said.
Barrett gave me a sidelong glance, I hadn’t told him or Whitt what I wanted to do.
“What proposal?” Dr. Adams asked.
“Barrett deserves to be on the team,” I said and leaned against the counter. “Mason is a shitty player and didn’t earn the captain position. He helped Becca set a few things up and got there through shady ways.”
“Shady? I understand that Barrett here is failing so he doesn’t qualify,” Dr. Adams said. “That goes against school policy.”
“He’s only failing because the system failed him. Your school failed him. He has a learning disability and instead of addressing it, your school participated in covering it up and passing him without dealing with the underlying cause.”
Dr. Adams flinched and Barrett sucked in a sharp breath. I knew he hated me talking about his vulnerabilities in front of people, especially Whitt.
“What are you saying?” Dr. Adams asked carefully.
“I’m saying that I’m tired of the bullshit around here, Dr. Adams. I’m so tired of it. The wrong kids wind up running the place and the kids who deserve the things they worked hard for wind up being left behind. Barrett needs help with his education, and he needs to be back on the team as the captain. Or else it would be a real shame if this was all leaked to the media.”
Dr. Adams chewed on the end of his pen, a beautiful hand carved wooden Cartier. He was the epitome of style and needed to cling to his persona, the face he put on for the world. I was banking on that though, that Dr. Adams wouldn’t want a scandal to rock the foundations of Westview Academy.
Finally he clicked the pen a couple times, took a deep breath and said, “What kind of help does he need?”
And I knew I had him.
I spent the next few minutes outlining the type of tutor the school needed to hire for Barrett and then had him call down to the coach to let him know we were coming down.
And that Barrett was back on the team.
We left the office and made sure we were out of hearing range before I laughed and said, “Holy shit, I can’t belief that worked!”
“You scared him, babe,” Whitt laughed and put his arm around me as we walked. “I thought Adams was going to piss himself just trying to stare you down.”
“Who knew our girl had balls of steel?” Barrett grinned and took my hand in his.
We walked like that, like we were completely okay with being seen. The three of us.
And we were, at that point nothing could bring us back down to earth.
By the time we made it to the football field for practice, the coach was waiting for us with a smile on his face.
“I’m glad to see you here, Barrett,” he said and clapped Barrett on his back. “That little pissant Mason can’t hold a candle to you or your throwing arm. The team needs you. We need our star Quarterback and our captain.”
Barrett looked to me and raised his eyebrows. I’d done so much in a short time, more than Elaine had done for him in years it seemed.
Mason came walking over to us, an arrogant twist to his mouth and he said, “What’s going on here? You’re not letting this fucking retard back on the team, are you?”
“First, that’s a disgusting word,” I snapped and took a step towards Mason. “Second, fuck off. Nobody wants you as the team captain so you can go eat a giant bag of dicks, Mason.”
The coach snorted and shook his head in disbelief. “Well, she’s got you there, kid. It is a disgusting word and I support you fucking off. You’ve been nothing put a gigantic pain in the ass since you ran Barrett off and the team is better without you.”
Mason shot daggers at me, but he picked up his helmet and strode towards the change rooms. He knew he was defeated so he was probably going to run off to Becca and tell her what I’d done.
I’d have to be prepared to face her over this, I was sure of it.
I did laugh though, and felt as if we’d finally vanquished part of the beast we were fighting.
With Mason gone, Barrett getting extra help and him back on the team, I was one step closer to destroying my enemies and making the school a safer place.
Now I just had to focus on Elaine and Becca.
Later that week in Biology I was more than prepared when Becca attempted another stupid prank.
The good thing about her was that she wasn’t very clever, and she was single minded in her goal to humiliate me. That was her end game, just to shame me in front of other students.
We had a small experiment to do that day, it was dissecting a fake frog. Some time in the last decade they’d decided that cutting open millions of real frogs for high school Biology classes was too cruel and had gone with these models, thank god.
Becca was planning something though, the way she was talking to Marie and Agnes all day made it pretty obvious. She wasn’t exactly subtle with her hatred of me.
Also thank god.
I watched her out of the corner of my eye from the side of the classroom and deliberately didn’t hover over my frog.
I saw her pick up my frog and mess with it, while a couple of her friends watched and snickered. Becca must have thought I was as dumb as she looked because she was being super obvious.
Maybe me being naïve and believing in the good in people had come off as stupid though, so I couldn’t exactly blame her. Becca wasn’t exactly a deep thinker with many layers.
When we were told to start cutting into our frogs and follow along with the slideshow presentation on the computer at the front of the class, Becca rushed off to her seat.
She was just a few tables over so I picked up the frog that she’d done something with, walked to the front of the class to ask the teacher a question and paused near her seat.
“What are you looking at, skank?” Becca snapped when she saw me.
“Nothing,” I said and swung my arm just enough to knock her pen off the table.
“Watch it, slut,” she said and bent down to pick it up. As she did this, I replaced my frog with hers and continued to the front.
I asked som
e lame thing about our marks and then walked back to my seat.
Once the teacher pressed play on the presentation, I picked up my scalpel and waited to begin.
“Cut into the frog where you can see the previous incision on the pseudo flesh,” the video said.
Becca and her friends snickered rudely and looked back at me, waiting for the big moment.
I picked up my scalpel, yielded it dramatically and cut into the frog I’d taken from Becca’s table and caught their intense disappointment out of the corner of my eye.
She flipped her hair and shrugged her shoulders and turned to her own frog.
I watched as she picked up her scalpel and cut into the frog she’d doctored for me.
And bright blue ink exploded out of the body of the frog and all down the front of her.
She screamed and jumped up, threw the scalpel to the floor and shrieked again.
“What the fuck, who did this?”
And then she turned around and locked her eyes on me. “This was you! You fucking cunt! You did this!”
I lifted my eyebrows and said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Get me paper towel!” Becca screamed at her friends who darted around, running into each other and fumbling with the paper towel rolls.
The class started to laugh and Becca was stained with blue ink all over her white blouse, and her face and hands.
I hoped she was evil enough to have decided on actual ink. Something that would stain her skin semi permanently so she would be forced to wear the reminder of her nasty attempt to humiliate me every time she looked in the mirror.
I laughed with everybody else, and couldn’t believe how good it felt to get her back.
Becca ended up running out of the room covered in ink and screaming about bitches and skanks and sluts.
It was a good week.
Chapter 49
Friday was going well, Mason and Becca were both absent for most of the week and Whitt and Barrett were behaving themselves around each other.
In math class, Rome was waiting for me with a concerned look on his face.
“What’s up?” I asked and sat down in the desk next to him.
“I need help,” he said and held up the test we’d taken the day before.
He’d gotten an F.
“Oh shit, that’s not good,” I replied.
“I want you to know I had nothing to do with Saturday night too, what those bitches did to you,” he said quickly. “I was so fucking wasted that I was passed out pretty early on.”
“You didn’t seem wasted when you were making out with Marie,” I replied.
I wasn’t exactly mean about it, or jealous. Or maybe just a little jealous, but that would be silly. I had Barrett and Whitt.
“Oh god, Marie,” he groaned and ran his hand through his shaggy hair. “I can’t believe I went there. That in itself should let you know how wasted I was, I swore I’d never bang that crazy bitch again. At least I passed out before she got all of me, hey?”
He gave me a sheepish grin that made me laugh. “So you’re not dating the bitch who tried to set me up and leave me on the beach to freeze to death?” I asked.
“No, I’m not. In fact, Becca was a big part of the reason we split up last year. Marie is like a zombie around Becca. She just follows orders, it’s beyond annoying.”
“What do you need help with?” I asked.
“Can we study this weekend? Sinclair is going to let me take the test over on Monday. If I fail this, I’m not going to pass. If I don’t pass, I might not graduate. And then we all know my parents will kick my ass,” he said and then offered a crooked grin. “So help me, Stephanie Montgomery, you are my only hope.”
I sighed and did my best to seem put upon, as if Rome’s request was beyond anything I could possibly handle, but the truth was that I was flattered.
And the distraction would be good. Being around him would be a nice way to flirt and have fun without the tension of still being a little mad at both Barrett and Whitt.
“Fine,” I said. “You have my number, text me and maybe we’ll get together later.”
“Thanks,” he said. “You’re the best. I owe you.”
“Remember that when I need something,” I smiled and gave him a wink.
After school I was having another driving lesson so Barrett went to football practice, and then had to meet with his tutor to do some intense catching up over the weekend.
I missed driving home with him, but I’d been getting so good at driving now that I was going to go for my license before the year’s end.
And then I’d have absolute freedom with my hot pink little Audi.
Kit was waiting for me in one of the house black Land Rovers, she hopped out with a smile and tossed me the keys.
“You’re up, Steph,” she said.
I climbed in, went over the mental checklist of everything I needed to do, and put into drive.
“You’re doing so great,” Kit said as I navigated my way out of the school parking lot. “You pick up on things so fast.”
“Thanks,” I replied. “I’ve always been pretty good at learning. I’m lucky that way.”
“How’s Elaine being around you, by they way?” Kit asked out of the blue. “She’s been a bit…well, odd lately. She hasn’t been taking as many tennis lessons and she seems pretty moody. A lot of it seems to be directed at you.”
“She’s been avoiding me, but that’s a good thing,” I replied. And then I decided to tell her everything while we drove. I told her how Elaine had coordinated with Becca to project those pics and that video on the side of the mansion, and how she’d almost ruined Barrett’s chance at leading a normal life by ignoring his learning disability.
I even told her I suspected Elaine was behind Becca’s plan to drug me and leave me with Taylor to be possibly raped. Although I didn’t think Elaine had connected the dots. She’d assumed Becca would find some horny teen to take advantage of me, not her lover.
Kit was quiet as I talked, but when I’d finished spilling my guts, she seemed really mad.
“She’s deplorable,” Kit said with a scowl. “She’s been like this for years, but she’s ramped up her bitchiness since you got here.”
“I wish there was something I could do. I thought about letting Dad know what was going on with Taylor, but I don’t want to hurt him. I hate the thought of hurting him,” I said.
“Me too. I wish we could hurt Elaine and not David,” Kit said. “I like your father even if he’s not the best dad in the world to you. I know he wasn’t there a lot when you were growing up…I think he does his best, considering his own trauma and upbringing. And he’s trying now.”
“That’s true. He is doing his best with me now, and that means a lot,” I agreed. I thought about it for a moment and then added, “We have to find a way to do something to Elaine though. What could it be? What’s Elaine’s worst fear?”
“Getting fat,” Kit laughed and shook her head. “There’s not much we can do about that though.”
“Isn’t there?” I asked and pulled into our driveway. I turned to take the car into the garage.
“What do you mean?” Kit asked.
The garage door opened and I parked my car. I looked over at her with a thought forming and a sly grin on my mouth. “What if we started adding a little extra to her smoothies in the morning?”
“She might get suspicious if you’re lurking over them,” Kit said.
“But not if we get the staff in on it. I want to get rid of Elaine, I think she’s awful for my dad and I think she’s a horrible human being. What if we put some of that weight gain powder in her smoothie as a start, and then work from there?”
Kit laughed and said, “You know it might just work. Let me ask around and see if any of the girls will do it.”
We left my car and went our separate ways in the house. I went straight upstairs to my room so I could tidy up and change into something more comfortable in case Rome decided to
come over for math lessons.
Like I believed that. I needed a moment alone to think about that too, him. I was attracted to Rome, there was no question about it. I had been since day one.
But I had assumed he was with Becca’s group, and therefore off limits to me. He wasn’t though, and he wanted to spend time with me.
Rome felt uncomplicated, completely different than Whitt and Barrett. I had to admit it to myself that I was still hurting from Barrett’s taking off and Whitt’s participation in Becca’s horrible prank.
I could forgive them both, I knew that. My feelings for them were so deep that I could let them back into my heart fully and absolutely at some point, but right now it still stung when I thought about the feelings I’d carried with me over both of them.
Rome didn’t have that kind of residual pain, he was a complete and empty slate. Clean and uncomplicated.
And he didn’t fight with Whitt or Barrett. The two of them competing over me felt a little annoying at times, I wanted to see them separately but felt like it was unfair because I lived with Barrett, so I needed Whitt around all the time too.
I flopped back onto my bed, picked up a pillow and screamed into it. Just a release of pent up frustration because of all the thoughts spinning in my head about it all.
I just wanted life to be simple. I had planned on having a boyfriend, friends who supported me, and to graduate at the end of the year.
Somehow I had found myself in the middle of a mine field of teenage angst and emotion and it was sometimes a little too much.
But if I hung out with Rome, what did that mean to Barrett and Whitt? Was that cheating on them, or was I cheating on one boy with the others?
What the heck had I gotten myself into here?
And why, in spite of the frustration, did I love it so so so much?
Chapter 50
Rome texted me and I decided to meet him outside and go study at the library in town. I wasn’t about to try and do anything with Barrett lurking around.
