Jayden had never mentioned having a sister, but we were friends for only a grand total of three days, and I’d been avoiding him like the plague ever since.
“Did you drop something?” her soft voice asked, even as she averted her gaze.
“Huh?” I frowned, then remembered I was sitting on the ground. “Oh, yeah, kind of.” My dignity. My sanity. My sense of self-preservation.
I shoved my phone and the remnants of my lunch into my bag, rose up onto my knees, but paused before I fully got to my feet.
The girl had buried her chin in her chest, and her eyes were watering, seconds away from spilling fat tears down her innocent cheeks.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” I shuffled forward, the worn carpet scratchy against my bare knees.
She shook her head. “Nothing.”
I took a chance and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. She jumped slightly at the contact but didn’t shrug me off. “Doesn’t look like nothing.”
She took a lightning-quick glance at me. Whatever she saw must’ve been enough to crack her defenses just a little more.
“It’s just . . .” She breathed hard, and the tears spilled over. “It’s just overwhelming. I feel like I’m drowning, and I don’t know what to do.”
I sighed. I didn’t want to feel anything for anyone even remotely related to Jayden, but she was so vulnerable, so broken. “I get it. Starting high school can be hella scary. Everyone feels like this from time to time, OK? Even if they don’t show it. It does get better.”
It hadn’t gotten better for me. It got worse. But she didn’t need to hear that. She just needed someone to tell her it would be OK.
She bit her lip. If anything, she looked sadder, but her tears were drying up.
“What’s your name?” I asked, rubbing her shoulder lightly.
“Jenny,” she mumbled, her voice a little steadier.
“Hang in there, Jenny.” I gave her a reassuring smile. “You can do this.”
She met my eyes. She didn’t smile back, but she did give a little nod.
The bell rang, and her eyes widened. “I can’t be late.”
She zipped up her bag, swung it onto her back, and turned to rush away.
I grabbed my own bag and got to my feet just in time for her to turn back and wrap her gangly arms around my waist.
“Thank you,” she mumbled into my T-shirt, then ran off before I even had a chance to hug her back.
I saw her again at the end of the day, along with another, unfortunately familiar, face. I didn’t know what it was about Jayden’s dad—I hadn’t even met him—but I’d taken an immediate dislike to him, probably because he was related to Jayden. Or maybe I was just jealous that he could stand in front of the school and shake hands with Turner in front of everyone, while I had to keep my very identity secret from the boy I liked.
As I made my way through the parking lot, I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He was leaning against his car and reading something on his phone when Jenny walked up. She reached for the car door, but he stopped her so he could grab something off the front seat. Bending at the waist until they were at eye level, he pulled a cupcake out of a paper bag and held it out with a big smile.
She was facing away from me, so I didn’t see the happiness the sugary treat surely brought to her face.
Maybe I’d misjudged Mr. Burrows after all.
When was the last time my parents got me a cupcake for no reason, let alone picked me up from school? I had to walk even when it was pouring down rain. It wasn’t their fault—they both worked hard—but still, it wasn’t fair.
Jayden bumped my shoulder, nearly making me drop my bag, as he barrelled past me toward his family.
I turned and hastened away, both happy the sad little girl was having her day brightened and bitter that an asshole like Jayden had anything positive in his life. Why shouldn’t he suffer the same way he made me suffer every day?
After school, I needed to focus on something other than Turner, so I got my makeup out with the intention of trying to re-create that watercolor look I’d seen on Instagram. I quickly realized I didn’t have the right kind of eyeshadow and decided to do a dramatic vintage look with killer winged eyeliner instead.
It had been a dramatic day, so it was only fitting.
With a full face of makeup, I spread my books out on my bed and started on my homework. I worked on an English essay, then reluctantly moved on to a Statistics worksheet.
Halfway through my fourth question—and about fifty percent sure the previous three were wrong anyway—the sound of the front door opening provided the perfect excuse to stop.
I stretched my arms over my head and walked into the kitchen to find my mom depositing several grocery bags on the counter.
“Hey, Mom. Is Dad working late?” They both picked up overtime whenever it was offered. That usually resulted in takeout for dinner—my parents liked to cook together as they talked about their day. I used to sit at the dining table and do my homework, or when I was little, they’d give me something nonessential to the meal to chop.
“Yeah.” She smiled at me, then paused. “Oh my god, Philomena, you look stunning! When did you grow up?”
She stroked a lock of hair hanging over my shoulder as she inspected my makeup.
“Thanks, Mom.” She was so busy, so overworked and tired, it was rare for us to talk like this.
“I’m making pulled pork tacos for dinner. Wanna help?”
I shot her a skeptical look. She was full of energy and in a suspiciously good mood, but it was nice, so I chose not to question it. “Fine. But only because you buttered me up with your compliments.”
“Great! Can you unload while I freshen up? Thanks!” She didn’t wait for a response before disappearing into the bathroom.
“Child labor . . .” I grumbled as I started putting things away.
She came back in a pair of my sweats, her hair up in a messy bun and her contacts replaced with glasses. We were the same size, but my mom was a little shorter.
Mom chatted about her work, the gossip she’d heard from the ladies she had coffee with every Saturday afternoon, and the movie she’d fallen asleep during the other night. She asked a few questions about school and my friends, but I’d perfected dodging those questions a long time ago. Instead I told her about the math homework I was struggling with and the few things I did with my cousins and Amaya.
My parents had enough on their plate without worrying about me. What would be the point in telling them I didn’t have any friends at school? They couldn’t afford to send me to Fulton Academy, and there were no other public schools I could get to in under an hour on public transport. I was better off gritting my teeth and getting through it. Not counting days off, I had only 174 days of school to go. I was on the home stretch.
“You know what we haven’t done in a long time?” Mom said as we laid everything out on the table. “A girls’ day with your aunt Emily and your cousins.”
I smiled. “Yeah, we should definitely organize that.”
When we moved back to Devilbend, my mom and her sister had started organizing girls’ days for us. My mom hadn’t really kept in touch with my aunt before we moved back—I wasn’t sure why—but Auntie Em seemed really happy to have us living so close. She invited us over all the time and had encouraged us girls to become friends.
We’d go to parks and have picnics, go for hikes, or even take the hour-and-a-half drive into San Francisco and spend the day there—although my mom didn’t like that too much; it was expensive. I didn’t see what the issue was when my aunt was happy to pay for everything.
“That smells amazing.” My dad toed his shoes off at the door, back just in time for dinner.
“Gross!” I gagged as my mom gave him a big hug and kiss.
We sat at the dining table to eat for the first time in weeks, and the TV even stayed off. Dad was exhausted, but Mom was in the best mood I’d seen her in for a long time. I figured it had something to do with a c
lass she kept rambling on about. It was run by BestLyf—I knew nothing about them other than that they had a tall building in downtown Devilbend and employed a lot of people from the nicer side of town—and Mom had attended her first session over the weekend. It sounded like self-help bullshit and was likely to go the route of the yoga class she’d taken at the community center, or the pottery class she’d taken with Auntie Em, or the stack of adult coloring books she’d brought home one time. None of those things had lasted, but they’d each given her a brief period of excited energy.
When I went back to my room, my math homework was still sitting on my bed, mocking me in all its half-finished glory. I sent Turner a text whining about it and then packed up all the books, deciding to get up early and finish it tomorrow.
After sending the girls a pic of my makeup, I headed to the bathroom to wash it all off and get ready for bed.
I got a little pang of excitement when I returned to see my phone flashing with notifications. I didn’t get a lot of messages. Usually it was Mom or Dad telling me they were working late or asking me to do a chore.
I turned the light off, got into bed, propped my phone on my pillow, and settled in for some scrolling before trying to sleep.
The messages were from the girls, gushing about how good I looked and how flawless my makeup was. Amaya begged me to post them on Instagram every single time I sent a pic, and tonight was no different.
In between chatting with them, I scrolled Instagram, obsessing over makeup that was way better than what I could do and trying to ignore the fact that Turner still hadn’t replied.
Under a pic of some artfully arranged makeup brushes, there was a post from the “DNHS Confessions Page.”
“The new guy—Turner—is fucking hot!”
Usually I scrolled past, trying not to read what they said, but Turner’s name caught my attention. Like a masochist, I tapped on the page and scrolled through the recent confessions. No one knew who ran the page, but the description read, “Send us your Devilbend North High tea, and we’ll spill it for you! Oops!” Students sent in anonymous comments, gossip, and bitchy things, and the page posted them all, unedited. I had a feeling Kelsey ran it. Something like that would require someone mean-hearted to keep it going, and that bitch was always on her phone.
There were several posts about how hot Turner was and what people wanted to do to him. There were common ones like “Anna cheated on the science quiz” or “Meg and Josh were making out in the back of the admin building even though Josh has a girlfriend.” The juicy gossip was interspersed with just plain mean comments. At least one per day was about me. “Phil looks particularly fat today,” “Is that thing on her face contagious?” and so on. It was a running joke for people to then comment with some variation of “Who? What are you talking about?”
I growled and locked the screen, dropping the phone on the bed beside me and rolling onto my back.
Why was I reading that shit? Why was I doing that to myself?
Those people weren’t my friends. I didn’t like them, and they definitely didn’t like me. But it still hurt to read comment after comment about how fucking worthless I was as a human being.
I’d tried to switch off from it completely once. I deactivated my accounts and embraced being as invisible as they all liked to joke I was. It was bliss . . . for about two days. Then I opened my locker at school, and a sea of paper came flying out. Hundreds of printouts of posts, comments, and taunts I’d avoided while offline smacked me in the face, quite literally.
“We saw you deactivated your accounts, and we didn’t want you to miss anything important,” Kelsey had said, a self-satisfied smile on her face.
“Can’t believe you’re going to keep killing trees when you can read all this online. Don’t you know we’re in a climate crisis?” Madison’s threat had been clear—get back online or keep receiving printouts.
Defeated, I cleaned up the mess before one of them reported it to a teacher and got me in trouble. Then I reactivated my accounts. What else could I do?
And if I really thought about it, I’d missed the makeup accounts I followed, not to mention talking to the only people my age who didn’t treat me like shit—the girls.
My phone vibrated next to my thigh, and I picked it up reflexively, my heart kicking up a notch, as it did every time. I never knew if the notification would bring a mundane message from one of my parents or an anonymous suggestion I end my own life.
It was Turner.
Turner: Sorry I didn’t reply sooner. It’s been a crazy day. I had to help my dad with something. Did you get the math homework done?
I smiled and responded immediately, not even caring if that looked as if I’d been up just staring at my phone, waiting for him to message me. I was so happy to hear from him.
I poured salt into the shaker and passed it to Chelsea. She screwed the top on while I did the next one, both of us taking our time, leaning on the end of the counter.
Barry, the cook, was out back having a break, and Leah had taken the night off. Tuesday nights were always quiet, so a good part of my shift was spent refilling the salt, pepper, and sugar shakers and restocking the takeaway cups, along with general cleaning and tidying. And of course, gossiping with Chelsea. Or rather she’d gossip, talking a million miles an hour, while I dropped in the occasional “OMG!” or “Are you serious?”
She used to talk a lot about her boyfriend and his friends, but they’d broken up recently, and now she talked more about some new course she wanted to do.
“Sorry, what was it called?” I realized I’d zoned out and overfilled the last saltshaker. I mopped up my mess as she repeated what she’d been saying.
“BestLyf.” She huffed. I was pretty sure that was the same thing my mom had been talking about the other day. “You OK, girl? You seem more quiet than usual. Distracted.”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry. Just tired.” I’d been staying up way too late talking to Turner on the balcony or on the phone. I gave her a smile, and she launched right back in.
“Well, remember the info session I mentioned a couple of weeks ago?” She waved the saltshaker lid around animatedly as she talked.
“Uh-huh.” I nodded and glanced around the diner, making sure the three currently occupied tables didn’t need anything.
“Well, it was so good. I mean, I only went because I had nothing better to do, and that chick I met at yoga was raving about it, and she seemed nice, but it was totally worth it. They even had sushi platters out after, and I didn’t have to worry about dinner.” She chuckled, and I gave her a wide smile. That girl was obsessed with raw fish. “It was the first time in, like, a month I managed to not think about Dave for more than ten fucking minutes.” At the mention of her ex, her face fell.
I dropped the large box of salt and squeezed her hand. “He didn’t deserve you.”
“No, he did not.” She squared her shoulders, and we got back to work. “I mean, I came out here for him. I left all my friends and my family back in Illinois because I thought we were in love and creating a life together. Then six months after we move here, he dumps me and moves to San Francisco! He is such a fucking asshole.”
I shushed her, glancing around at the patrons again.
She cringed. “Sorry. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about moving to San Fran myself, just to stick it to him, ya know? But it’s so expensive. And then I was thinking about moving home, but I haven’t told my mom that we broke up yet, and I’ve kinda lost touch with my friends and . . . I dunno. Anyway, I think I’m gonna stay now. That info session really helped put things in perspective for me. I learned that it’s OK to put myself and my happiness first, so that’s what I’m gonna do.”
“You learned all that from one free info session? Wow.”
“No, silly.” She grinned. We finished with the salt and moved on to the sugar. “I’ve been to three free info sessions, and the other night I went to my first workshop, which they charge for, but it was so worth it.”
“You went to four events in two weeks?” I asked, a little surprised.
“Yeah! I mean, it’s not like I had anything better to do, and I was learning so much and meeting all these amazing, successful people. I think it’s lucky that BestLyf has one of its centers right here in Devilbend. Makes it possible for them to offer more events, ya know?”
“Uh-huh. Lucky. I’m really happy for you, Chelsea. It’s good to see you so positive again.” I didn’t know much about this program, but I wanted to be supportive.
“Thank you.” She beamed. “Hey, you should come. They’re super welcoming to everyone. It’s a really flexible program that’s tailored to your individual needs, the further along you get. The main focus is always on helping you be your best self—whatever that means for you.”
“Uh, yeah, maybe . . .”
The bell above the door dinged, saving me from having to awkwardly avoid going to whatever motivational self-help crap Chelsea had gotten involved in.
“I got it.” I rushed to the door before she could say anything else.
Donna, Harlow, and Amaya walked in wearing their school uniforms, looking cute in their knee-high socks and so pretty. I’d never look that pretty. The table of college guys in the corner watched them with unconcealed interest.
“Well, hello there, fair maidens.” I gave them a mock bow. “Welcome to our humble establishment. How may I be of service this evening?”
Donna and Amaya chuckled, but Harlow jumped right into the ridiculousness with me. “Your finest table, wench. We’re weary travelers in need of a warm meal to fill our bellies and a pitcher of your best mead.”
“Who you callin’ wench, bitch?” I dropped the act and stepped forward to give them each a hug before leading them to a booth.
“That uniform looks amazing on you.” Amaya tugged on the edge of my stained blue apron.
I gave her a skeptical look. “Please.”
Like You Care: A Dark High School Bully Romance (Devilbend Dynasty Book 1) Page 5
