Invisible

by Marni Bates

  “His features are too classically shaped to be ‘cute.’ He has a strong nose, but it doesn’t appear disproportionate. The disheveled, short, dark brown hair, green eyes combination usually falls under the ‘hot’ category—and either he has an incredible metabolism or he gets some kind of physical exercise on a regular basis. The guy is in excellent shape.”

  Isobel wasn’t wrong, and I had definitely noticed. Which didn’t mean anything. Stuff like that is bound to happen when your hormones don’t get the message that the insanely hot guy adjusting his camera is slime.

  Backstabbing slime, to be specific.

  “Yeah, well, I tend to choose substance over surface. I’m picky that way.”

  Isobel shrugged. “So have you told Mackenzie or Logan th—”

  “Move your ass, fatty!”

  No, I didn’t say that to Isobel. That honor would have to go to Alex Thompson—football player, Notable, and the all-time-reigning king of the jerks at Smith High School. His mile-long rap sheet makes my grievances with Scott look petty in comparison. Although even if Alex Thompson’s only crime had been outing my best friend Corey in our freshman year of high school—I would still have hated his guts.

  The memory of that afternoon still haunts me sometimes.

  I had been standing right next to Corey when Alex Thompson yelled, “Here comes the homo!” in the cafeteria.

  Corey blanched, his skin taking on a deathly waxen sheen as the entire school tittered uncomfortably. At him. Nobody stood up and yelled at Alex for being a jerk. They just stared expectantly at Corey—probably hoping that he would burst into tears, since that would make the story even more intense.

  And I knew that within hours the whole school would be abuzz with speculation on Corey’s sexual identity. That changing for P.E. in the boys’ locker room tomorrow might no longer be a safe option for him. Not with all the rumors that he was secretly trying to sneak a peek at everyone around him.

  “Are you going to cry, fairy?” Alex continued mockingly. “Pathetic.”

  I was gripping my stupid plastic cafeteria tray so tightly my knuckles turned white, caught in the crosshairs between the bully and my best friend, and yet . . .

  I did absolutely nothing.

  Alex Thompson had a nasty smirk plastered across his face—daring us to try to take him down. And I just stood there, utterly powerless, staring at this broad-shouldered football player who was capable of such senseless cruelty.

  If Corey hadn’t dragged me away, I probably would have stayed glued to that spot, gaping at Alex in horror. I wasn’t even able to find my voice outside the cafeteria. I had just nodded numbly when Corey swore me to secrecy. I didn’t even try to talk him out of hiding it from Mackenzie.

  I merely nodded and pulled him into a hug. And when Alex Thompson bodychecked Kenzie in the cafeteria line—two years after his altercation with Corey—I proved that I was still too much of a nonconfrontational wimp to speak up.

  Instead, I did my brilliant imitation of a statue.

  So I shouldn’t have been surprised that Alex Thompson would insult Isobel in the cafeteria—especially since it was one of his favorite locations for dweeb hazing. Still, I had hoped that Alex would back off now that Logan—aka the captain of the hockey team and Kenzie’s boyfriend—had ordered him to quit messing with us. Which was still something of a sore subject with Kenzie, since she doesn’t like other people fighting her battles.

  Normally, I would agree with her, but when it comes to bullies like Alex Thompson, I care a lot more about ending the geek hazing than about the kind of relationship precedent it sets.

  But either Logan’s message didn’t stick or Alex didn’t think Logan’s shield of protection extended to Isobel. After all, she was a freshman and hardly connected to either Logan or Mackenzie.

  Easy pickings.

  And maybe if I hadn’t spent the last few days mentally psyching myself up for a confrontation with Mr. Elliot, he would have been right.

  “Excuse me?” I squeaked, before fighting to keep my voice level. “What was that?” I gave him my strongest, most withering glare (which I had aimed at Scott without any positive results only a few hours earlier) and hoped with every fiber of my being that he would mutter: I didn’t say anything, so that we could let the matter drop.

  “I said: Move your ass, fatty!”

  Except this time he didn’t just say it. He practically yelled it for the whole cafeteria to hear. Isobel was seconds away from tears as she pushed her glasses up higher on her nose with shaking fingers. Worst of all was the dull, resigned expression in her eyes—as if she had known all along that her day had been too good to last.

  That’s when I snapped.

  I dropped my tray on the counter, pulled back my fist, and slugged Alex Thompson right in the face.

  Hard.

  The bright shock of pain that radiated from my hand took me by surprise. All I could think was: Holy shit, that hurts! The whole thing felt like a surreal out-of-body trip, like something out of a cheesy body-swap movie. If it hadn’t been for the pain and the murderous look on Alex Thompson’s hard-as-granite face, I might have even been able to convince myself that I had made the whole thing up.

  Except then his fist came hurtling in my direction. I threw my hands up, but was unable to block the punch, the force of which sent me sprawling backward. My mind was numb, but my body sure felt it when I connected solidly with the cement of the cafeteria floor. Searing pain had me gasping for breath as I hauled myself off the ground. Everyone around us started chanting, “Fight! Fight! Fight!”

  Well, everyone except Isobel. I think she was too shocked to speak.

  Alex moved in for another attack, making my (rather limited) Women’s Self-Defense training kick in and my brain switch off. I punched, pinched, clawed, grabbed, and kicked as much of him as I could reach. I only dimly felt the arms separating us as I struggled to get in one last good swipe, but the Autoshop teacher had an iron grasp and forcibly dragged me away. I heard Kenzie and Logan shout my name, but I didn’t actually see them since Scott switched to flash, temporarily blinding me. I had heard the incessant click, click, click of his camera during the fight, but I hadn’t paid much attention to it. Actually, I hadn’t given it a second thought. When a football player built like a tanker has a fist plummeting toward your eye, the smaller details in life tend to fall by the wayside.

  The last thing I saw inside the cafeteria before I was hauled out, caveman-style, were my three best friends (and Logan) trying to run to my aid. Well, that and Scott snapping more photos of my dramatic exit.

  And Isobel wondered why I didn’t like the guy.

  Chapter 5

  “So, Jennifer, do you want to explain to me what happened in the cafeteria?”

  I looked at the guidance counselor, Mr. Shelder, in disbelief. What did he expect me to say: Sorry, I figured it’d be a good idea to attack the biggest guy on the football team for no reason. My bad. But being nice little Jane Smith, I couldn’t let the sarcasm out. So I did what I do best: I kept my feelings tightly locked away inside.

  “Um, I’m Jane. Not Jennifer. And Alex Thompson insulted my friend, so I punched him in the face.”

  “I see.” Mr. Shelder jotted down a note and looked at me with his best concerned counselor look firmly in place. “Are you often this protective of your friends?”

  “No. Usually, I’m spineless.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true,” he said soothingly. “There’s no shame in avoiding conflict. Especially when an altercation could potentially become physical.”

  “Yeah, it’s real noble of me to let jerks treat my friends like garbage.”

  The bitter words tumbled out of my mouth before I could stop them, and I stared at the dingy tile floor in discomfort. I couldn’t bring myself to look directly at Mr. Shelder, because I knew exactly what I would see if I met his gaze: poorly masked condescension. I could hear it in his voice already. He would probably return home, shaking his head, a
nd muttering something stupid like, “Teenagers. Why must they make everything so dramatic all the time?”

  “Violence is never the solution, Jenny.”

  That was easy for him to say. He wasn’t the one who pretended not to notice when our lunch spot was referred to as the table for “gays and strays.” As far as I was concerned, this was one bout of violence that should have happened years ago. I was a little surprised it hadn’t. I tentatively skimmed my index finger around the edges of my bruised eye as it throbbed mercilessly.

  “Right,” I agreed, without even bothering to correct him on my name. Again. I couldn’t drum up the energy to care. Not when the pounding of my eye could keep pace with ReadySet’s fastest rock song. I tried to figure out which one of their hits best matched the beat while I tuned out Mr. Shelder.

  “Good. I’m glad you’re ready to apologize. It’s really the mature way of handling situations like this.”

  That pulled me out of my pain-filled preoccupation.

  “Wait, what? No way am I apologizing to that—” Mr. Shelder gave me his best look of disciplinary disapproval, the one that was supposed to evoke guilt in good girls like me. But I guess I’m not such a good girl anymore since I wasn’t even fazed. No way in hell was Alex Thompson going to get an apology from me.

  Not after all the crap he had said about my friends.

  “Janice, be reasonable now. You know I can’t just let this go. You attacked a football player a week before the big game. Ordinarily I would have already notified the parents.”

  Of course, my offense wasn’t that I’d hit someone—it was that I had hit a football player before some stupid school-rivalry game. If Mr. Shelder were to call my parents, he would have to discuss it with the quarterback’s family as well. Something I suspected he would want to delay until after the game. After all, he didn’t want to be forced into sidelining our star player over a simple misunderstanding in the cafeteria. High school really sucks.

  “But because this is a first-time behavior from you, I hope detention will be a sufficient deterrent if you are ever tempted toward violence again.”

  I slung my backpack over my shoulder. “I’ll be sure to check myself before I wreck myself next time. Better yet, I’ll reprimand him using my indoor voice.”

  The silence that filled the room triggered my guilt reflex. It wasn’t really Mr. Shelder’s fault that I was in this mess. If he went out on a limb for me and actually tried to change the dynamic at Smith High School, it might put his job in jeopardy.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled. “No more fighting. Behave myself. Write a nonviolent story for the school newspaper. Got it.”

  “Good. Wait, what was that about the school paper?”

  “Nothing. Just ignore me.” I winced as my own words sank in. “Shouldn’t be hard for you to do.”

  And with that I walked out of his office—only to be confronted by my friends.

  “Jane, you’re officially my hero! That was phenomenal! The way you sucker punched him in the face . . .” Corey whistled appreciatively. “Most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

  Isobel still didn’t appear to have found her voice. She just stood there in the hallway gaping at me. Unfortunately, Kenzie has never had a problem speaking her mind when it comes to me.

  “Are you deranged? What were you thinking? Oh, I forgot. You weren’t thinking! Seriously, Jane, what part of enormous football player did you not understand?”

  Logan put a comforting hand on her shoulder. Even after a month of watching Kenzie’s eyes turn dreamy whenever Logan was around, it still struck me as strange to see them actually doing couple-y things. My best friend dating a Notable who treated me like a geeky kid sister . . . yeah, that was one change that definitely required some adjustment time. “Mack, breathe. Jane, how are you feeling? Besides your eye, what hurts?”

  The searing pain I felt in the cafeteria hadn’t lessened, and I struggled not to resent that my so-called friends were yapping at me when they could be doing something helpful. Like shooting me with a tranquilizer gun so that I could be unconscious for the worst of the ache.

  Or handing me some Tylenol for my headache.

  Either was preferable to being on the receiving end of Kenzie’s lectures.

  “How . . .” I cleared my throat and tried again. “How bad does it look?”

  “Badass!” Corey proclaimed. “Just like the way you took on Alex Thompson! You attacked him like a territorial she wolf on the Discovery Channel or something.”

  I heard a snort and had to swivel my head so that my good eye could locate the source.

  Scott. Of course.

  “You’ve got a problem, man?” Logan demanded, his eyes a cold, hard gray I never wanted to have directed at me.

  Sometimes it’s nice being friends with a high school hockey captain. Especially when a major pain-induced headache makes rational thought unbearable.

  Scott just ignored Logan and spoke to me instead.

  “Interesting way to get a story, Grammar Girl. Nice plan. Nothing impresses teachers quite like getting your ass kicked by a football player. Foolproof.”

  “You were trying to get a story? Why?” Corey asked as he draped a protective arm around my shoulder. I winced as he pressed down exactly where Alex had landed a wayward punch.

  Every single inch of me hurt.

  “Jane’s working on a piece for the school paper,” Isobel informed him, picking one hell of a time to speak up. “See, she’s planning on starting—”

  “Isobel,” I interrupted warningly. I didn’t want Scott to know about my ideas for the paper—definitely not before I had a chance to run them by Mr. Elliot. Creating a fiction page was a long shot, but it wasn’t impossible. At least, it wasn’t if Scott didn’t have any opportunity to prejudice Lisa Anne or Mr. Elliot against it. “Not right now, okay?”

  Everyone noticed my not-so-subtle head nod in Scott’s direction.

  Scott didn’t appear even remotely fazed by all the sudden attention. He grinned. “Don’t stop on my account. You were saying?”

  “Um . . . that violence is never the answer. Jane, you shouldn’t have hit Alex.” Isobel didn’t speak with her normal level of conviction, and I knew she was still shaken up by what had happened.

  But I had absolutely no idea what I could say to make it better.

  “Look, I’ve already heard the ‘turn the other cheek’ speech,” I told her tiredly. “I get it. Really.”

  “I don’t think turning the other cheek was necessary.” Scott examined me narrowly before he snapped another photo. “Both sides of your face look equally bruised to me.”

  Logan couldn’t hold himself back any longer. “What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded. “Get that damn thing out of her face!”

  “Logan.” Kenzie put a firm hand on his shoulder to make sure he didn’t try to land a punch of his own. “Take your own advice and calm down.”

  He turned on her hotly. “Alex was punching Jane, our Jane, and that jackass just stood there taking pictures!”

  I didn’t really know what to make of the whole “our Jane” thing, but the rest of it was accurate. Except . . . Scott was doing exactly what Mr. Elliot and Lisa Anne wanted. What he probably thought I wanted too.

  He was doing his job.

  Not that I was going to defend him.

  “I knew I forgot to bring something to school with me today—my noble steed. Good thing you were able to come riding to the rescue, Logan. She’d be lost without you.”

  It’s never a good idea to piss off a high school athlete, even one as laid-back as Logan Beckett. They tend to punch really freaking hard, a lesson I had just learned the hard way from Alex. Although Scott looked like he might be able to hold his own if it came to blows. Not that his muscles bulged in a protein shake/pumping weights kind of way. They were just very nicely shaped.

  Like the rest of him.

  I really must have smacked my head hard when Alex knocked me down in the cafeteria. That was
the only logical explanation for why I was standing there daydreaming about Scott’s arms while Logan was poised to kick some butt.

  “Logan,” Kenzie repeated, a definite warning underlying her tone. The situation was quickly getting out of control, so I forced myself to face down Scott before anyone could do something stupid.

  “A white knight is still better than an ass,” I blurted out. “So . . . lay off.”

  Scott’s lips twitched into something that resembled an amused grin, and I knew I had just blown any chance I may have had for him to see me as a force to be reckoned with. Still, my comeback seemed to go a long way toward mollifying Logan. His shoulders finally relaxed as he returned his attention to me.

  “Do you think you have a concussion, Jane? Say the word and we’ll blow off school and go to my house.”

  Scott raised an eyebrow. “Are you a nurse now too?”

  “Both of my parents are doctors.” Logan’s clipped tone made it clear that he was trying to keep himself in check. “My mom is sleeping off a night shift, but I’m sure she can take a look.”

  “I’m fine, Logan. Really. No doctors needed.”

  “And you can’t just ‘blow off’ school!” Kenzie said indignantly. “Your tutor is not okay with you randomly skipping class!”

  Of course, since Kenzie is both Logan’s girlfriend and his tutor, she’d know her own official position.

  “This would fall under extenuating circumstances.” Logan grinned for the first time since he’d seen me get pummeled. “Look at her.”

  “Hmm . . . good point.”

  “Hey!” I said. “I’m right here!”

  “She does look pretty bad,” Corey agreed as another wave of headache-related pain rushed through my system.

  “Still right here, guys!”

  Isobel shifted uncomfortably, her eyes locked on the dent in the locker right behind me. “You didn’t have to do that for me, Jane. Really. It was no big deal.”

  And that’s when I realized my black eye would probably fade a lot sooner than the blow to Isobel’s self-esteem. It wasn’t fair. Alex had no right to pick on a nervous freshman girl whose biggest ambition for high school was probably fading into obscurity with her fellow geeks.