by Mj Fields
Instinct kicks in, and I shove him back.
“Five minutes late to the party, I see,” Patrick says, grabbing Miles’s balled fist, tsking. “Not gonna happen. Three on three sounds fair, but three pussies still nursing off their nannies’ tits against us, doesn’t.”
He shoves him back then looks at me. “Seem fair to you?”
“Don’t really give a fuck.”
Patrick pushes them all toward the door. “Come on, old chaps, before JT opens a can of whoop ass and totally fucks up high tea.”
Tricks walks back into the fitness center, grinning. “That was fun. Let’s do it again sometime soon, and not on school property.”
Tobias looks at me. “After the game, you and I need to hang out.”
Patrick shakes his head. “King business?”
I narrow my eyes at him.
He holds his hands up and shakes his head. “I don’t even want to know.”
“Makes fucking two of us.”
Tobias and I make plans to get together after the game and dinner.
Walking into Stats, the last class of the day, I see she’s finally made it to school, and she’s making a statement—sitting next to Reeves. I see the smug look on his face as he whispers something to her, causing her to tense up. I don’t bother saying shit as I walk past her to the back corner of the room and take a seat beside Truth and Patrick.
“Fucker has a death wish, huh?” Patrick chuckles as he nods toward them.
“They’ve slept together off and on for a couple years now,” the kid ahead of me whispers back at us. “Sex not love, type of thing. I mean, until you all moved here.”
I lean forward to tell him to mind his fucking business when he turns and looks at me. His blue eyes against his dark skin cause me to hold my tongue.
“What’s your name?”
“Nolan,” he answers.
“How old are you, Nolan?”
“Fourteen.”
“Fourteen taking Stats?”
He shrugs. “It’s not rocket science.”
“You got family here?”
He shakes his head. “Scholarship.”
“You know Tobias Easton?”
He looks at Truth then back at me. “Know enough about him.”
“Gonna assume you know a lot about everyone.”
He smirks, deep ass dimples popping. “I know enough.”
I nod once. “So, you know Gabrielle isn’t banging Harry, right?”
“I know she was, and I know she’s supposed to be with you.” He nods toward them. “But kinda looks like you’re slacking on keeping your woman at your side.”
Patrick snickers, and Truth giggles.
“Do me a favor?”
“A favor where I come from comes with a return favor when needed.”
“What do you need, little man?”
“A job, so my sister can stop busting her ass.”
“What makes you think I have a job to offer?”
“I know who you are, and I know who you’re about to become.”
“Fifty bucks to go tell Gabrielle she’s needed back here.”
He nods.
“Bring your things and take her seat so she can’t go back to it.”
“And sit by that asshat?”
I shrug. “Fifty bucks is fifty bucks.”
“Plus a favor,” he reminds me.
I nod in agreeance as I reach in my pocket, grabbing my cash. I peel off a fifty and hand it to him. “Plus a favor.”
When he walks away, I sit back, link my fingers behind my head, and notice Truth and Patrick checking me out.
“What?” I ask.
“Did you just make a friend?” Truth smiles.
“I just made a business partner,” I answer as I see Gabrielle stand up and look back at me.
I raise an eyebrow and nod to the seat in front of me. She narrows her eyes as she grabs her books, her bag, and walks back.
She sits in front of me, and I lean forward, pushing her hair to one side with my pencil while pulling her chair back with my foot. Then I whisper in her ear, “Queenie, you broke rule number one already by not being at the front door, but you followed rule number two by moving when I said to.”
“Fuck you,” she hisses so only I can hear her.
“Not a chance, Queenie, but since you can’t seem to follow instruction without rules, rule number three: when we’re in class, think of yourself as a game piece on my chessboard.”
She looks back at me with hope in her lying eyes.
“You’re the pawn, one step ahead of me at all times, unless told otherwise.”
Hope diminishes, replaced by anger. “Can’t get enough of this ass, can you?”
“Your ass has nothing to do with it. Seen and had better. You’re only one step ahead because, that way, I have eyes on you. Trusting you to play this game smart has now backfired at my expense twice. It won’t happen a third time without dire consequences to you.”
She huffs, “For your information, I was playing the game. Proving to him that we were fine, that you were the bigger man, even after yesterday.” She quirks a brow, as if to say now what?
“Bullshit, Little Liar. From now on you let me play the game, and you just try to follow the damn rules?”
She scowls. “I was convincing.”
“Don’t give a fuck what you think. He played you, tried to get me to react when I walked in here. So again, one step ahead at all times, for your own good. Three strikes, Queenie, and you’re gonna wish all you got called was out.”
She turns around when Higgins walks in.
“Sorry I’m late. We’re going to do some review for Stats AP exam next Monday.” He drops a pile of copies on the desks in the front. “Pass them back and get started working independently.”
I see Harrison look back at Gabby, eyes narrowed, and I catch the smug look on her profile as she shrugs.
I hate Statistics, but any class I can take in high school that counts as college credit, therefore allowing me to get through the bachelor’s degree in under four years that I promised my parents I’d get so they’d let me shadow Tags and learn the craft that I intend on mastering, is a necessary evil. By the time I graduate in a year, I should only have to go to college for three years instead of four.
“Okay, class, make sure your names are on your tests and pass them forward.”
I look up and see we have five minutes left, and I could definitely use them, but the man said pass them up.
I stretch my legs out and nudge her suck-me-and-fuck-everyone-else heels.
She leans her head back, thin neck stretched, as she looks up at me. “What?”
I lean forward so my face hovers above hers and whisper, “Next time you break a rule, I’m gonna fuck your face from this position just so I can watch the head of my dick stretch out your scrawny little neck.”
She scrunches up her face in disgust. “Pig.”
“Bitch,” I hiss before covering her face with my packet.
When the bell rings, I stand and start for the door when I feel a hand grab the waistband of my jeans and jack me back. I glare behind me, knowing it’s Gabrielle.
“Don’t look at me like that. Your rule.” She pushes past me and looks back. “I’ll get back to you on the consequences for breaking your own damn rule when I come up with one equally as demeaning as yours.” She whips her head back around, and I get a face full of hair and a reminder of how sweet she once smelled to me. But, as I learned on a field trip to a local flower shop with the nuns, even a flower as alluring, exotic, and sweet smelling as an Angels Trumpet can cause serious health issues, including hallucination and death to unsuspecting and naïve fools who dare inhale or ingest it.
I’m no fool.
Not anymore.
By the time I get to the front doors to go grab my cleats from my vehicle, I am so fucking annoyed at her intentional snail’s pace that I’m ready to take it out on her in a much different way than I mentioned to her in class.
; “Swear to God above, Gabrielle, if you don’t stop the fucking games, I’m gonna do more than fuck your face; I’m going to wreck that ass of yours too.”
She stops short and looks back at me. It’s not disgust I see when I nearly mow her over and have to grab her hips to stop her from face-planting into the door; it’s shock.
I take advantage of it by hurrying past her and out the fucking door.
Stepping back to shut my door, I hear her heels tapping pavement, and see her out of my peripheral storming toward me, angry as fuck, too.
Shutting the door, I smile smugly and turn around just in time to grab her wrist so she doesn’t slap me, as she clearly intended to.
Seeing others take notice, and by others I definitely mean Harrison and his bitches, I place her paw on my chest, drop the cleats, and grab her hip, turning her and, none too gently, pushing against her so her back hits my ride.
“You better—… fuck,” I sneer when she grips my dick through my pants.
“You better, Justice,” she seethes. “You better quit talking to me and treating me like I am, or ever have been, your whore!”
“Why’s that, Queenie? Because you’re everyone else’s wh—fuck!”
Her grip now tightens, passing uncomfortable and going right to painful as fuck.
“I’m nobody’s whore. I do who I want to, and what I want to. You would have known that had you bothered asking.” She squeezes tighter.
“I’m two seconds from flipping this scene and taking you over my fucking knee,” I sneer at her.
“I’d rather continue being treated like shit and being used by someone who will never know me than by someone who once did.” She lets go of my dick and shakes her head as she looks down at the bulge in my pants with disgust. “The Justice I knew is gone, too. The Justice you are now is no different than any other hard dick who wants to own the pretty girl, with the pretty clothes and the pretty house, to feed his massive ego.”
When she starts to slide out from between me and my vehicle, I place both hands on either side of her, caging her. “You walk, you go to them, you’re dead to me.”
She leans against the vehicle, smiling sadly as she nods. “I think that’s best for both of us.”
“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” I snap.
“I said what I said.” She starts to duck under my arm, and I grab her face.
“Justice, don’t do this to yoursel—”
My lips crash against hers, and I feel her whimper against them before her soft plea of, “Don’t,” escapes, giving my tongue the access it desperately wants. She opens her mouth wider as she grips my blazer and pulls me so I’m tight against her.
I slide my hand behind her head, protecting it from getting smashed into the vehicle when I pin her under my weight against it.
Her paws now caught between us, flexing her fingers into my chest, she moans and whimpers into my mouth as her needy little tongue dips inside it.
I grind my erection against her bony as fuck hips, a stark contrast to how she used to feel under me when we dry-humped on a blanket covering the sand, under the stars, until neither of us could take it anymore. Then I move my hand up her waist and to her protruding ribs, once covered by meaty flesh that I could grip without fear of hurting her. I bite into her lower lip and pull it out as I break a kiss that never should have happened, but I know it will again.
I press my forehead against hers, and she opens her eyes. I see she’s just as worried about this shit as I am, no doubt for different reasons, but I’d rather know I’m feeding her needs than any other motherfucker at Seashore.
“You don’t even feel like you anymore. Your fucking diet of cosmos, Tic Tacs, and random dick is done.”
She’s back to angry. “Fuck you.”
“If I fucked you right now, I’d split you in half.” I step back. “Rule number four: you’re gonna start eating better, because I’m not into scrawny-ass women with attitudes bigger than they are. You wanna push buttons, you better be able to back that ass up in a literal way.”
She tries to walk away, but I grab her paw, slipping my fingers through hers, and yank her back.
“Rule number five: you need to hang around those fucks because of some skewed loyalty to the boy who popped your cherry and was quick to replace you for power that means dick in high school then you do it only when myself, Tobias, or one of my crew is around.”
“You can’t make me—”
“I’ll fuck that thirsty, little best friend of yours if you do, just to remind you that none of these fuckers know the meaning of loyalty.” I bend down and use my free hand to grab my cleats.
“You’re ridiculous.”
“Queenie, you haven’t seen the half of it,” I say as I drag her beside me.
“Maybe I don’t want to.”
I glance over at her and catch a smile.
“Rule number six …” I pause.
She sighs exaggeratedly. “Go on, Justice; let’s hear it.”
“Like you, they’re on a need-to-know basis,” I say as we pass a crowd of nosy asses who watched this all go down. “And right now”—I drop her paw as we reach the door, and I open it for her—“you don’t even need to know.”
She stops and crosses her arms.
“I’m holding the fucking door, Queenie. If you’re waiting for a red carpet, it’ll be a while.”
“School is over. I don’t have to go back in.”
Shit, I think to myself but don’t want her to know that what happened just then fucked up my head, so I tell her, “My game starts at four. Be there.”
“Why? So you can treat me like shit?”
I narrow my eyes at her and am about to tell her …
“If you say because I said so, I will refuse to come based on the fact that you told me I had to.”
I shrug. “I don’t have to tell you to. You want this to be realistic, you’ll be there. If you don’t, then don’t show up, and tomorrow, I’ll pretend I don’t even know you.”
“Your money’s in your fucking abomination.”
“Better be all of it.” I turn, and with that, I walk in the school and hear the door close loudly behind me as I walk toward the locker room.
When I look up, I see Truth, Patrick, and Max all standing there with shit-ass grins on their faces.
Max is the first to open his mouth. “What happened to no chicks from Seashore? No steady ass? No—”
“Steady is always ready.” Patrick shrugs as he slaps his paw on my shoulder.
“Cut the shit, both of you.” Truth laughs.
“You’re not pissed he’s sleeping with the enemy?” Max asks her.
“She’s not that bad,” Truth says, jumping up and fucking with his hair.
“So I can let Nina drag me to the janitor’s closet again?”
“No,” we all say at the same time, and he laughs.
Batter Up
Gabrielle
Standing in front of my mirror, wearing just a pair of underwear and a bra, I look over my body. Years ago, I did the same thing. Back then, I considered myself chubby and always wondered what the golden-skinned, hazel-eyed boy with the chest and abs when no one else our age had them, and the sparkling smile, saw in a girl like me. Now I’m hating my body for a whole different reason, but because of the same guy.
I turn to get a better look at my ass, a diet of less than a thousand calories a day certainly didn’t trump genetics. I still have a big ass.
Number two, though?
A few weeks ago, when Truth and I were walking down the hall, someone snapped a picture of our asses and posted them on The Sound app with a “This or That” type poll. She won. I won’t say it was underserving—she has a great ass—and besides that, she needed a win. I was a total bitch to her for several months.
Back in November, I lied to everyone and told them I was going to be with my family for the holiday, just like most everyone else was. I secretly hoped and not so secretly prayed that they’d somehow gotte
n word that I had to let the staff go, that things were not good, and they’d show up, or at very least come and take me with them.
I’d done the right thing by advancing the staff’s pay so they could get through the holidays, but it somehow left me short. Stress suppressed my appetite a great deal, but I was dating Harrison, who loved dining out, so I always had leftovers … until the one day a year everyone eats until they feel like they may burst, and I ran out. And when I say ran out, I mean an empty pantry. There was not even flour to make naan.
With everyone out of town, there wasn’t even a possibility of throwing a party to make some money, and honestly, I wouldn’t have been able to stock the bar, anyway. I was broke, penniless. Yes, I could sell any number of things in the house to make a few bucks, but I want everything to be the same when they come back.
I decided I had to get something, by any means possible, to quell the growl in my stomach, which would have killed my one constant companion, and possibly stop me from being dizzy or starving and dying in a big house where no one would find me. I know it’s stupid, and I’m certainly not proud of it, but I was hungry. So very hungry.
With very little gas in my car, I had to stay close to home, but I was smart enough to have parked far enough away so that no one would see my vehicle, and I wore a hoodie that one of the landscapers had left here over the summer. No one would have suspected it was me under that hood.
It was the perfect cover-up, and I found the perfect place to lift something to tide me over—a small convenient store, no cameras that I saw, and a girl checking out. I hid the food under the bulky, oversized material of the hoodie and was about to rush out the door undetected when some girl called after me, “Hey, Karen, he’s gotta ring it up for me. She must have forgot.”
I knew I was the only “Karen” in the store, so I walked up, she paid for my food, and then we walked out together. Scared that I would be recognized, and angry that she blew my cover, I snapped, “Rot in hell,” and ran off.
When a new girl, part of the family who’d started the day after break, a cousin to the girl Harrison had just dissed me for in front of my whole homeroom, complimented me on my shirt, we immediately recognized one another from the store. With no one else in the hall, I did what I had to do—I threatened her and shoved her against the lockers to drive the point home.
