Secret Bay High Issues (Secret Bay High - Book #5)

by Blair Young

  “I’m glad nothing bad happened,” the counselor said. “Nothing worse than what’s already happening, anyway.”

  After filling our more forms and signing my name on various documents, she let me leave, but I was still feeling like I was the one blamed for what happened. It made me mad to think that he was able to get away with such a crime against me, but it also made me mad knowing that I wasn’t the one to come forward.

  Damon wasn’t mentioned at all, and neither were Dean or Susan. I was the face of this crime, even if I was the one who had been a victim when it happened, and I was the one who hadn’t come forward about it. It wasn’t fair to me, that was for sure, but no one cared.

  Still, I tried to press on, keeping the drama at school there, and the drama at home, there. Though, it wasn’t long before I had reached my breaking point with Susan as well. Ever since the trip to the college campus, I had been keeping my distance from her as much as possible. I couldn’t say that I blamed her for not taking me, but at the same time, I was frustrated with the fact she always let Dean call the shots.

  Of course, I hadn’t planned on saying anything to her about it to her face, but when she came at me to make another appointment with a counselor, I couldn’t hold back any longer.

  It happened the Wednesday after Chad’s arrest. The news had spread not only through the school, but it was around town, too. Kids just didn’t do that sort of thing to each other, let alone cops arresting a student right out of school. There was no keeping it under wraps, and Susan didn’t take long in checking up on me over the whole thing.

  “How do you think I’m doing?” I asked when she addressed the situation. “The kids at school are all blaming me, the counselor basically said that I was mad about something and made up the whole thing, and everyone else is acting like this is my fault from the beginning.”

  “Why don’t you go back to your counselor?” she asked. “You were doing so well with her?”

  “The one who told me that I was adopted?” I shot back. “Yeah, she was really helpful. Asking me how it felt to be adopted when I didn’t even know that my dead parents weren’t even my real mom and dad in the first place!”

  “Sutton, I know you’ve been through a lot, and this latest drama didn’t help, but I really think you should consider going back to therapy,” Susan said.

  “Well we all know you’re going to get what you want. Or, should you ask Dean if it’s okay that I go?” I snapped.

  “Sutton!” Susan said in disbelief. “What are you talking about? Of course if you need to go see a therapist, you’re going to go!”

  “I mean you let Dean walk all over you! You let him rule the place like we’re all his slaves and he gets to call the shots about everything!” I snapped. Susan looked at me with wide eyes, and I knew she was hurt by my outburst, but I didn’t care. I was angry, frustrated, and ready for a change.

  I was so tired of the way she let him treat the rest of the house, and I knew it hadn’t always been this way. Damon had told me directly that Dean wasn’t always like this, and I didn’t enjoy it. I hated that he was in the house in the first place, and I hated that Susan was just turning a blind eye to so much. I felt it was her job to take care of us, first, but she chose Dean above all else.

  “It really hurt my feelings that I nearly had to miss out on that college campus trip because Dean got mad that he wasn’t invited!” I said. “You are my mom, so why does he get to make any of those choices? Thank God Damon was able to take me, or I would have missed out entirely!”

  “Sutton, you know I’m doing my best. But there are some things in life that just aren’t so easy,” she said. “I know it feels like it was the wrong thing to do to turn in Chad, but that was really the only option. You were a victim, it wasn’t your fault, and I didn’t want him to get away with it.”

  “Well, thanks to you and Dean, I’m now the talk of the school again, and who knows if this is going to affect if I can get into Harvard,” I said. “It better not, or I’m never going to speak with you again!”

  The words hung in the air, and immediately, I felt bad about saying them. I knew Susan meant well with most of the things that she did, and it did make sense for her to want me to get justice for what had happened. It wasn’t her fault that the kids at school took Chad’s side.

  It wasn’t my fault that any of it happened. And, it had to be hard for her to try to balance the life she wanted with the life she had. She was my mother, after all, and though she never had told me why she had given me up for adoption, I couldn’t imagine it was an easy choice.

  Then to add to that the fact that Damon argued with her about most things in life, and Dean was far from easy to get along with, I knew Susan had a lot to deal with in her own life.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, almost as quickly as my initial outburst. “I didn’t mean that. Really. I’m sorry.”

  Susan nodded. I knew she wasn’t going to hold it against me, but the words were out there, and there wasn’t any taking them back now. I had said them, and no matter what I said or did now, she knew that’s what I thought, at least in that moment anyway.

  “I’m going to make you an appointment with the counselor,” she said. “I think that would be the best thing for you right now. You don’t have to make it regular, but you should at least talk about what happened with Chad, and what you’re dealing with now. I’m not sure I can handle it, and I want you to get the help that you need.”

  I didn’t argue, but I didn’t agree, either. I felt bad for snapping at her, but at the same time, I didn’t want to go to the counselor. Still, I knew it didn’t matter what I had to say about it. I didn’t want to go the first time, and she still made me go.

  No matter what I had to say about this time, I knew it would be much the same. I would go, I would say what the counselor wanted me to say, and I would move on with my life. It was only a few more months and I would be able to move away from this town and away from all these people.

  I could stick it out until then. I still had Damon, and for the moment, I still had Abby. They couldn’t make all this better, but they could really help, and they were both doing their best.

  I’d push through the appointments, and I would start filling out applications to get out of there as soon as I could. Harvard was still in my sight, and I wanted to go more than anything. It would happen, I didn’t care what I had to do to make it a reality, but it would happen.

  Nothing would stand in my way.

  Chapter 22

  Sutton

  “Aren’t you going to class today?” Susan asked when I came downstairs still in my pajamas. I’d spent most of the evening before in my room after she and I had gotten into that argument, and I was surprise at her gentle tone.

  I shook my head. “I don’t feel like dealing with any of them,” I said. “It’s always the same. I’m doing well enough in all my classes I can afford to take the day off, and I think I really need it.”

  I hadn’t noticed Dean sitting in the living room, and when I turned, I expected him to get on my case about not going in. But, to my surprise, he said nothing. He was watching the news, a cup of coffee in his hand. Damon was getting ready for school in his room, and Susan was making breakfast.

  “Alright,” she said. “I’m sure you could use a break after everything. Are you caught up on your homework?”

  I nodded, and she continued. “Maybe Damon can take it in and drop it off for you, then you won’t be behind at all.”

  I shrugged. I knew Damon wouldn’t mind. I had done the same for him during his suspension, and he had managed to do a pretty good job of keeping up with the class. I went upstairs to get the papers, and I gave them to Damon when he came out of his room.

  “Aren’t you coming?” he asked in surprise. I shook my head.

  “I’m going to take the day off,” I said. “I could use it after the way the week has gone.”

  Damon kissed me on the forehead. “Take it easy today. I’m sure this is all
going to blow over soon enough, and things are going to go back to normal.”

  “Promise?” I asked.

  “Promise. Besides. Graduation is coming, then we’re going to settle into a whole new kind of normal. College is on the horizon, and our new life in Massachusetts,” he said with a grin. I smiled. Though I was feeling sad and overwhelmed about what my life had become, Damon did know what to say to make it better.

  And the thought of this being over soon, and both of us having the chance to move away and start a new life felt good. I was eager to make that change. Eager to get out of the slump I’d been in since the sixth grade.

  Sure, it wasn’t all bad, but today I felt like I was back to being that girl who was suicidal and couldn’t pull herself together enough to go to school. It was frustrating to say the least, but I had to accept it. I had learned through the time I spent in counseling that I had to accept things about myself and work through them.

  There really wasn’t another choice.

  With a sigh, I headed back into my room. Damon had my homework and he was taking it to school, Susan and Dean could do whatever it was they were doing downstairs. I didn’t feel like hanging out with either one of them. It was bound to turn into a fight anyway, especially with Dean around.

  I didn’t care if he hadn’t said anything to me about not going to school. It was getting harder and harder to be around him without it turning into an argument of some kind, and after the discussion I’d had with Susan the day before, I really didn’t want to get involved with him.

  I secretly counted when I could be out of the house right down to the day. I was so eager not to have anything else to do with him. Sure, I was sorry that I didn’t have a better relationship with Susan considering the fact she was my biological mother, but there were some things I just had to accept in life and move on.

  Susan had made her choice when she gave me up for adoption, and now she had to live with that choice years later. It wasn’t my fault she wanted to give me up, and it wasn’t my fault that my adopted parents were murdered. It wasn’t my fault that Chad was being scrutinized over what he had done to me, and it wasn’t my fault I had been bullied for most of my life.

  Now, I was going to pull back from the rest of the world and just get through the next few months. I would move on, and things would get better. They had to. After all I had been through the past few years, there was one thing that stayed on the forefront of my mind.

  They couldn’t keep getting worse.

  “Who would be calling at this hour?” Dean said, letting his frustration show. He hated it when someone called the house when we were eating dinner, and I often wondered why they had a landline at all.

  In the world of cell phones, it seemed to make far more sense to me to just have our own personal phones, but, they didn’t. Instead, the landline would continue to ring at the most inconvenient times.

  Dean didn’t answer at first, but when the phone rang again almost immediately after, he rose from the table and headed out to the living room to give whoever dared to call him during dinner a piece of his mind. I was glad I wasn’t the person on the other end of the line, but at the same time, I knew it was going to put him in a foul mood for the rest of our meal, too.

  Not that he had been the most pleasant person to be around anyway. There had been an awkward silence for most of the dinner, Damon and Dean being the only two really talking, as usual. But these days, it was mostly Dean.

  I could sense something had changed between the two of them as well, and I wondered what it was. Dean had become someone we didn’t really talk about. I was frustrated with the way Damon always saw the best in him, and I didn’t like hearing him defend what Dean was doing. But, something had clearly changed, there was no denying that.

  Part of me wanted to ask him about it, but I knew it would be better to wait until more of this other drama had blown over. When we were out of the house and living on our own, it would be a lot easier to talk about some of the things that had gone on living with Susan.

  No one spoke at the table, and it was hard to hear what Dean was saying on the phone in the other room. The conversation lasted longer than I thought it would, and Dean did sound frustrated when he did reply. But then, he always sounded angry or frustrated. Gone were the days when he was happy and carefree, just trying to be a good dad to the foster kids in the home.

  Now, we all expected him to be in a bad mood more times than not, and when he returned to the table, it was clear he wasn’t happy with the situation.

  “Who was that?” Susan asked innocently enough. Dean shot her a look before shaking his head and dropping back into his chair.

  “It was the cops,” he said. “They aren’t going to file any official charges against Chad. There’s not enough evidence to support the claim that he did anything, and they’re treating it as just a report.”

  “What!” Damon said. “I gave them plenty of evidence about what happened! What do they mean there’s no evidence?”

  “Chad is obviously going to tell them a different story than what you said, and he’s telling them that nothing happened, but that Sutton was more than willing to participate in anything. Since neither of you came forward sooner, and since there’s no more physical evidence of the fight you allegedly had with him as a result, they have nothing to go on. Sutton’s not even going in there to give her own statement, so there’s really not a lot they can do.”

  “I thought they could reach back and get all kinds of evidence about what happened. There are women who come up against celebrities and manage to get their cases handled years after the fact, this was just a few months ago,” Susan remarked. “How can they say that there’s not enough for them to go on? This is a really serious crime!”

  “That’s why I say they should have handled it sooner,” Dean gestured to both me and Damon with his fork. “They knew about it when it happened, and if they had come forward the day after, we might have had a chance with prosecuting this guy and getting him locked up like he should be. Thanks to these two, we’re going to have a predator walking free on the streets.”

  “It’s not their fault,” Susan said. “They’re kids, and they handled it the best way they could think of.”

  “I can’t believe you are defending them! This guy could have raped Sutton, and you’re going to tell me that it’s good how they handled it! If they had come forward when it happened, we could get this guy locked up!” Dean said. He was clenching his fork, and I could tell he was getting angrier by the second.

  But, even with how mad he was that Chad was going to get off so easy, I didn’t get the impression he really cared about me. He seemed to be more upset that Chad wasn’t getting in trouble because of the point rather than the fact I wasn’t going to get the justice that I deserved from everything.

  And, to think that it was my fault that he got off so easily was also a slap in the face. I didn’t want to go through with this in the first place. Shoot, I didn’t want to even go on the date with him in the first place. I had gone because I thought it would help me make friends at the school. I wanted to fit in, I wanted them to be happy.

  But instead, it was just one more thing in my life I now realized was a mistake. I shouldn’t have gone on that date, and I should have come forward sooner. I shouldn’t have put up with so much of the crap that I had gone through in life, but I did, and now, I wasn’t sure how to handle any of it.

  “May I be excused?” I said as I grabbed my plate. “I’ve lost my appetite.”

  “Sutton!” Susan rose from her chair but Dean shook his head.

  “Let her go, she needs to realize that she made a mistake here,” he said.

  “It’s not her fault!” Damon nearly shouted.

  “I’m so sorry,” Susan grabbed my shoulders and pulled me close for a hug. “I’m so sorry that this happened.”

  She hugged me tight, and I could vaguely hear Damon and Dean arguing in the background, but the ringing in my ears was drowning out mos
t of what I heard, and I could hardly think straight. I didn’t know what to make of any of this, and the thought of Chad not getting in trouble for what he did only made things worse.

  What was he going to do now? Was he going to try to get revenge on me? He clearly thought that I was the one who had turned him in, and with so many of the students already on the fence about what they thought might have happened, I knew he was going to immediately be the victim in the situation.

  Shoot, the school was bound to take the stance that I had made up the entire thing because I was mad at him for some reason. I knew it was unlikely for anyone to believe what really happened.

  But, with Susan hanging onto me and Dean arguing with Damon, it was hard for me to wrap my mind about anything that was going on. All I could think about was how much this felt like a nightmare I could never wake up from. It was just my life, and no matter how hard I tried, I was going to be stuck in some sort of drama.

  Forever the one who was picked on, forever the one who was made fun of. Forever the one who was going to be blamed for anything that went wrong in life. I wondered if it was even possible for me to work through this. Was it even possible for me to make it to Harvard? Were they going to be like everyone else in the world and just shove me to the side?

  I didn’t know what to think, I didn’t know what to feel. But then, another thought popped into my mind and struck me harder than anything I’d thought in a long time.

  None of this made me feel anything. Not Susan, not Dean, not Damon, not even the kids at school. Nothing about this situation got any sort of reaction out of me.

  Nothing.

  I just felt numb.

  Chapter 23

  Sutton

  “Isn’t there some way we can make sure he leaves me alone?” I asked. “I thought the police were going to handle this, but he’s back.”