As soon as the bell rang for dinner a throng of students squeezed out of the reading hall heading towards the dining. I sat back to wait for the crowd to thin out and told Charlie to go ahead without me because I really wasn’t in the mood to rush for dinner of fish stew and potatoes. Besides I needed to finish my assignments and the new report Annabel assigned to me. As much as I hated her weird attention and her need for entertainment at my expense, I was happy to do the reports because doing them was getting me ahead of the session’s syllabus which means good grades and good grades would make mom and grandma happy. I was on the last line of my report when I looked up to see that the hall was empty. It was just me in the entire hall, everyone else had gone for dinner. I quickly finished my report and assignments, packed my books and pen in my bag, and stood up. The walk to the dining was eerie especially since the only sounds were my footsteps and the noise of insects. Usually, the w
“ Can Jessica Underwood report to the principal’s office please?” The voice came in through the 2 speakers in the wall of the class. I started and looked at Charlie to make sure I heard well. She had a look on her face that left a bad taste in my mouth. The principal’s office was never good news for me back at Lake George. Why was I being called? Charlie shrugged as though she heard the question in my head. Was it another period prank by Heather and her side chicks? That was unlikely. Another possibility came to mind: the battle of pranks had begun and I was in trouble for a crime I did not commit. I heard Dahlia snicker as she tossed a glance Lola’s way. “She looks stupid with her eyes wide like that,” Lola said. I don’t know much about her except for the fact that she was Heather’s friend, bossed around by Heather and maybe Jordan or Tyler’s girlfriend hard to tell when every one of them is kissing up on each other. Heather laughed. “Relax Underwood, the battle isn’t on… yet. Go o
“I swear if you scream one more fucking time I’m going to not only lose my mind but plant my fist in your jaw!” I could tell Charlie was angry but I could barely keep from venting my frustration. Since I stormed out of the empty chemistry lab where Mark had dropped the bombshell on me earlier that day I had been in a foul mood. Charlie was surprised at my reaction to the news when I told her about it, she said she had expected a better reaction from me since I was supposedly a bad bitch or something and to be fair I was surprised at my reaction too. But it hurts so much. It hurts so much because I always prided myself on being the taker, not the giver, the heartbreaker not the broken, it hurts even worse because before Mark I never opened myself to another guy. He was hot, cool, a great catch, a bad boy – my kind of boy but he betrayed me. If my guesses were correct he was cheating on me with his bitch before I left Lake George, that’s the only way she could end up pregnant just weeks
You know there are times in your life when you can just guess that some days aren’t the best days for you? Like you just wake up and know “Today is going to be fucked!” Yeah, I felt that way this morning. As soon as I woke up I got this feeling that something was wrong and no it wasn’t because Charlie was spending forever in the bathroom or because she was singing off-key at the top of her voice or that my skirt was slightly rumpled or that on the way to breakfast at the dining I almost tripped and fell or that Helen was at the far end of the dining stuffing her face with toast and butter and hot chocolate or that Annabel Reed said my chemistry write up was pretty impressive. No, it was none of those! Something was up and I could tell deep in my bones there it wasn’t something good. Whatever it was was making the hair at the back of my neck rise. It’s that feeling you get when someone is about to jump out in the shadows and stab with a knife, or when you feel you are about to walk int
I honestly don’t know who pulled who but soon Charlie and I were marching down the halls to Senior Class 1 to find this Jake of a guy. I couldn’t care less were or not people were watching us or if they were giving those sympathetic looks anymore, all I cared about was restoring my reputation which someone seemed bent on destroying. Charlie pointed out the SC 1 and yanked me inside. The class was shaped and arranged like ours but it was almost empty as most of the students were outside for the break, the rest of the students who remained in the class were the novel readers and the introverts who would much rather sleep, pretend to sleep to avoid conversation or stare out the window. “There he is,” Charlie said. She pointed to a tall lanky boy with a thick mass of brown curls that stood were very much scattered from way too much pulling. Even as we approached him he was pulling at a lock as he doodled something on the pad before him. Charlie and I walked up to him and she slammed her
“You slimy snake!” I bet Heather didn’t see the slap as my hand made contact with her face. The blow was resounding and silence that reigned after it was louder than the noise itself. For a moment Heather simply held her cheek and stared but not for long. She raised her hand to hit me but as she brought her hand down Christian held her hand and yanked it down with such force that she squeaked but my victory was short-lived as Dahlia and Lola both pounced on me. Suddenly all I could see was fists, hair was flying all over the place, buttons popped and in the midst of it all, I could feel Charlie holding me back as I tried to get a hold of Tyler’s smug face. “Enough of this!” The tone was commanding and authoritative and I was soon to find out that the voice belonged to our Principal Mr. Jorge. Great. Just great. I’m sure Mom would love this. “Jessica, Heather, Christian, Tyler, Jordan, Charlie, Lola, and Dahlia to my office now!” And so we found ourselves doing the walk of shame
“Mr. Jorge is such a ninny.” It was Zoe who spoke. She was sitting on Charlie’s bed with her legs crossed, and a historical romance book was resting in the middle of her crossed legs. Charlie was on her chair eating some cookies she snagged from the shop that opened on the school premises during school hours. “Not much of a ninny as a pussy,” she said between bites of chocolate chip cookies. “I bet the reason he didn’t punish Tyler and Heather was that he feared Tyler would run off to tell his father like the little bitch he is and then Mr. Maximilian Edwin would fire Mr. Jorge and makes sure he never finds any job anywhere again. I can’t say I blame him, I won’t want to be in his position.” “And you’re forgetting the fact that Jess’s father controls Mr. Edwin’s branch here,” Zoe said with a half-smile. Charlie winked at me. “Feels good to be friends with you Jess, I can always blame you whenever I find myself in deep shit knowing that Mr. Jorge won’t be able to do anything without
As soon as Helen and I stepped into the Hall, fashionably late, of course, silence reigned in the hall. Every class from junior class one to Senior class 3 had their eyes in our direction. I live for this, I live to be the center of positive attention but it wasn’t me they were looking at, it was Helen. Helen faltered and I had to hold her elbow to support her as we walked past rows and rows of seats to the table Charlie and Zoe kept for us. Soon people started whispering. “That’s Helen?” “Helen? The Helen?” Even Heather and her group of cronies couldn’t help but glance in our direction. I guess you could say she was blown away by what a simple A-line skirt could do for Helen’s figure because her mouth hung open more than that of a fish thrown out of water. Helen's full hips completely filled out every inch of the short dark brown skirt and contrary to what she thought she had really sexy legs that made even me jealous. Just as I was enjoying my victory some idiot from my right sid