Fragments

3.7

            3.7

            It turns out that having a fairly good-looking boy carry you into your dorm late at night causes a lot of gossip. It causes even more when you direct him to your room because he refuses to put you down and you're lazy, and even more than that when he comes back into the hall and leaves two minutes later.

            The first person who has the guts to say anything to me the next day is a girl in my first class. She matches my pace, hugging her books tightly to her chest and smiles a plastic smile.

            "Uh, hi?" I don't know her name.

            "Did you have sex with that guy last night?"

            I blink. "Excuse me?"

            "You know, the hot one who carried you in."

            "No," I snap, walking a little faster. The girl does the same.

            "No you don't know who I'm talking about, or no you didn't have sex? I mean, some people think you did because he was in your room and all, but he was barely there long enough for you guys to take your clothes off. Unless you like to keep them on." She winks like we're friends and I brush past her, into the classroom.

            "No," I repeat sternly, "I didn't have sex with him." She tries to open her mouth and I meet her with a dark gaze. "Now leave me alone."

            I sit at my desk and try to pretend people aren't talking about me, staring at me, but I know they're there, I can hear their whispers. I lower my head until my forehead touches the desk and close my eyes to focus on my breathing. In, out, in out, in out.

            But then everything comes crashing into me.

            It's like I'm suffocating, remembering the looks, the whispers, the downright stares after what happened with Trevor. And now everything is catching up to me for something completely unrelated.

            "Class, time to get started," the teacher says, but her voice is so far away I can barely hear her. When the chatter is replaced with white noise I wonder if she's saying my name, if that's her and not in my mind.

            Something touches my arm but my head feels too heavy to lift, like it could kill me to move.

            "Piper." The voice again, so close yet so far away.

            I close my eyes and try to block it out.

            Trevor. Trevor. Trevor. Trevor. Trevor.

            "Piper!" the teacher yells.

            And then I'm screaming.