Pretty in Black (Pretty in Black #1) A Vampire Romance Series

Afternoon Psychology

"Ellie, you're going to have to stop cutting yourself. And skipping class. You're a senior now." I pulled my sleeves down over my wrists and clutched the excess fabric in my fists.

"You're beginning to exhibit delinquent behavior. Your grades are falling behind. You used to be a good student. Why don't you make some friends, join a school club, attend a school dance?" The school psychologist gazed at me like I owed her an answer.

"Because I don't care about any of that." I stared at my shoes.

"Ellie, I understand what you've been through with your sister's death and all, but you've got to live your life. You're about to graduate soon and you haven't even applied to any colleges. Do you have any in mind?"

I shook my head.

She couldn't possibly understand my life at this point. I went from living in a fairly middle class home to living in a trailer park.

She exhaled a breath of air. "You quit cheerleading, Ellie. Just last year you were at Nationals."

"Yeah." I didn't feel like myself anymore. The girl who used to be a cheerleader, I no longer knew who she was. The new me dressed different, spoke different, had different interests than the old me.

"You have a close friend?"

"Yeah. I do. Two of them actually."

"Well, that's good."

"Yeah, um, their names are Freud and Poe and we spend quality time together dissecting the hidden and deranged nature of the human mind. Yeah, I mean, it's even kind of inspiring me to be a shrink, especially with all the talks you and I have. It's so easy. You just ask a bunch of redundant questions that make people feel uncomfortable while simultaneously wasting their time."

"Oh, so you have something better to do than be here today, discussing your problems?" She clicked her pen. Here we go again, she's adding some psychobabble to my stack my file. She crossed her right leg over her left one and smoothed her skirt.

"Yeah, actually I do. I'm just not going to share it with you."

"Okay. But no one can help you if you don't reach out." She stayed so calm the entire time, with that condescending smirk on her face, while I was growing more infuriated by the second.

"Excuse me, but who said I needed anyone's damn help?" I leapt out of my seat. "Quit trying to pry into the inner workings of my mind. School? This isn't school. This is like an institution that is teaching me to unlearn the lies I've been fed."

She didn't flinch or even blink. "Sit down, Eleanor." And I plopped back down into my seat.

"Do I need to have a conference with your parents?"

"Parent. Singular. And she wouldn't come."

The look on my face must've told the psychologist that this was the truth. My mother didn't care about anything I did.

She didn't press the subject. She twisted her pen and scribbled some more notes in my file.

"You date Declan? How is he?"

I laughed a little. She didn't know she'd made an innuendo by the way she asked that last question. If I were to answer the question the way she'd asked it, the answer would be The experience is awful. But I just said, "Don't wanna talk about it."

"Your home life?"

Hmm. Let's recap. A mother that doesn't care. A father who left after Darcy's death. "Don't wanna talk about it."

She pulled something from my file. "Here's a photo." She held it between her fake fingernails and dangled it in my face. "Look at it. It's a picture of you and Madison at the beginning of last year. You're happy in this picture. You're in your cheering uniform. What happened to this girl, Ellie?"

"She woke up one day and realized that everything is bullshit."

I rose out of my seat, grabbed my bag and left. My footsteps squeaked on the polished floor. Empty hallway. School day officially over. Suddenly-giggling, jumping girls. Cheerleaders racing to practice for the big game tomorrow night, and I used to be one of them. Sigh. Pom-poms dancing, they headed toward me. Madison Terry, smile in her eye.

"Ellie, we really need our main girl back on the team. It's not too late to join us again, you know."

Inhale. Exhale. "Madison, I can't. After everything that has-"

Ashley interrupted me to tell Madison, "Her sister? Remember?"

"Oh my God. I'm so sorry. I can't imagine what you must be going through."

Yeah. She really must not know, considering the fact that when my sister died this past summer, not only did she not send condolences or come to the funeral, she went MIA, and I quit going to cheerleading practice. I mean, I know she has a life and everything, but damn. She could've at least checked on me, which she didn't.

"I'm just afraid I'm losing my BFF."

She really tosses that term around lightly. What true friend doesn't support her BFF during an extreme loss? She didn't come around the entire time I was mourning. "You're changing, Ellie. You don't even look the same."

Yeah, death does that to people, Madison.

"You dress...dark. You act depressed. I don't wanna lose a friend."

I'm sure you'd miss me Madison with the other fifteen girls you have swimming around you all the time. Remember, you ditched me this summer.

"Have they found your sister's murderer?" Ashley gazed at me.

"No." The silence was uncomfortable.

Madison cut in. "Okay. Let me know if you change your mind. There's always a spot for you on this squad, girl. We need our head flyer back." She gave me that smile, and with that, the team disappeared.

A deep part of me really missed my old life and I longed to return to the way things used to be. But it wasn't that simple. Things were never going to be exactly the same again.

I pushed open the glass doors and darted down the steps. The afternoon sky was overcast and a mild wind blew through my hair as I walked down past the basketball court, which was vacant. And there was a ball. I abandoned my bag on the bleachers and dribbled the ball around and then shot it into the basket. It swished through the hoop and bounced back down onto the pavement.

"Score!" I turned around to grab my bag and leave when I heard dribbling. Someone else was here. I swung around to see Marcus Marble.

I raised my eyebrows. "Since when do you play basketball?"

"I do a lot of things."

"Oh yeah? Is stalking on that list?"

"What are you talking about?" He smirked and dribbled in my direction, teasingly.

"Give me that ball!" I said and guarded him, trying to obtain it.

"Nope. Sorry." He side stepped me and tossed it toward the hoop.

"Ouch. A total miss." When it bounced back down, I stole it and made a perfect basket.

"You're kind of good. Do you play?"

"On a school team? Nope." I retrieved the ball and passed it to him. "Did you come looking for me?"

He dribbled back and forth between left and right hands. "Now tell me, why would I do that?"

"So I could beat your ass in afternoon basketball."

He took another shot. "Score," he said.

"What?! That wasn't a score. That was a total miss." But then he pulled me into him, wrapped his arms around my waist, and kissed me.

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