Okay, super quick upload! Trust me, this won't happen that often because I'm usually really busy but I had the time so I wrote it. Thanks to everyone who gave me encouragement to keep writing and I promise I will so don't panic!! lol. I'm dedicating this chapter to soocool who is just soocool :)
Thanks!
Chapter 8
Flynn’s POV
“What happened to her, Flynn?”
I pulled my eyes away from where Corinna had disappeared into the house to look at Jesse. His blue eyes were filled with pain and worry as he focused on the same spot I’d been looking moments before. “No one’s ever looked at me like that before.” He turned his head and his bleak eyes connected with mine. “There was nothing there, Flynn. Her eyes were completely flat, totally cold.” He shook his head, shock and concern written over his features.
“Give me your phone,” I said, a thought suddenly occurring to me. Automatically, Jesse held the device out to me, his attention focused inward as I flipped through the call history and dialled the number of the most recent call. It rang a couple times before an automated voice told me that it was a pay phone that could not accept incoming calls. “Fuck!” I shouted, anger boiling up inside of me like I’d never felt before. I wanted to punch something, preferably the person who’d put that look on Corinna’s face, causing all the blood to drain from her cheeks and the happiness that had been tentatively making its way into her eyes to vanish.
“What do I do?” Jesse said quietly, running a hand through his hair. “How am I supposed to help her when I don’t even know what’s wrong.”
I just shook my head, unable to speak past the anger choking me. Somehow, I knew that phone call and those marks on her wrist were connected and if I ever found out who was responsible, they wouldn’t like the result.
“What are you guys doing out there?” Donald asked, poking his head out the front door and giving us a confused look.
“Nothing,” Jesse mumbled, taking a jerky step towards the house.
“Flynn, are you coming in? Corinna’s sick so I’m not sure if she’ll be up for tutoring tonight,” Donald said, stepping aside as Jesse walked in.
I frowned, walking into the house behind Jesse. “She’s really sick?”
“We were sceptical at first too but she really doesn’t look so good right now,” Donald said, heading towards the stairs that took him downstairs to where the living room they actually used was.
“She swore at me again,” I heard Sandra’s voice say from downstairs. “I don’t know how much longer I can take this, Donald. We both know she’s only going to get worse.”
“She’s sick, Sandra,” Donald said, disappearing from view but his deep voice carried up to me, making my clenched fists loosen slightly. “Let’s just give her a break, okay?”
“How many breaks are we going to give her?” Sandra said just before the volume of the TV was turned up and the sounds of American Idol blocked out the sound of their voices.
A new anger joined the old one as I stared down the stairs after the people who were pretty much my second parents and had been ever since I was a little kid. They’d been the ones who were there for me when I needed them because my own family was less than reliable. When my mother had left a couple years ago, I’d practically moved in with Sandra and Donald to avoid my father as his drinking became worse and worse and not once had they treated me with the same indifference that they treat Corinna with.
“I’m going to go check on her,” Jesse said, stepping out of his shoes and heading towards the stairs that lead to the upper floor but he stopped when he saw Corinna heading down towards us, her lips curved into her usual smirk and her eyebrows raised at Jesse in question.
“You were coming to check on me?” she asked, her tone light as she stopped on the step just above the landing and reached her hand out to pat him on the cheek. “That’s so cute,” she said, giving him a little pinch as he stood there with his eyes wide and shocked.
“Cory, are you okay? What was that phone call all about? Who was that guy?”
“A creditor,” she said more softly, her eyes flashing with an emotion that didn’t last long enough for me to read. “A very persistent one apparently but don’t worry, it was all a misunderstanding. He won’t call you again.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about, Cory,” Jesse said as she brushed past him and headed towards me.
“Ready to study?” she asked, smirking up at me. “You can’t back out, you promised.”
“Tell me the truth.”
“You need a haircut.”
I made a sound in the back of my throat that I could only describe as a growl of frustration and lashed my hand out, gripping her arm hard and yanking her a step closer to me. “Tell me the truth,” I repeated, my voice low and vibrating with barely restrained anger.
“I just did,” she replied, her eyes flashing with anger and if I wasn’t mistaken, panic before settling into their usual cool mask.
“You know what I’m talking about.”
“Are you going to help me with my homework or not?” she asked, her voice flat and emotionless as she stared up at me coldly.
“Let go of her arm,” Jesse said, making me realize that he was standing right beside me, his eyes focused on where my hand was still gripping his sister.
I blinked, realizing how hard my grip had been. “Sorry,” I mumbled, immediately loosening my hold.
“Whatever,” she said, shrugging and turning on her heel. “Are you going to help me or not?” she asked, heading into the dining room, leaving the two of us standing in the foyer.
“You’re taking this a little personally, aren’t you Flynn?” Jesse asked and when my eyes met his, there was a knowing gleam in their blue depths.
“She’s like a sister to me,” I said, ignoring the nervous jump in my gut.
He quirked an eyebrow and the move reminded me of Cory only Jesse’s eyes lacked the coldness that hers were so filled with. “Are you sure that’s it?”
“Yes, of course,” I responded smoothly, looking him right in the eye as I lied. No good could come out of telling him that I was in love with his sister especially because it didn’t seem like Cory would be feeling the same way any time soon. “I’ve known her for as long as I can remember, Jesse. It’s perfectly normal for me to be worried about her.”
He let out a breath and took a step back, giving me a sheepish look as he ran a hand through his short, light brown hair. “You’re right. I’m sorry, man, it’s just that, with everything that just happened, I really don’t need something else to worry about. Plus, I think my friend Aaron likes her.”
“Oh yeah?” I said mildly, feeling my eye lid twitch lightly and my hands clench at my sides. “What makes you say that?” I asked, impressed that my voice came out relatively normal as thoughts of strangling that irritating Aaron guy were floating across my mind.
Jesse shrugged and moved towards the staircase. “He told me. I just wasn’t sure if he liked her for who he thinks she is or for who she actually is.”
I ground my teeth together as Jesse moved up the stairs and out of sight, remembering the scene I’d walked in on when we’d gone to pick Corinna up earlier. When I’d gone into the store, I was in a good mood from spending the day with Cory and Jesse, just having fun but then I’d watched as Aaron had wrapped his arms around her and planted a kiss on her cheek that made my vision go red.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, relaxing my shoulders and releasing some of my anger, trying to tell myself that Aaron really wasn’t a bad guy. If Cory was going to date someone, then Aaron wouldn’t be such a bad pick.
“Yeah right,” I muttered, perfectly aware that I would never be okay with anyone she chose to date unless it was me.
I walked into the kitchen and Cory looked up from her notebook to give me an emotionless stare. “Took you long enough,” she said, smirking at me. “I thought you were going to run away.” She jerked her head to the stack of books in front of her and grimaced slightly. “I’m kind of desperate here.”
“I’m not going to run away,” I said, my voice coming out a little hoarse, making her eyes jerk up to mine, something flashing in her gaze before it became unreadable again.
“Good,” she said softly, her voice less sarcastic than usual as she turned her head to face the notebook in front of her again, her long blonde hair falling over her shoulder, a few strands of it, covering her eye until she impatiently brushed it aside. “I think I’m okay with calculus now but chemistry and physics are like a different language and Spanish really is a different language, one that we didn’t have at my old school so I’m getting further behind every day. The only subject I’m slightly good at is English Lit.” She looked up at me again, raising an eyebrow and quirking her lips in their standard smirk. “Aren’t you going to sit down?” When I didn’t move, her smirk slipped a little and her lips thinned as she glared at me. “You promised you’d help.”
“I’m not backing out,” I said, scowling down at her as I took my seat. “I’m just wondering if maybe you should take the night off from studying after that phone ca─”
“Forget it,” she said firmly, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest. “It was nothing.”
Her eyes met mine squarely, obviously trying to convey her sincerity but I could tell that she wasn’t being entirely honest with me. The left side of her mouth didn’t quirk but there was something in her brown eyes that was telling me I’d be a fool to believe her. “It didn’t seem like nothing.”
“Just drop it.”
“If you need help with anything─”
“Yeah, I do need help with something,” she said, waving her hand over her homework and quirking an eyebrow at me. “So do you think maybe we can get to it or should I just ask Jesse?”
I gritted my teeth as I glared at her, wishing that she trusted me enough to tell me her secrets, to ask for my help for something more than calculus. “Okay,” I said finally, letting out a breath and dropping my gaze to the pages in front of us. “What is this?”
“Acetic Acid.”
“No it isn’t.”
“Really?” She bent her head down, her hair brushing over my hand that was resting on the page making my heart beat a little faster. “I thought I got that one right,” she muttered, her forehead wrinkling in a little frown that looked really cute on her.
I blinked and shook my head slightly thinking that I really needed to get over this obsession of mine because it was starting to get out of hand.
Corinna’s POV
“You don’t want to do this,” I said flatly, my eyes looking straight into Tara Bryon’s, one of the bitches who’d been there the night that Rachel had called me out for the express purpose of kicking my ass. I eyed the girl up and down as she and her two friends pinned me against the bathroom wall, noticing that she was almost as tall as me and her long black hair was sleek and perfectly straight. Her eyes were a strange shade of purple that was obviously fake and her features were covered in a thick layer of make-up. She looked kind of like a stripper to me but I guess guys thought that was attractive. Someone should tell her she could be getting money if she wore her skirts just a little bit shorter and did a dance between classes.
“Oh, I so want to do this,” she said, her perfectly painted lips curling into an evil smile.
I let out a sigh and watched calmly as she lifted a large strand of my long blonde hair and brought the scissors closer to it. “Listen, can we hurry it along because I’m going to be late for English Lit.”
Her smile faltered for a second as she looked at me in confusion before shifting her gaze to her much shorter friend who was holding my left arm while another girl of medium height held my right. “Maybe she’s too stupid to understand,” the short one said, glaring up at me with her pretty blue eyes. “We’re going to cut your hair off, bitch.”
I rolled my eyes in frustration. “Yeah, I got that but you’re also making me late so if you’re going to do it, then just do it and get it over with.”
“Just do it, Tara,” the third girl said, her curly brown hair cut to her chin in a cute style that suited her angular features and wide brown eyes. She looked like she was part Latina but I couldn’t be sure.
“Okay,” Tara said, bringing the scissors towards my hair as I watched dispassionately.
“Wait,” the fourth girl in the room said, making my heart stop at the coldness there. “She doesn’t even care about her hair, girls. I think we need to do something more drastic,” Rachel said, approaching from where she’d been standing at the door, her dark blue eyes glued to mine dispassionately. Her lips quirked into a small smile as she tapped her finger on her chin. “Why didn’t you come to meet me on Friday?” she asked, her voice mild as if she were asking me to pass the milk but her eyes flashed with anger.
“I was busy.”
“Doing what?”
“Studying,” I said, smirking at her.
Her eyes lit with fire as she closed the distance between us and shoved Tara out of her way. “Don’t lie to me. Everyone saw you at that party, surrounded by guys and drinking. You just didn’t care enough to come see me.”
“You’re right,” I said coldly, seeing a flash of genuine hurt in her eyes as she pulled away from me and shifted her gaze to look at the linoleum floor.
“Just leave our boyfriends alone, got it?” Tara said, moving back into place.
I looked down at her and tilted my head to the side. “What makes you think I’m after your boyfriend?”
“Oh come on, we know your reputation. You only like guys who already have girlfriends and our boyfriends happen to be some of the hottest guys in this school. If you’re going to go after anyone, it’ll be them,” the shortest one said, her high pitched voice making me wish for ear plugs.
I didn’t turn to look at the girl who spoke because I didn’t want to encourage her to speak again so I looked at Tara when I said, “You’re an idiot.”
Her purple eyes narrowed and her lips twisted. “Rachel, what should we do?”
“What we had planned on Friday night,” Rachel replied flatly and when I shifted my gaze to her, her eyes were as flat as mine.
“I thought we were going to have a heart to heart over a cup of cocoa,” I said, quirking my eyebrow. “I only skipped because I’m trying to cut back on my late night calories. You should have told me if you were planning to beat the shit out of me, maybe I would’ve come.”
“Shut up, Cory,” Rachel said, her voice cold. “This is your last warning. If I find you anywhere near someone’s boyfriend, I don’t care whose, I will make your life a living hell. Believe me when I say that the few bruises from today will be nothing compared to what I’ll do to you in the future.”
“When did you become a gangster?” I asked, trying to ignore the pain stabbing repeatedly at my heart and the voice in my head that was yelling at me to apologize for whatever I’d done to make her hate me so much.
“I’m just doing what I have to do to keep your lies out of my life. I’ve been through that once and when you left, I was relieved. The whole town was.”
I struggled to put a layer of ice over my heart as a lump lodged itself in my throat and tears prickled at the backs of my eyes but I refused to let them fall.
“You know,” Tara began but I didn’t even look at her. My eyes were locked on my childhood friend as something like guilt flickered across her gaze but she kept her mouth stubbornly shut. “My dad almost lost his job when you burnt down that school.”
“Was he the janitor?” I asked mildly, still looking at Rachel.
“A teacher,” Tara growled, “and it’s just like you to be insensitive about it.”
“You don’t know a fucking thing about me,” I hissed, my gaze finally swinging to Tara’s and she jerked back slightly, fear written clearly in her features. A slow smirk stretched across my mouth as I watched her try to recover, taking a step closer to me once more. Finally, I just rolled my eyes and said, “Are we done yet? I’m really late for English li─”
The slap didn’t really surprise me when Tara’s palm lashed against my left cheek but the force of it was kind of shocking. “Shut up about English lit,” Tara hissed, shaking her hand to get rid of the sting.
“Wow, that was pretty good,” I said, wincing slightly against the sting in my cheek. “Do you work out?” I asked, smirking at Tara whose eyes lit with fury once more and this time she used the opposite hand to deliver a slap to my right cheek. “Not bad,” I said, shrugging. “Not as good as the first one but there was still power there.”
“You’re really starting to piss me off,” Tara said, yanking on my shirt as the other two girls pushed me to the floor. The next few minutes were a blur of hair pulling and stinging slaps that I stopped feeling after the first couple. My cheeks were going to be red and swollen and my lip was cut from my own teeth biting into it.
“Ouch,” I mumbled when the short one turned her hand into a fist and caught me just under my eye.
“Ouch!” she shrieked, jumping up and down and shaking her hand out.
“Sara! Didn’t we agree not to punch her face?” Tara said sternly, twisting to get a good look at her friend who was cradling her abused hand.
“Tara and Sara?” I asked, looking between the two before my eyes traveled to the girl with short, curly hair. “What’s your name? Farah? Lara? Kara? Bo-Beara?”
“It’s Jeanette,” she said flatly, reaching out to slap me across the face again.
“Nice to meet you too, Jeanette,” I muttered.
“Have you learned your lesson yet?” Tara snarled down at me.
“Definitely,” I said, giving her my most sincere face while I calculated how much time was left of English lit and whether or not I was going to be able to get the blood off my shirt before the end of class.
“Rachel?”
I couldn’t see her but Rachel must have nodded because the three girls let me up and soon I was standing facing my ex best friend. “You didn’t fight back,” Rachel said quietly, cocking her head to the side as she asked, “Why not?”
“You wanted me to, right?” I asked, my voice flat as I took in her beautiful features that had once been as familiar to me as my own.
“What do you mean?”
Her voice snapped me out of my nostalgia and I shrugged. “If any of you had the slightest mark anywhere, it would’ve been so easy to blame it on me, wouldn’t it?” I let out a humourless laugh and glanced over at the three other girls who were looking a little dishevelled from their weak attempt at kicking my ass. I shook my head and grabbed my bag from where they’d tossed it under a sink before facing Rachel once more. “You didn’t get any shots in, Rach. Did you want to before I leave?” I asked mildly, stretching my arms out to the side, feeling my heart rate pick up speed as I wondered if she hated me enough to hit me herself
“Do you remember my fourteenth birthday?” she asked quietly making my heart stop completely.
“Yes,” I whispered, finding it hard to speak past the lump in my throat.
“Really? I’m surprised considering how drunk you were. Then again, that was the night you lit a building on fire so I guess it was pretty memorable for you.” Her dark blue eyes stared at me without any of their old light as she continued and my hands slowly lowered to my sides, my feet locked to the floor. “We’d spent the day together the week before and it was like old times, just hanging out and laughing at nothing. It was fun and we hadn’t had fun together in a while before that so even though my mother told me it wasn’t a good idea, I invited you to my birthday.”
“Rachel,” I whispered, my voice cracking halfway through the word but she didn’t seem to hear me.
“You showed up when everyone was leaving. You stumbled up my driveway just as Leslie Young’s parents pulled up and then you puked in a potted plant before throwing your arms around my neck, crying that you needed me. Leslie Young’s parents hustled her into the car, looking at me like I was some kind of idiot for letting you touch me and I was so mad at you, Cor. From that moment on, I hated you more than anyone and when the cops came to get you, I was glad because then you couldn’t ruin my life anymore.”
“Stop,” I said quietly, my mind flashing with the memories from that night, seeing the look on Rachel’s face through a haze of alcohol that I hadn’t wanted to drink in the first place. “You don’t understand.”
“I don’t care,” she said, her words stabbing into my chest like a blunt object. “You’re nothing to me now whether you’re here or not. Just stay the fuck away from me, okay?”
Taking a deep breath, I managed to straighten my spine and I’m not sure how I pulled it off, but a smirk stretched across my lips. “But I missed you so much, Rach,” I said, my tone laced with sarcasm that I didn’t feel.
I watched in slow motion as she swung her hand back and hit me hard across the cheek. Her slap doing more damage than all the other ones combined even though it wasn’t that hard.
Her eyes were flat and cold as I raised my hand and placed it across my cheek, my heart aching more than any of my physical injuries. Neither of us said a word and finally, she spun on her heel and left the washroom.
I wasn’t paying attention so when someone shoved me hard from behind, I stumbled forward, hearing my shirt tear loudly as my bag landed on the floor, spilling its contents all over.
The four of us looked down at the books and pencils scattered across the bathroom and when I looked up, they were all still frowning down at the contents of my bag in confusion. “What did you expect? A bong? Maybe a switch blade?” I asked, leaning against the wall behind me, feeling a draft on my back where there had been none before.
“Just stay away from our boyfriends, okay?” Tara hissed, pointing a finger at me and stepping on my chemistry text book on her way out, Sara and Bo-beara following behind her.
“Fuck,” I whispered, sliding down the wall and dropping my head into my hands, feeling like a hippo was sitting on my chest, making it impossible to breathe.
Tears that I’d been holding back ever since Rachel and her friends had cornered me in the washroom started to flow down my cheeks even though I was trying my hardest to stop them. It had always been like that for me, I could hold back the tears forever in front of others but as soon as I was alone, they’d flow like a river. I winced when I heard the bell ring, realizing that I’d missed English lit completely and calculus was about to start. Slowly, I stood up from the wall, my breath hitching as I continued to cry, wishing I could just explain everything to Rachel and have us go back to being best friends again but I knew it wouldn’t be the same. It was impossible.
“What the hell happened to you?”
I whirled around at the sound of the voice, my eyes landing on a tall girl with long, dark brown hair and very dark brown eyes that tilted interestingly up at the corners, giving her an exotic look. Her skin was nicely tanned and she had the kind of body that some girls would pay anything for.
“I fell,” I said in response to her question, not even bothering to inject sincerity into my tone as I bent and started to collect my school supplies.
“That’s believable,” she said, her voice laced with sarcasm as she bent to help me, picking up my notebook and my English lit text book which the shortest gangster had stepped on, making the spine crack. She held the two items out to me and I snatched them from her hand before stuffing them into my bag.
When I stood up, I caught sight of myself in the mirror and groaned. “Holy shit,” I muttered, turning the tap on and cupping my hands to splash some water over my bruised and bloody face. My cheeks were swollen and bright red from all the slaps and my lip was cut and bleeding. There was a cut on my eyebrow that was sluggishly leaking blood and a bruise was already starting to form under my left eye where I’d taken my one and only punch. My hair was a wild mess of tangles and it stuck out at all angles from my head.
“Your shirt’s torn,” the girl said when I finished wiping my face with a paper towel, wincing at the sting in my cheeks from the rough material again my already abused skin.
I looked at her in the mirror, hearing a strange tone in her voice and noticed that her eyes were glued to my back. Slowly, I reached a hand around behind me and realized that my shirt had torn from the neck to just past the shoulder blades, exposing a decent amount of skin. Enough to explain why she was staring.
I knew what she was looking at. Her eyes were roving over the series of small white scars on my pale skin that covered my entire back and my upper arms. “What happened to you?” she asked, her eyes rising from my back to meet my gaze in the mirror.
I shrugged, giving her a flat stare. “I fell,” I repeated, giving her a half truth this time.
She raised an eyebrow at me but didn’t press me any further. “I have an extra shirt in my locker, do you want it?”
“I don’t know, is it going to be covered in itching powder?”
Her lips twitched and her dark brown eyes lit with humour as I turned around to face her. “No but only because I just used the last of it on my brother’s shoes.”
My own lips twitched slightly in response and slowly, I nodded, feeling like I could trust this girl for some reason which automatically made warning flags wave in my head. “Thanks,” I mumbled, pressing my lips into a thin line, suppressing any further lip twitching.
“No problem,” she said cheerfully, heading towards the door. “I’ll be right back,” she said and then she was gone.
I moved into one of the stalls and locked the door behind me just in case anyone else walked in. I winced when I thought about my back and the differently shaped and sized scars all over the skin there, remembering clearly what they were from even if I’d planned on wiping the night from my mind.
“I’m back!” the girl said cheerfully, her low heels clicking on the floor as she strode towards my stall and held a shirt over top.
“Thanks,” I muttered, taking the soft material in my hands and feeling a little shaft of warmth in my heart at the gesture. When I’d pulled the shirt on which was a plain cotton t-shirt that was soft from being worn so much, I stepped out of the stall. I gave a small but genuine smile to the girl, pointing at the picture of The Beatles on the front of the shirt. “Nice.”
“Thank you,” she said, nodding in acknowledgement as her eyes traveled up and down my body, pausing at my exposed wrist where you could see the three circular cigarette burns. I pulled my hand behind my back and gave her a cold look, wishing I had a sweater with me. “Here,” she said, taking the loose sweater she was wearing off and handing it to me.
“This is going to come back to haunt me, isn’t it?” I muttered as I reached out to grab the sweater, breathing a sigh of relief when the warm material was settled over my shoulders.
“You’re being dramatic,” she said, rolling her eyes in my direction before thrusting out her hand for me to shake. “I’m Jessica Savoy and there’s really no need to introduce yourself.”
“Want my autograph?” I asked through gritted teeth, wishing for the millionth time that I could’ve afforded to go to any other school besides this one.
“Maybe later,” she said, grinning at me as she propped herself up onto the sink behind her. “Here’s the thing Corinna Evans, I’ve seen you moping around here, scowling at anyone who talks to you and I figure you could use a friend.”
I snorted, leaning my shoulder against the wall and crossing my arms over my chest. “Is that what you think?”
“Yeah, it is and I used to date Flynn so you know you can trust me.”
My eyes snapped to hers and an uncomfortable feeling settled in my stomach. “Tyler Flynn?” I asked in disbelief.
“Yup,” she said easily, hopping off the counter and putting her hands on her hips. “Since you’re like a sister to him, if I ever did anything to hurt you, I’d be dead meat so what do you say? Friends?”
I let out a deep breath and gave her a cold look, hoping to discourage her from ever talking to me again. “Though I’m grateful for the shirt─”
“And the sweater.”
“And the sweater,” I continued with a nod, “I really don’t have time for friends right now. I’m here to do my work and graduate and then I’m gone so it would be a waste of time for both of us.”
“I disagree.”
“This isn’t a debate,” I said, hitching my bag up onto my shoulder and walking towards the exit. “I’ll return your shirts tomorrow,” I said over my shoulder as I walked out of the washroom, ignoring the slight pang of regret in my chest at rejecting my first genuine offer at friendship in years.