Nine

I opened my locker and sighed. People were still putting those stupid flipping fliers in my locker. Really?

I truly hoped that people would be over this. Apparently, the people at my stuck-up school are just that immature. I took them out along with the English book. Closing my locker, I walked down the hall in search of a trash can. The fliers fluttered down into the first one I found.

I made sure all of the fliers were in the bin before I turned and began to walk back to class. A smile stretched across my face, and my bad mood lifted away when I was stopped by Chrissie.

"Oh my God! Jules, what happened? Did you get the mysterious phone call? Who was it? What did they say? Are you okay?" She must have had a little too much sugar this morning.

"Yeah, I got the phone call. It was Jessie. He is the one who did the fliers. He said it was a dare and then hung up on me. Jack left my mom last night. I think I'm okay. Wait, did I answer all of your questions?" She nodded as she scanned the side of my face, surely seeing the haphazard job I did to cover it.

This morning there was no more than a small red mark across my cheek from where, I'm assuming, her ring had slid across my cheek. I used my untouched container of cover-up, but you could still see it if you knew to look for it.

I don't know why my mom buys me a ton of make-up but she just does. More than likely, it was so I could become a 'better Sanders', and I could live up to the 'family image'. Let me tell you, that 'image' is a steaming pile of poo smeared on a canvas.

"What a jerk! I mean Jessie, not Jack. I wonder what happened between Jack and your mom. But, Jessie! I still can't believe he did that. I mean, I knew he was capable of it since he hangs out with that group of ass-wipes, but I didn't think of him as that much of a jerk. Of course, I've only talked to him a few times since he hit me with the door. I wonder which one of those jerks dared him to do it." She kept babbling.

"Chris!" She looked at me. "You need to breathe. I swear I thought you were about to fall over and pass out. Maybe you should cut back on the sugar." We both laughed.

"No, no, no. This is the doing of two Monsters, one AMP, and a Red Bull." She leaned in to whisper in my ear. "I've been having nightmares again, and I didn't want to sleep last night." She pulled back, and her eyes were wide. She was shaking so hard I thought she was going to vibrate away.

"What?" I laughed. I looked up and met Jessie's daggers. My smile fell, but Chris was still lost to her caffeine rush. If I smiled and walked by he would destroy me more, but if I act upset he would think he won. I was so sick of everyone tearing me down and thinking they were better than me. I didn't want him to think he broke me. It didn't matter that he actually did.

"I have to get to class. Bye." She gave me a quick hug and ran down the hallway.

I walked down the hall quickly in the opposite direction. My head was down the entire time, trying to avoid eye contact with everyone.

As I walked into the class, I still heard the remarks. I still saw the dirty looks. I still felt ashamed that so many people actually believed that I was so promiscuous.

By the second hour, I had managed to ignore most of the noises and dirty looks. I walked in early and had a seat at my usual desk in the back. Today, it seemed that Jessie decided to mix things up. He sat right next to me.

"Why are you so sad?" There was so much sarcasm in his voice that I'm surprised that I could understand what he said.

"Why would you care?" I snapped back, my voice coming out stronger than I expected it to.

"Oh, come on! I thought we were just the best of friends!" He made his voice high pitched, and propped his hand underneath his chin. I let my head fall. I never did anything to him. I just met him like 4 days ago, for crying out loud!

"Everyone is just so happy, laughing at you, so why aren't you happy? Why aren't you smiling like you always do?" Is there something he is trying to get at?

"Why do you have a problem with the fact that I like to be happy and don't care about what other people think of me?" My mouth decided to take control. I started spitting everything I was thinking, and I couldn't stop it. "Yeah, I only have one friend, yeah, my sister can be mean sometimes, and yeah, my mom is a drunk when things don't go her way. But I am happy because some people don't even have that! To them, I'm the lucky one! I have a house. I have food in my fridge to eat. I have things that some people can only dream of. So, what do you have against being happy? What did I do to make you hate me so damn much?" I clamped my jaw shut. Why the heck did I just say all of that?

He didn't reply, and neither of us said anything the rest of the class hour. Occasionally, I would catch him looking at me but as soon as I looked over at him, he just looked away.

I called Chrissie later that day, and I told her everything. She thinks that no matter how hot he is, there is nothing that he could ever do to make up for what he did to me, and I had to agree. Maybe now he would leave me alone. He certainly didn't expect me to word vomit on him and didn't seem to know what to do after.

"Oh, hey I know what to do to cheer you up! We can go to The Shack! That always cheers you up!" Her voice rang through the phone.

"I'm pretty sure that won't cheer me up." I heard her sigh. "Chris, don't you remember that when he moved here, he got a job there."

"But Jules! Please, please, please! It will be so much fun! I love their Brownie Batter Blast thing, and he might not even be working today. Please!" She held out the last please so long I thought that she was going to get light-headed and pass out.

I guess if it makes her happy, "This is a bad idea." I mumbled. "Alright, we can go, but only because I love you. If he's there, I am leaving."