Cruel Read online

  I felt his eyes sweep over the skirt covering my white underwear before he met my gaze with annoyance. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “What does it look like I’m doing here? Do you own the bleachers now, too?” I sat up and crossed my legs in front of me before I put the joint to my lips and took another drag.

  Maybe this was how I could handle them. It almost didn’t hurt to look at him when I was like this. One of the first indicators that I had been shunned was that “our” places were now “their” places. I couldn’t go to my favorite restaurant off Bloomington Street or jog at the trails near City Park. I had thought that the bleachers were safe, but I guess not. It’s hard to know where was safe when these assholes decided they owned everything.

  There was a time that I called Rogue my best friend. There was a time he didn’t look at me like I was dirt beneath his boots. I didn’t know what I did wrong. Seven months ago, they just suddenly claimed that they were done with me. They humiliated me in front of the entire school.

  I’d pleaded for answers, stood outside his house with tears streaming down my face until security escorted me off the property. Not a single one of them told me what happened to ruin our friendship. The not knowing killed me.

  “I own this whole town, Scarlett.”

  “You keep saying that,” I mused with a dark laugh. “Yet, here I am. Free of the Heirs. Free of you.”

  “We don’t make it a habit of owning trash, Scar. You aren’t the Heir’s queen anymore.”

  I felt my body relax even further, taking me away from the pain of his words and protecting me with a hazy and all encompassing comfort. Rogue couldn’t hurt me if I was a pillow. Yeah, this weed was fucked up.

  I laughed, my giggles feeling like a balloon carrying my pain up. I felt weightless. “Then you don’t own everything. Is this the part where you tell me I’m worthless? Or slam me against the lockers? Tell Stephanie to beat me up? I’m just wondering how to prepare for the next round of bullshit coming my way.”

  I watched Rogue stare at me as I stretched my arms high up above my head. Closing my eyes, I danced my fingers along the chilly air and smiled when I heard his annoyed exhale. After a few beats of this, I opened my eyes again, greeting his dark stare. I wasn’t sure if it was the weed, or my wishful thinking, but I saw a hint of wistfulness about him.

  “There he is,” I whispered with a smile. Right then, he looked like the boy I once loved. Out of all of them, I knew Rogue best. We met in kindergarten. I fell off the slide, and he helped me hobble over to the teacher for a band-aid.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  There was movement from the side of the bleachers, and I watched his eyes slice in that direction. I started to pick at my nails to distract myself from the dull sadness in my chest. The moment was lost, and the glimpse of the boy I knew was gone again.

  “Oh. He’s gone now,” I said as a giggle escaped my lips.

  I heard someone call Rogue’s name, and I pulled another long inhale of the joint as his face slipped into that familiar fury I’d come to expect from him over the last few months.

  Rogue mumbled something under his breath that sounded like, “Fucking stoner.” He looked frantic now, eyeing the bleachers with unease as he ran a hand through his dark hair.

  He then walked over to one of the trash cans under the bleachers. “Get the fuck out of here. I have a girl meeting me in a few, and I don’t want an audience,” he said while crossing his arms over his chest.

  It shouldn’t have hurt me, imagining him with another girl, but I’d always loved Rogue, hadn’t I? I couldn’t remember, now. I was too busy counting the seats of the bleachers above me. “No,” I replied with a shrug. “Fuck you. Go get off somewhere else.”

  A distant male voice called his name. Rogue stood there for a moment, just staring angrily at me. I refused to let him ruin my high. I sunk lower and lower, until I was nothing but melted chocolate on concrete.

  Then Rogue Kelly ruined everything.

  He gripped the rim of a nearby trashcan and picked it up before walking closer to me. “Time to take out the trash,” he said with a sinister smile before flipping it over and dumping the contents of it right there on top of me.

  Sludge and trash coated my skin. It smelled rotten, like it was leftover food from last week’s football game. I shrieked as cold, cruel sobriety washed over me in a dull wave of disgust.

  I wiped at something resembling a curdled milkshake from my arm and cried when I saw maggots in my lap. First my morning with Stephanie and now this. I lost it.

  I looked up at Rogue, as tears pricked at the corner of my eyes. I debated on getting up and running away. I should have. But courage was a fickle thing, making itself known in those moments when pride and rage shook hands and poured gasoline on the situation. I stood up, trash slipped off my skin at the movement. Then, I glared at Rogue, who looked like a complex mix of annoyance, fury, and…stress. So he wanted to get off with another girl here? Good luck.

  I meant to tackle him, but when I lunged at him, that fucking blend of muscle memory and hope bled through my pores. I wrapped my arms around his rigid middle instead, getting the nasty trash all over his body. “Fuck you, Rogue Kelly.” I whispered.

  For a moment, he didn’t push me off, he just let me hug him for the exact amount of time it took me to exhale the sadness balled up like a fist in my chest.

  When he did shove me away, it was a cruel sort of push that sent me soaring towards the ground. My ass landed on the concrete with a thud, and I cried out in pain as he wiped off his shirt. “You nasty ass Trash Whore,” he snapped.

  I heard footsteps from behind me, and since I didn’t want to see whatever beautiful girl he would be spending time with, I got up and ran. I ran past the sadness. Past the sharp pain in my tailbone. Past the sound of Rogue’s laugh and my breaking heart, and went straight to the gym showers.

  Chapter Three

  After I washed off, I visited the nurse for the second time. She gave me a sympathetic smile before handing me her last pile of clothes. I wondered if I needed to start leaving spares up there. I didn’t go to class. There was no point. So instead, I went to the one place that still brought me happiness.

  The gym was my safe space. It was where your last name didn’t matter, and the only thing that you had to bring to the mat was your body. It was where it didn’t matter who you were or how much your daddy made. Hard work trumped status here.

  Gymnastics was my favorite thing in the world. Mama signed me up as a kid because I’d had so much energy. As a kid, I constantly chased after the guys and climbed the walls. She wanted an outlet, so she signed me up for monthly lessons. Then, it became twice a week. Then daily. She had no idea it would become my obsession. Sometimes, I wondered if she ever regretted signing me up in the first place.

  “Haven’t seen you in a while,” Coach Michaels said from his office. He didn’t bother to get up from his desk, which was covered in papers, gum wrappers, and sequined leotards. I walked closer to him while adjusting my messenger bag higher on my back. His eyes roamed over my busted lip, but he must have decided it wasn’t worth his time to question me, because he didn’t say anything about it. It wasn’t the first time a teacher decided to overlook a problem at this fucked up school. He glanced at the clock. “You should be in class.”

  “Hey, Coach,” I said sheepishly as I walked forward.

  We were one of the few schools in the state with a gymnastics program, mostly because we were one of the only places with a tuition high enough to afford it.

  Coach Michaels was one of the few adults I actually respected. He was a hardass and had no problem telling the obsessed mamas that liked to start cat fights in the bleachers to shut the fuck up and sit down. He was ruthless, demanding, and one of the best gymnastic coaches in the country. Only the best for Smith Academy.

  “Your mama know you’re here? Wouldn’t want her to worry about your delicate figure,” Coach Michaels
said with a distasteful sneer. He was also one of the only teachers here that didn’t kiss her ass.

  Mama made me quit gymnastics before I started senior year. I couldn’t prove it, but part of me wondered if it was punishment for ruining my good thing with the Heirs. She always prided herself on my connection with the elite people of this town. She gave me a bunch of excuses, though. She was worried about my body. My muscles were toned—an “unsightly size for a well-bred woman,” and I had some joint pain, common with most gymnasts. She blamed my school work, too. She wanted me focused on my guaranteed acceptance into Harvard.

  But really? I think she didn’t like that I was actually good at something. Mama became a Principal because it was something to do, not because she was particularly interested in raising tomorrow’s youth. She liked the power it gave her, the insight to other well-off families. She used to be a beauty queen. Daddy once told me that she’d wanted to be Miss America, but then she got pregnant with me. Shit happens.

  “She doesn’t know,” I replied honestly, hoping that he wouldn’t kick me out. I needed it. I missed it.

  “Good. This gym is for gymnasts only.” Coach Michaels always played this damn game. “Is that you?” he asked, and I felt my chest constrict. I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs that yes, I was a fucking gymnast, and a damn good one at that. But months out of the circuit were like years in the competition world. I could feel my skills slipping daily. Coach didn’t understand why I gave up so easily. But I wasn’t in a good place back then. Mama forced me to quit right after Rogue decided I wasn’t worthy of them any more. Feeling sorry for myself seemed to take over.

  So instead of answering him, I gave Coach Michaels a challenging stare, one that said everything I couldn’t. “Get your ass on the beam, Livingston,” he finally said in that no-nonsense tone of his that I respected.

  I smiled and then raced to the corner of the gym where the beam was. Nurse Courtney had lent me a pair of guy’s pants with a belt to wear for the day, which came in handy for what I wanted to do. I dusted chalk on my hands and then lifted myself up on the beam. I started off just walking, warming up my muscles with the familiar movement of traveling the line. I loved knowing that I was in control. Falling was up to me. How fast, how high, how far.

  I stretched out once my muscles were warmed up. My tight limbs groaned when I straightened my legs and bent at the hips. It had been a while since I’d done this, but my body knew the drill. Fifteen years of muscle memory couldn’t be erased in a matter of months. Once I was loose, I started with a couple of pike jumps, getting my body in the groove. It felt good to hover both my legs over the beam, pointing my toes as I jumped and bent at the hips.

  “Fucking Stephanie,” I cursed before doing a full turn. I was a little out of breath as I balanced on one foot and spun. “Fucking school.” I pounded my frustrations about everything with every landing, every jump. “Fucking Rogue.”

  I let my breaths come in strong inhalations, then pushed them back out my chest with purpose. There, on the beam, I was in control. I didn’t have to hold back like I did with the bullies or with Mama. There, I was strong. I wasn’t powerless or devalued. I wasn’t trash. I went to the gym to remind myself of that, and the second my feet got into position, I let all the bullshit slip away.

  I did a back handspring to a layout step-out, flipping through the air with finesse before landing with a thud. I could feel my muscles contract. I could sense how sore I was going to be in the morning, and I loved it. I relished in the feel of the beam beneath my feet. The way my toes curled and my upper body kept me balanced.

  I did another and another and another, going back and forth down the line. On my third round, I almost missed my landing. “Don’t fall, Scar,” I whispered to myself before I got into position for a front tuck. It was one of the more difficult maneuvers. Each time I was in the air, I didn’t think of how alone I felt or how fucked up my school was. I just thought of what my body needed to do, and then I did it.

  “You’re gonna wear yourself out, Livingston,” Coach Michaels yelled from his office. Didn’t he know that was the point?

  I leaped, tucking my body and then expanding it once more before landing on the beam. But my ankle wobbled since I didn’t bend at the knee when I landed to absorb the shock. I fell off the beam, and my knees hit the mat.

  “Dammit,” I hissed. But even the fall felt good because it had only been caused by me.

  Coach Michaels was soon beside me, helping me up with a scowl on his face. “You’re getting rusty, but you’re still the best damn gymnast in my club. Keep some clothes in your locker, and I’ll look the other way if you want to come back tomorrow during study period.” I grimaced when my ankle gave a little twinge when I stood, but my expression turned into a beaming smile at his words. “And put some ice on that, Livingston.”

  “Yes, Coach.”

  Chapter Four

  It was two days later, and I was relieved when last bell rang, freeing me from the constant press of unwelcome looks and jeering words. I’d texted my driver and told him that I wanted to walk home today. It was a risk, since any of the students of Smith Academy could have stopped to fuck with me. The last time I walked home, someone spun the tires of their daddy’s mercedes in the mud, getting it all over me. But today, I didn’t care. The crisp fall air taunted me. I wanted to walk off some of the anxiety in my soul and let my scars breathe for a little bit.

  The downtown Savannah strip bustled with businessmen in their southern best, and college students walked by with bright smiles. My feet led the way. I didn’t consciously know where I was going, but the moment I saw the rusted and abandoned train tracks long out of use, I sighed in relief.

  There was still a bit of magic in that place—still a bit of hope. That spot grounded me. It was filled with memories, and every track of metal felt nostalgic. I let myself relax for the first time today, and breathed in the smell of dirt and dust. Those train tracks used to be our special spot. Our little group might have stopped going there, but I couldn’t bring myself to give up that place that I loved.

  “What are you doing here?” a low voice grumbled, startling me.

  I turned away from the tree where we’d carved our initials when we were kids, and I frowned when I saw Godfrey Taylor leaning against the rough bark, smoking a joint. He was wearing his signature aviators, smiling at me, the wide grin highlighting the subtle stubble on his face.

  Godfrey came from a long line of lawyers. His father owned one of the most profitable firms in the south. He could get away with anything, and usually did. He was known to get off the most notorious criminals, ensuring they walked.

  I steeled myself. “You know that I always loved this place,” I said defensively. I didn’t want to give this up, too.

  Godfrey was usually the only one in Savannah’s elite circle that still talked to me. Maybe because our parents had high hopes that we’d someday marry and combine empires. But it was probably because he liked to keep me on my toes.

  “Heard Stephanie fucked with that pretty face of yours,” he commented while walking towards me, frowning when he got a good look. “Looks like you’re healing,” he said, eyeing my lip that was now scabbed over.

  I crossed my arms, and he tossed me a smirk before continuing. “Stephanie bragged about it before she sucked my cock in eighth period. She slid up and down real nice for me,” he said tauntingly. “The high of y’alls fight made her teeth chatter.”

  And just like that, I was reminded once again that Godfrey and I weren’t friends. I really should remember that.

  Godfrey saw the change in my expression, saw me about to shut him out, and immediately, his eyes glittered with challenge. Because he was Godfrey, he wouldn’t just let it be. Unlike the other Heirs who outright tormented me, he seemed to get some sick satisfaction from the constant push and pull. He liked toying with my emotions. I just wish it didn’t work.

  He wrapped his arm around me and pulled me into a hug, and I let h
im. With my face pressed against his chest, I could smell her on him. It was her sickly-sweet, ridiculously expensive perfume that she always spritzed in the locker room. It made me want to puke.

  I should’ve pushed him away. I should’ve turned around and walked off. But because I was a masochistic idiot, I let him hug me. I still craved his contact, still craved the tiny bit of affection he offered.

  In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time someone had held me like this. Hell, I couldn’t remember the last time someone cared enough to comfort me. My own parents didn’t even offer me physical affection. No hugs to let me know that they loved me, or even a pat on the back. And now that I had no friends, my body was so starved for affection that I gave in to him easily. I missed the old Godfrey enough that I was willing to allow him to touch me, even after he’d just told me that he’d let that bitch blow him. I was so fucked up, that I enjoyed the feel of his arms around me, even if it was fake comfort—even if he only did it to screw with me.

  The question I’d asked myself a million times was at the tip of my tongue. Why? Why did they hate me? What happened that changed everything?

  I bit my lip to hold back my questions. I was scared that if I asked them again, Godfrey would stop talking to me. He was the last one to not completely shut me out. He was my only way in. I was like an addict, who used whatever methods I could to find out what was going on in their elite world. Sure, he gave me whiplash with his constant push and pull, but at least I got some pull with him.

  As soon as he felt me relax against him, he dropped his arms and pushed me away. The smirk on his face told me all I needed to know. The hug was nothing more than another game. It was always a fucking game with him.

  “Rogue has a thing tonight,” he said.