Masquerade (2 page)

“
Hey, girl,” Kimber chirped
as I slid in the passenger seat.

“
Hey.” I smiled and shoved
the uneaten granola bar and juice into my bag. It would join the
rest of this week’s uneaten breakfasts in the bottom of my locker.
I was aware of Kimber watching, but she didn’t say anything. Her
eyes were hidden behind a pair of sleek, dark purple
sunglasses.

As she backed out of the
drive, I checked out her outfit. She was wearing a pair of dark
skinny jeans and a pair of tan Uggs that came to her knee. Her top
was white but far from plain. It was a long sleeved, button-up with
a bunch of ruffles along the chest. The first three buttons were
unbuttoned, and a sparkly silver tank peeked from beneath it. To
top it off she had on at least four necklaces. One had huge aqua
colored beads on it while another had small yellow pebbles. The
other two were silver and sparkled when the sun hit them. It should
have been way too much, but on her it was perfect. It was exactly
like something I would have worn.
Before
.

Her Blackberry began singing a Taylor
Swift song, and she sighed. “Who is it?”

I picked the phone up from the cup
holder and glanced at the screen. “Cole.”

“
Ugh.” She took the phone,
hit the ‘ignore’ button, and dropped the phone back into the cup
holder.

“
Are you fighting with him
again?” Kimber and Cole have a definite love-hate relationship.
They’d started dating freshman year and had broken up and gotten
back together so many times in the past two years that I’d stopped
counting. It used to amuse me. Now I wondered why they
bothered.

“
I broke up with him.” She
sniffed.

“
I’m sure by lunch
everything will be fine.”

“
Not this time,” her voice
cracked.

“
Kimber, you know this is
the usual pattern with you two.”

“
I caught him kissing Jenna
last night after the game.”

“
He wouldn’t!”

“
Oh, yes he did!
I know we usually fight and make up, but this is
different. He
cheated
on me!”

“
With a skank!” Jenna
Hoffman was a snotty brat. She flirted with everyone’s boyfriend
and talked about everyone behind their backs. Unfortunately, the
teachers all thought she was great. She got straight A’s and sucked
up to all the right people. It didn’t hurt that she was next in
line to be head cheerleader, and that her parents had serious
money.

A giggle escaped Kimber.

“
What?” I asked. Dealing
with Jenna was no laughing matter.

“
You said
‘skank’.”

“
So?” I shrugged. “You act
like I’ve never called anyone that before.”

“
It’s been a long time. I
almost forgot how…” She pressed her lips together and fiddled with
the radio.

“
How fun I used to
be.”

“
I wasn’t going to say
that.”

I snorted.

“
It’s just nice to see you
excited about something.”

I didn’t think calling Jenna a skank
for acting like one was me being excited. “So what are you going to
do?” I asked, wanting to avoid this conversation.

“
About the skank?” Kimber
grinned. “Nothing.”

“
About Cole.”

Her grin faded, and she stared at the
road. “He keeps calling me.”

“
Have you talked to
him?”

“
I told him to leave me
alone.”

Her phone went off again, and I picked
it up. “It’s him.”

“
Just turn it
off.”

This was serious. She never
ignored his calls. She always answered to yell at him and then hung
up. It was part of how they worked things out. Suddenly the idea of
Kimber and Cole breaking up – for good – seemed like too much. I
always thought they would be together, fighting forever. It was
something I counted on
–
a constant. In a world full of change and
uncertainty, I always thought I could count on them to be
there…well, fighting.

“
You okay?” Kimber asked,
slowing the car.

“
Yeah, I’m fine.”
Breathe.

“
You having a panic
thingy?”

“
I am NOT
having a panic attack.”
Please, not now.
I took a deep
breath. Then another. The tightness in my chest eased. Kimber was
watching me.

“
Need me to pull
over?”

“
No. I’m fine.
Sorry.”

She nodded, and we rode in silence for
a few minutes.

“
I’m sorry,” I said as we
pulled into the student parking lot at school. “That was really
crappy of Cole.”

“
Yeah.”

“
You going to be okay?” I
asked, reaching out, laying a hand on her arm.

She looked momentarily startled that I
touched her, but she recovered fast. She smiled and said,
“Shopping? After school?”

Shopping was the last thing
on earth that I wanted to do. All those people. All those bright
lights and mirrors. “Sure,” I agreed. She stood by me through a lot
this past year and without her I probably would have gone
insane. I would never be able to repay her, but
this was one small way I could make a dent in the debt I owed her
for all she’d given me.

She let out a loud groan as she pulled
into her usual parking spot. I looked out my window at the car
parked next to us. Cole was leaning against his dark blue pickup
waiting with his cell clutched in his hand.

“
I can’t do this right
now,” she confided.

“
Go,” I said, “I’ll talk to
him.”

“
Thank you.” She grabbed
her book bag and scurried from the car. I heard Cole shout her
name.

Kimber kept running, yelling over her
shoulder, “Do not follow me!”

I was slower to get out of the car,
reluctant to begin the day, but still I moved faster than normal.
Surprisingly, Cole listened to Kimber and stayed behind. He stood
at the back of her car, his hands shoved in his pockets, watching
her run into the building.

I slammed the car door and dropped my
book bag at my feet; reaching up to pull the hood of my sweatshirt
up, I made sure my hair was smooth around my face. Cole turned to
look at me. He looked miserable.

“
Jenna, Cole? Really?” I
sniffed.

“
It wasn’t
what it looked like.” He walked over and stood in
front of me.

“
So you weren’t kissing
her?”

“
No – I mean yes!” he
yelled, frustrated.

I flinched.

“
Sorry.” he sighed, bending
to pick up my bag to
hand it to
me.

“
It’s all
right.”

“
No, it isn’t.”

“
Really, I’m fine.” I was
busy pulling at
my hood.

Cole noticed me pulling the hood even
further forward and said, “Quit hiding all the time.”

“
You gonna to tell me about
Jenna?” I avoided his words because I always felt like
hiding.

He sighed and ran a hand through his
rumpled, dark hair. It stood out all over his head, and his
normally bright blue eyes were bloodshot. Even looking as wrung out
as he did, he was still good looking. He stood almost six feet tall
with the broad shoulders of the football player he was. He was a
popular guy, one of the most popular in the class, but he was still
a nice guy. Even though he did a lot of things to make Kimber mad,
he never did anything like cheat. We began walking toward the
school entrance.

“
I could explain if she
would just talk to me.”

“
How do you explain what
she saw?”

“
It didn’t mean anything.
It was a dumb bet. She shouldn’t even have seen it.”

“
That’s your story? It was
a bet, and you did it because you thought you wouldn’t get
caught?”

He made a frustrated sound in the back
of his throat. “I’m not into Jenna.”

That I actually believed. He was too
good for her. “You went too far this time, Cole.”

“
Funny thing is
–
I did it for
her.”

I stopped in my tracks. “You kissed
another girl for Kimber?”

“
It was a bet. I made a lot
of money. Kimber’s birthday is next week.”

“
You have a job.” I pointed
out. He worked at the local grocery store bagging
groceries.

“
I don’t make enough to get
her what I wanted to get her.”

“
Looks like you won’t have
to get her anything now.”

We went up the front steps;
he walked ahead and held open the door for me. I paused before
going in.
Just another day, just like
yesterday.
I went in, and Cole
followed.

“
She’s not going to forgive
me, is she?” He sounded miserable.

“
I don’t know.” I shuffled
from foot to foot. Did that mean I couldn’t forgive him either? He
was like a brother to me. He was one of the very few who still
treated me like I was normal, even though I wasn’t. I sighed. “I’ll
see if I can get her to talk to you.”

“
You’re the best,
Hev.”

“
Give her a few days
okay?”

“
You got it.” He grinned.
“I’ll call you later.”

I nodded, and he went down
the hall calling out greetings as he went. I tried to remain
invisible as I walked to my locker. There were only a few stares
this morning, which was good. One of the girls I used to cheer with
called out a timid greeting. I gave her a little wave and a small
smile before returning my gaze back to the floor. Just because
people weren’t staring didn’t mean they weren’t looking. They tried
not to stare, but they couldn’t keep their eyes away.
I was a freak now. I made people
uncomfortable
–
and not necessarily because of my scars
–
but because what my scars
represented. Danger, fear, and the unknown. Something bad had
happened to me, something not even I could remember. They all
probably thought that I was crazy, that I somehow did this to
myself.
I couldn’t blame them. How could
I? They might be
right.

Chapter Two

Heven

“
What did he say?” Kimber
asked before I’d even sat down. I pulled out a chair, facing her
and the wall away from everyone else. Kimber’s fashionable lunch
bag was open before her, along with a bottle of Smart
water.

“
Where’s your lunch?” she
asked, frowning.

“
I’ll get something from
the cafeteria.”

She grimaced. She didn’t eat food from
the cafeteria. She said that if she couldn’t tell what it was, she
wasn’t going to put it in her body. I used to feel the same way.
She reached into her bag and pulled out a turkey sandwich on wheat
with avocado slices. “Here.”

“
I’m not going to eat your
lunch, Kimber.”

She pulled an identical sandwich from
her bag and raised her eyebrow. “Eat.”

She stared at me until I was chewing.
Only then did she start eating. “So you talked to him this
morning?”

I nodded. “Maybe you should talk to
him.”

She shook her head
adamantly.

“
He said it wasn’t what it
looked like.”

“
Do you believe
that?”

“
Maybe.” I put the sandwich
down. It was hard to swallow.

“
You’re on his side?” She
looked absolutely wounded.

“
No!” I cried. “I’m on your
side. I just hate to see you so upset.”

“
Cole cheated on me,
Heven.”

“
With a skank,” I added,
hoping to make her smile again.

“
The skank is headed this
way,” she whispered under her breath.

I resisted the urge to turn and look.
A scent of freesia wafted toward us announcing her arrival. Before
I looked up I pulled my hair to the side and over my left
shoulder.

“
What do you want, Jenna?”
Kimber asked, her voice full of annoyance.

“
Just wanted to remind you
that we’re having an extra practice Saturday morning. The
competition is next month, and you need all practice you can get so
you don’t embarrass the squad.”

In my lap my hand balled into a
fist.

“
Well, if I need extra
practice it’s because you taught the team the cheer we’re doing.
It’s hard to get the moves down when your form is so
sloppy.”

I giggled.

The breath hissed between Jenna’s
teeth. “Speaking of sloppy,” she purred. “I’m going to have to
teach Cole how to kiss…clearly he’s learned nothing from
you.”