Long Way Home
Page 50

Some are nice. Some are not so nice. Some need to die and be damned to an eternity of being roasted like a marshmallow. But that’s life, that’s people. I can’t control them, I can only control me and so far I’ve done a suck job at controlling me.
I’m doing what my physical therapist requested and I’m slowly, steadily, on my crutches yet using both legs to walk. As if a turtle had been let loose on the autobahn. My pack is on my back, so my hands are free to drop my crutches and catch myself if I should trip. Chevy walked with me to my first class, but I’m on my own for second, third, then going into lunch.
I barely beat the bell for Business Economics, and like the first two periods of the day, the class goes deathly silent. Yep, they heard about the Amber Alert, heard Chevy and I were kidnapped, and if I’m going to be honest, if it didn’t happen to me, I’d be staring, too.
Kidnapping only happens to strange people in big cities and we hear about it on investigative news programs. Even for the Terror, it’s a stretch and now I’m the girl who lived.
The moment my butt hits the seat, there’s shouting outside in the hallway. A scuffle. A banging of a locker and my blood pulses in my veins.
They’re here. The Riot are here.
Teachers run down the hallway, a blur of white shirts, and our own teacher sprints to the doorway and he mumbles a curse. “Get in groups, read twenty-four and finish the questions at the end of each summary.”
He leaves, the class breaks out into conversation and my body feels like I’ve been put into a meat shredder. It’s not the Riot. Not every sound is going to be the Riot.
The person behind me leans forward and says, “Jordan Johnson was fingered as the last guy in the picture scandal. Twenty bucks the fight in the hall is Leeann Matteson’s boyfriend beating the hell out of him for posting those pics of her changing in the girls’ restroom.”
I turn and blink at the sight of Addison. We’re friends, but not friends. Associated, but not associated. She’s blond hair, blue eyes and a cheerleader for our school. She’s talented and can flip like those people on TV during the Olympics.
Some of my new set of friends are friends with her, but Addison mostly hung out with her best friend, Breanna, and this is where the association comes in. Razor fell in love with Breanna this fall, Breanna fell for him and her parents recently sent her to a private school far, far away to keep the two of them apart.
“I thought you’d want to know,” Addison continues. “About Jordan.”
She’s right. Five guys tormented girls from our school with pictures they took of us in vulnerable moments and blackmailed us. If we didn’t do what they wanted, the pictures went up on a social media account they created.
I use us because it happened to me, but Razor helped catch the asshole who was blackmailing me. The guy wanted me to make people think I was dating him. Honestly, he wanted more, and when he suggested sex, I threatened to kill him and he believed I would happily sit in jail with his blood dripping from my fingernails.
I tried to flat out refuse the pretense of dating and he uploaded a picture of me. It was taken during a black time in my life. After I broke up with Chevy, after Mom and I had our millionth fight, after I didn’t understand why I wanted to keep breathing.
I drank too much and blacked out at a party. Turns out boys at parties have cameras and like to play dress up with the passed-out girl. To keep any more pics from going up, I fake dated him. Had to kiss him a few times. Even though it was just kisses, I still felt like a whore.
“Why wasn’t Jordan suspended like the others?” I ask.
“He was. Last week. But his daddy’s on the school board and is fighting the accusations and punishment. You know, the whole—” she performs air quotes and drops her voice to mimic a man “—my son would never do such a thing. He’s an angel. He was about to improve his failing grades and had told us over dinner he was going to become a rocket scientist.”
I laugh, Addison cracks a hesitant grin and I turn fully around. “I hope he gets the hell beat out of him.”
“Me, too,” she replies. “I hope they all do. What they did wasn’t okay.”
No, it wasn’t.
“Were you really kidnapped?” The question comes from a few rows over and all the chatter stops.
Don’t know why, but I search Addison for an ally. I can tell, though, she’s just as curious. Regardless of Breanna’s parents’ efforts, Addison’s best friend is entwined with the Terror. Razor loves Breanna. I don’t see signs of him letting her go as long as she wants him, so that means, in Addison’s eyes, her best friend is in danger.
I can’t argue with that logic.
“There was an Amber Alert and it said she’d been taken,” someone else says. “So of course she was kidnapped.”
“Was it people you knew who took you?” I know that voice. It’s a girl I’m perfectly fine with being one of the people who burns in hell. Her name is Jana and she was over-the-top nice when I first tried to break free from the Terror. It turns out she’s one of those who wants people to worship her as she kicks everyone else down.
Jana got mad at me when I told her to back off when she informed her, in theory, best friend she was fat. Never understood why girls wouldn’t stand up for themselves. But I did take a stand and I ended up tossed from her inner circle.
Boo flipping hoo.
“Mom says people in motorcycle clubs all know each other and treat each other badly,” continues Jana. “I bet you knew the people who kidnapped you and you’ll be mixing it up with them in a few weeks.”