Redwood High

Chapter 6

“It’s good to have you back, man,” Mason grinned as he slapped Jake hard on the back.

Jake glowered. “What the hell was that for?”

“That’s for thinking we didn’t want you as a friend anymore because of some stupid town reservations,” Liam said.

Aaron nodded. “I concur.”

All five of us were seated at our usual table in the school cafeteria. The other students were staring in shock since Jake Grayson had joined us. Ever since I had learned that the boys were Jake’s childhood friends and had stopped hanging out with each other because of his father’s death, I had made it my sole mission to get them back together.

It turned out the boys had reached out to Jake after the incident, but he had been so wrapped up in his own despair and detest for himself that he had unknowingly pushed them away. He had thought all three of them would treat him the same way the townspeople did, so he had separated himself from the first.

Finally, I had gotten them to put their egos aside and talk things through, putting us in the exact moment that we were now in.

“Well, it’s good to be back,” said Jake, with the most genuine smile I had ever seen on his lips. It made his face light up, and he looked even more handsome than norm

al if that was possible.

We couldn’t stop people from staring at him like he was an alien or avoiding him like the plague, but it was going to take time.

“Jake’s back, baby,” Mason hollered, and Liam joined in while Aaron looked on with a dazzling grin of his own.

My eyes met Jake’s, and when he mouthed, Thank you, I replied with a nod. My boys were all together.

The bell rang, and we all walked to the gym for the fourth period. As soon as the boys moved over to their section, it was like an alarm had gone off, and I was suddenly accosted by Leila and her gang.

She approached with her arms crossed and her friends behind her. “Well, well, if it isn’t Miss Whore…”

“Excuse me?”

“All three of them weren’t enough for you? You just had to have the bad boy too, didn’t you? What’s it like fucking all four of them, huh? Are you that much of a slut?”

“Miss Hamilton! That language isn’t tolerated on school grounds, especially not to a fellow female. Do you understand?” said Mrs. Peters, our gym teacher, who had suddenly appeared from nowhere and had overheard that last sentence.

“Yes, ma’am.” Leila directed a glare at me before turning to walk away with her friends.

“Back to the routine, everyone,” Mrs. Peters yelled, blowing her whistle as we all took positions. We were doing a gymnastic routine, and my post was at the top as six other girls held me up, two on each level.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Leila crashed into us, and from the look of pure contempt she had thrown at me, it was clear that her action was intentional.

As expected, the girls holding me up staggered, and I could feel myself falling. There was no time for me to even yell, and I landed with blinding pain and the sound of a crack.

Screams filled the air around me, but I couldn’t tell who was yelling. Briefly, my eyes opened, and even though the images swirled before me, I could still make out the people that stood before me.

Liam, Aaron, Mason, and Jake … and they all looked furious.

The following evening, I lay in a hospital bed with my leg raised in a cast and my head bandaged. My Mom sat by my bedside as the boys came in, and solemnly told me that Leila had been found dead that morning. Her body had been crammed into a locker. Her friend Gina had seen it and let out a bloodcurdling scream that had alerted everyone to the gruesome sight.

The cops had ruled it as murder, and they had started investigations. What was even worse was that Jake, although cleared as a prime suspect, was taking the brunt of something he didn’t do. Maybe he did it; maybe he was evil. After all, there was no way we could predict the human heart. So evil that he had to mask his true self with kindness.

The whole town had their suspicious eyes on him once again, and everyone was accusing him of killing Leila because she had messed with me, just as he had done to his father.

Tears fell from my eyes as the boys told me Jake hadn’t been at school for a while, and I couldn’t wait for my ankle and my concussed head to heal so I could go in search of him.

Chapter 7

I didn’t have to go looking for Jake because as soon as I got home, he came climbing into my room.