Rowdy Boy

CRACK!

A twig snaps in half, but it makes me jolt up and down.

“Who’s there?” I ask.

No one replies.

Two seconds later, three boys pop out from the bushes. They’re drunk and walking like idiots. One of them falls over a rock while the other two laugh and drink more booze. And when they look up, they spot me.

I sit there and stare at them.

It’s only then that I realize … Michael is one of the boys.

He clutches his red cup closer to his chest the moment he spots me, a flicker shimmering in his eyes. My nails dig into the wood.

“Hey, isn’t that …?” he murmurs.

I get up from the stump and bite my lip. “Leave me alone.”

He tilts his head, wearing a dirty smile on his face. “Yeah, it is. It’s you. You’re that girl. Cole’s.”

That girl. Cole’s.

Is that how I’m known now?

My stomach twists into knots as the three boys walk closer and closer.

“Hey, why aren’t you in there with him?” Michael asks. “Don’t you like him?”

“That’s none of your business,” I say, my hands forming fists.

“Aww … you’re pretty,” one of the other ones says. “Wanna dance?”

“No, thanks. I’d rather be left alone,” I say, and I walk off away from them toward the trees.

“C’mon! Don’t walk away now. We’re just trying to have fun!” the other one says. I recognize him now as the guy I just danced with back at the house. Shit.

“Don’t leave now,” Michael taunts.

“Go back to Ariane,” I yell at him.

He laughs. “Why would I? She doesn’t care about me. She only came because of Cole.”

That makes me stop in my tracks.

“How do they know each other?” I ask as I turn my head to him.

He raises a brow, and a filthy smirk appears on his face. “Yeah … you’d like to know that, wouldn’t you?” He licks his lips and then ogles me in a way that reminds me of the night I try so desperately to forget. “What are you willing to do to find out?”

“Never mind,” I say, and I quickly turn around and keep walking.

“Hold on, where are you going now?” one of the others says. He catches up with me and grabs my arm.

“Let go!” I hiss, jerking free.

He’s momentarily taken aback by my aggressive move, but I’ve learned not to get close. Especially not to drunk boys … or ones who have done drugs. Because I can definitely smell them on his breath.

“You’re too pretty. Hasn’t anyone told you that?” he murmurs, making me want to vomit with the way he’s breathing in my face. “What’s a pretty girl like you doing out here all by yourself?”

“Trying to get away from you,” I spit.

The look on his face changes. Monstrous.

Unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

“Fuck you,” he retorts, his voice threatening, vile.

I quickly move away and start walking in the opposite direction again.

“You know, I think you’re a catch,” Michael says. “Cole doesn’t know what he’s got.”

I don’t reply. I keep walking and ignore them because saying anything is just baiting them to act.

“And I think you know that,” Michael adds. “Why else would you show up at our cabin?”

They keep stalking me, and I’m getting more and more anxious as my adrenaline starts to spike.

“You wanted a taste, didn’t you?” he asks. “You were practically begging for it.”

The other boys laugh and grunt. “Maybe she’s still asking for it,” one of them says.

I wish they’d just shut up and go, but they won’t leave me alone … and they keep chasing me farther into the woods.

Suddenly, one of them grabs my arm. “C’mon. Give me a kiss. Lemme see what’s made Cole this horny.”

I slap him. Hard.

Fuck.

He touches his cheek and releases my arm. When I start walking again, he growls, “Grab her.”

Panic seeps in, and I run as hard as I can.

When I look over my shoulder, my face scrunches up at the sight of them chasing after me like goddamn hunting dogs, and I scream.

I run even faster than before, my heart racing in my throat.

Their footsteps crackle behind me as they run across the fallen leaves, a reminder of their nearby presence.

I’m being hunted down by drunk, drugged-out boys who want to do things to me that I can’t and don’t want to think about.

Tears well up in my eyes, but I keep going, so I can get as far away from them as possible. I don’t think. I just run.

But when one of them grabs ahold of my waist and pulls me down, I scream.

He quickly covers my mouth with his hand, wrestling me down onto the dirt. I cry and fight him off, but it’s no use. Another one sits down on top of me. A belt buckle is pulled.

No. No. NO!

This can’t happen again!

“You know you want it,” the boy whispers into my ear.