Teen Hyde (High School Horror Story #2)(13)
Paisley had been my best friend for years, but when I thought about the barbs in her tongue, the ones that could poke me and call me a slut with a laugh and an oh you know it’s true smile, I wanted to recoil as though from a hot stove.
The more I thought about it, the more I saw that Sunshine worked like a really great tube of concealer. It matched my skin tone perfectly and nobody, not even Paisley, needed to know that I had a pimple.
“We just met up at the park and played a little basketball.” I shrugged. “No biggie.”
Paisley polished off the rest of the Danish and licked her fingers. She’d never had the same tendency toward chubby stomach rolls that I had. “Okay, so you’re taking it slow. That’s good, I guess. Different for you, though.”
I rolled my eyes. “We’re not taking it anywhere.”
Her eyes widened. “Is he gay?”
“I don’t know, Paize, and I didn’t ask because I don’t care.” By now the Sunshine was flowing through my veins like liquid gold. I gave an easy smile. One that had the old Cassidy written all over it. “Stop being so uptight.” I pinched her cheek like an overzealous great-aunt. Then, in my altered state, a thought seized me. “Hey, do you want to go for a run this afternoon? It’s really beautiful out.” Sun poured through the glass doors. Outside, churchgoers were shucking off their cardigans and enjoying the weather.
“Did an alien abduct you? Or … oh, I know, are you doing one of those Gwyneth Paltrow juice fasts because I’ve been debating trying the master cleanse, but wasn’t sure…”
I kept my gaze trained outside, staring at the fresh air and the rustling leaves and the flowers, all brushed with a spring glow. “Truth?” I cut her off.
Paisley gave a light, frustrated stomp of her foot. “Truth. Yeah, of course. Always.”
“It was, just, I don’t know, getting kind of exhausting being sad all the time.”
*
SWEAT DRENCHED THE neckline of my T-shirt and turned my legs slimy. I kicked my tennis shoes off on the front porch and shoved them next to the family welcome mat. My muscles burned and my calves were already tight. I’d run the mile to Hollow Pines High to meet Paisley where we’d then done two full sets of stadium steps. Even though I knew I’d be sore in the morning, I relished the surge of endorphins, the feeling of fistfuls of blood pumping through my heart and the way my body felt totally awake after a good workout. An Eminem song blared through my headphones, reminding me of the times that Paisley and I used to ride around in her car, windows down with nowhere to go, blasting rap songs and nailing every line word for word at the top of our lungs. The memory made me smile. I tugged the buds from my ears and wrapped the wire around my phone as I pushed open the door to my house.
“Mom, I’m home!” I yelled. My socks left cloudy imprints on the hardwood floor as I pounded up the stairs to my room. The door to my bedroom was closed. When I opened it, I let out a soft shriek once I found that it was occupied.
“Honor? God, you scared me.” I blinked several times in quick succession, surprised to see her in my room when she wasn’t supposed to be and even more surprised when I took in what she was doing.
“Cassidy!” She whirled to turn her back away from the full-length mirror. She didn’t realize I could still see the phone clutched in her palm through the reflection.
My little sister was wearing a red thong and a black push-up bra. Both of them were mine. “What are you doing?” I lunged for her phone.
She jumped clear of me and held the phone out in her opposite hand to stay clear of my reach. “Nothing. God, don’t overreact. I’m going to wash them and put them right back where I found them, okay?”
Underneath her constellation of freckles, her face flushed pink.
“You think that’s what I’m worried about? Whether you return my … my underwear?” Her knobby knees bowed slightly inward as she tried to shift into a more modest position. I gawked at her pointy elbows and sharp collarbone, both of which would have made her appear more at home on a playground than posing in lingerie. “The question is what are you doing in them because I’ll tell you what it looks like you’re doing.”
She rolled her eyes and in that moment it looked to me like my little sister had morphed into some kind of otherworldly being. “Please, Cassidy. Like you aren’t going to parties and sneaking out with boys. I found you yesterday morning wearing your clothes from the night before. Remember?”
My mouth fell open. “I—I—what? That’s totally different.” And for a second it was like I had double vision. I saw Honor sneaking out to Dearborn. Honor flirting with college boys. Honor ditching her friends for a cute smile and a free drink. Honor being passed around, sneered at, called horrible names, names so poisonous they would burn a hole through her chest. And Honor not getting to choose her first anything because it was taken from her in one stupid moment.
She stood there twirling a few strands of hair around her finger.
“Give me your phone,” I said slowly, stretching out my hand.
She lifted her chin defiantly just as she had when she was five years old and wanted to wear a tutu for a week straight. “No.”
“Give it to me.”
“No!”
“Honor Mary Hyde, give me that phone!” I charged and grabbed her behind the elbow. We tumbled onto my bed.