The Rebel of Raleigh High (Raleigh Rebels #1)(12)

Once I’m in my car, I lean my forehead against the steering wheel, relief soothing my frayed nerves; I made it out unscathed. Today was just one day, though. I pull out my cell phone and open up the calendar, doing the math. It takes a while to factor in all of the public and school holidays, but time is something I have right now. Since Mom and Dad still think I’m on the cheer squad, I have a full ninety minutes to kill before I can show up at home without raising any red flags. Eventually, I come up with a number—a large, soul-destroying number that makes me want to weep. One hundred and sixty-nine days. That’s how many school days there are left between now and graduation. Reaching my car without mishap just now felt like a victory, but in the grand scheme of things, it was nothing. I’m going to have to repeat this whole, shitty, frustrating process another one hundred and sixty-nine times before I can walk away from this place for good.

I almost drop my phone, jumping at the sound of the deep rumble across the other side of the parking lot; it can only be Alessandro Moretti’s motorcycle, roaring to life. Two weeks ago, I started off this academic year, determined to make it through the other side in a dignified manner, with a straight back and a defiant ‘fuck you’ in my eyes.

What a joke. I’ve been in detention once already, and the arrival of some jumped up bad boy wannabe has sent me down some weird helter-skelter of anxiety for absolutely no goddamn reason. I need to be stronger than this. I am fucking stronger than this. I need to remember who I am, the girl I used to be before one terrible night changed everything and my life disintegrated before my eyes. The old Silver would never have sulked in her car, hiding from the world, feeling sorry for herself. She would have grabbed today by the balls and forced it into submission. And if it hadn’t obeyed? The old Silver would have forced it to conform, or there would have been dire consequences.

It’s strange to me now that I used to be so confident. I remember feeling that way—self-assured, poised and assertive—as I stalked the halls of Raleigh High like some kind of apex predator, comfortable in the knowledge that I was untouchable. Those days feel like another lifetime. They feel like a very vivid dream I had once upon a time, real for a time during the hours I was asleep but gone the moment I awoke and found myself here, wearing the skin of someone deeply and profoundly crippled by self-doubt.

I close my eyes, thumping the back of my head against the headrest behind me a total of three times before I realize that it actually hurts, and I should stop. Fuck…this…shit. I could go to the library. I could hit up Giacomo’s for a slice and do my homework in a booth, but Mom sometimes picks up a pie for Dan’s kids after they finish school. If she saw me there, well, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. I know I can’t keep this up forever. There will come a time over the next one hundred and sixty-nine days when Mom or Dad finds out that I’ve been shirking the after-school activities that helped bolster my college applications, and I already know how they’re going to react. They’re going to freak the fuck out. Part of me thinks I should just tell them everything and get it over with. But then I imagine the look on mom’s face when I delve into the finer details of my outcast status, and I just can’t do it. It’ll fucking kill her. She won’t be able to take it.

I crack my eyes, checking Mickey, and I see that it’s only ten to three. Still almost another hour to go until I can leave. Man, time really does seem to slow inside the Nova when I’m—

“Fuck!” A loud rap on the window, right next to my head, startles the living shit out of me. I slam my knee into the console, scraping the bare skin that’s showing through the rip in my jeans. Damn, that hurts like a bitch. I can see blood, for fuck’s sake. I’m boiling mad as I quickly wind down the window and glare at the person standing beside the car, ready to rip them a new one, when…

Alessandro Moretti slowly bends down and rests his forearms against the side of the Nova, curving a dark eyebrow at me. His bottom lip is sucked into his mouth. His leather jacket is nowhere to be seen, even though it’s fucking freezing out, and it looks like it’s starting to rain. Quick, intelligent, demanding brown eyes meet mine, and I react by stuttering out a jumble of syllables that don’t make any sense.

“Ju—ne—wha—do—waiiiiiiit. Youuuuu…” I shake my head, throwing my hands up in defeat when I run out of potential sentence starters.

A deep frown forms between his charcoal eyebrows. “Non sembrava Italiano. Doveva essere Italiano?”

I just blink at him. “Excuse me?”

His lips purse, his mouth lifting up at one side. Am I imagining it, or does he look weirdly disappointed? His eyes aren’t just brown; they’re full of cinnamon, gold, honey, and caramel—all warm tones. So how the fuck do they somehow manage to look frosty as his gaze flits around the inside of the Nova, settling on the guitar case that’s sitting on the back seat. He huffs down his nose, then pulls away from the window. “Never mind,” he says in English.

He spins around and walks away, the back of his grey t-shirt spattered with rain, clinging to his back, and I’m left staring after him with my mouth hanging open.

Never mind?

What does that mean, never mind?

Did I just fail some sort of test? He was asking me if I spoke Italian or something; I heard the word ‘Italiano’ twice in pretty quick succession. But to just bail when I don’t understand? That seems like a bit of a dick move. In my mind, I lean out of the window, and I yell after him in the rain. I call him an asshole. I ask him what the hell he wanted. But I don’t do that, because I’m a coward. I’m fucking scar—