A Whole New Crowd(26)

She laughed, her voice squeaky. “You’re not like the rumors say.”
“That I’m a stone cold bitch.”
“Yeah and that you screwed Tray Evans.”
“Where?”
She listed them off with her fingers. “In the school parking lot, in the parking lot at the diner, at one of his parties, at Rickets’ House, and in his car.”
“I’ve been busy.”
She giggled and then squeaked before turning away. Her face got red. I looked over and saw Tray staring back. He had knelt beside me.
“What?” I gestured to the teacher. “He’s going to start class.”
“We have two days.”
“For what?” I wasn’t an idiot. I knew. I was just playing.
He wasn’t amused. “Will you please help?”
“I told you I would, but you didn’t spill the details. I had to hold my sister when she sobbed and asked questions. I couldn’t answer any of them.” He had helped me yesterday. Then Jace told me to stay away from him. I was getting whiplash from being pulled in so many directions. I sighed. “Let me think about it.”
He hadn’t gotten the answer he wanted. His lips pressed together, but he stood. “Saw Jace Lanser leaving town last night. Stopped at the diner for a burger.”
“Yeah. So?”
He backed off, taking his own seat across the room, but it didn’t matter. The entire class was listening. “Nothing. The guy’s a loser.”
“Keep talking and maybe I won’t help after all.” Jace was family. No one talked bad about my family.
Mandy hushed me. “Taryn, don’t talk to him like that.”
I ignored her. Everyone was waiting. No one spoke back to Tray Motherf*cking Evans, but I just did. He didn’t shoot back and I could feel the confusion from everyone. My classmate leaned over and whispered, “You are officially my idol. No girl who’s slept with him has gotten away with talking to him like that, and he sought you out.”
She was so excited about the last fact. I sighed. This would be the number one rumor going through school for the rest of the day. I caught sight of Mandy’s warning glare and rolled my eyes. Another day that I had saved her from the gossip mill. When she waved her finger in the air, I flipped her my middle finger. No one was going to tell me how to think, speak, or feel. If she kept trying, she’d learn like everyone else did that they could kiss my ass. When she gasped again, I was tempted to make it a double deuce and flip my other middle finger too.
“Okay, class,” the teacher started, and I ignored my sister for the rest of the class and the rest of the day. I ignored everyone else while I was at it, not that it was a sacrifice. As the day went on, Jennica pulled her friends to the side. All of them gave me varying looks of hatred. Mandy ignored me with her sudden new group of friends and all the other girls took cues from the reigning crowd.
I was a social leper. The only person who didn’t understand it was my table mate. When I went to another class, she saw me in the hallway and waved. Two other girls were with her. One gasped and the other grabbed her hand, pulling it down.
The next day was the same. Mandy still adopted the same philosophy to act like nothing happened in her world. She barely talked to me at home and that same guy slept over. I wanted to ask what the deal was with him, but since she wouldn’t even say hello to me, I assumed it would’ve been a lost cause to ask. The only thing different about the day was that Samuel and Tray were missing. People noticed. Towards the end of the day, I started thinking people had forgotten about me, but nope. Jennica and her friends stopped talking the second I entered the hallway. Their hatred was still going strong.
I shrugged. It was peaceful to me, but couldn’t help myself. As I passed by, Jennica stared at me the whole time. I pretended to scratch my ear with my middle finger again. I was fully aware how immature it was, but I enjoyed it and she had heeded my warning. No one talked about Mandy and Devon. No one seemed to notice that they weren’t standing next to each other, holding hands, cuddling, or talking even. My sisterly duty had been fulfilled. At the end of that day, as I headed to my car and saw Tray leaning against my car, I wondered if my friend duty needed to be fulfilled also.
Then I paused and asked him, “Are we friends?”
His arms were crossed over his chest and in that moment, I was reminded about his ‘god-like’ status around the school. Square jaw, his striking hazel eyes directed on me, and those perfect lips curled up in a small smirk. He really was gorgeous.
He smirked. “Only if you want us to be, Matthews.”
He had pissed me off. He had comforted me in a way no one knew how to do, and he knew how to read me. No one knew how to read me like he did.