Ace of Spades Sneak Peek(48)

I’d forgotten what that felt like.



* * *



Friday


Last night, while I slept, the melody seized my dream and took over. It played on a loop until I woke up, jumped out of bed, and rushed to school as fast as I could.

I finally know what my audition piece should sound like!

I’m so early that there are only a handful of people in the hallway as I rush in. I climb the stairs, pushing my way through the oak door of the music room. I look around the classroom. Mr. Taylor hasn’t even arrived yet, much to my sort of relief—I really want to be alone right now, no distractions.

I sit at my desk, plug in the keyboard, watching it come alive with its usual zap sound, and then I close my eyes. I decide not to use my headphones, since nobody else is in here.

I picture the sea, and the usual images filter through …

Me underwater … sinking … and then suddenly I’m on the beach; people are laughing and running across the sand. The sun is blinding; I run toward the water again to escape it. But bare arms trap me, holding me back from the sea. I struggle, but they won’t budge. I turn to look at who it is—

My eyes flash open as I stumble off my chair, chest heaving. I look up and Jack is standing over me.

“What the fuck, Jack!”

“What the fuck? The fuck is I thought you were taking care of it?”

Taking care of what? Everything Jack had a problem with is solved. Dre already broke up with me, his brothers are safe. What the fuck is there to take care of? He doesn’t even hang out with me anymore.

“I did—”

“Taking care of it is lying low. Taking care of it is not fucking Terrell Mc-Creeper-son from middle school!”

I swear my heart stops beating.

I can’t handle any more pictures or videos. I want to live my life without having to constantly look over my shoulder.

“You know Terrell?” I manage.

Jack shakes his head in disbelief at me.

“Of course I do. My brother told me he saw you guys walking home together. Everyone knows Terrell’s a fucking weirdo.”

I didn’t know he existed until last Friday.

My insides feel shaky and unstable. At least it’s his brother telling him and not a school-wide blast about me.

“You do this to yourself, Devon. You do this all to yourself. We studied, we got into this place, we both had the chance to be normal. To leave middle school habits in middle school—but nah. You come here, and you act as weird as Terrell. You deserve everything coming to you.”

Jack moves back.

“Have a nice life, Devon,” he spits.

Then he leaves.

I forget about trying to attempt the piece again, just stay seated on the ground and let my body do what it wants. I don’t hold back; I don’t shove things into corners or boxes. I can’t anymore.

I think about Ma and how she’s struggling and how I’m so fucking helpless. How I need to do well and get a job and get a scholarship and get into college. I think about Dre and how he said he loved me, then dumped me, like love doesn’t mean anything. I think about how I love him so much it hurts, and how I can’t make him drop everything for me like I would for him.

I think about Jack and how—despite the fact that we’ve been best friends for years, done everything together; despite the fact that I was there for him when he lost his parents, like so many of us do; despite the fact that he told me he’d always have my back when they took my dad away—as much as he doesn’t want to admit it, he’s always hated this part of me.

I remember when I first told Jack I liked guys, and the pained expression on his face. I remember the way he handed me his game controller and said he needed to go and check on the burgers in the oven. I remember feeling so shitty, but taking the controller and finishing the level he was on and not bringing it up again. Jack hated it when I started dating Scotty. He was never happy, and I told myself it was because Scotty was a dick, not because he had a dick. Jack would “joke” about girls that he knew with short haircuts and muscled arms who I could date, like who I’m attracted to is as trivial as appearance. And he would flinch when I spoke about Dre.

And on top of everything, there’s Aces—this person, or people, hell-bent on ruining my life.

I feel so lost.

Maybe I’m just cursed or broken … Maybe this is unfixable.

I keep sniffing as my nose blocks. God, I hate crying. I can’t breathe, and the more I gasp, the more tears fall, the more my chest hurts and squeezes.

The more I want to leave this place and never come back.





18


CHIAMAKA

Friday


In all my years of school, I’ve never gotten detention before. Now, somehow I’m on my third.

Sure, I’ve done things that could have resulted in one, but I’ve never been caught for anything.

And now here I am, in the year it matters most, no longer Head Prefect and standing next to Richards, being given our labor tools.

Usually, I don’t see him in detention—or outside of it, for that matter. But today Ward took us both to the same classroom, handing Devon the trash picker for outside and giving me the gum scraper for inside. I almost feel sorry for Devon. It’s raining pretty badly.

“No talking,” Headmaster Ward says, giving us one last look before exiting the classroom.