Aftermath(37)

“Ignore it?” Alberto says. “Someone locked you in a room and lit it on fire, Skye.”

“I understand that you’re trying to turn the other cheek,” Tiffany says. “But this is way beyond bullying. I’m taking it to Mr. Vaughn.”

I wait for a call to the office. When it doesn’t come by math class, I’m relieved. Then I’m angry, as I realize this means Mr. Vaughn got those notes… and is doing absolutely nothing with them.

I arrive in math before Jesse – I make sure of that. If I had to walk past him, I’d feel obligated to say something. I refuse to make the first move again.

So I get to class early, and I wait. I notice him walking in, and when I look up, there’s a hitch in his step. Consternation flashes across his face. I wait for him to remember he really needs to be somewhere else right now. He wants to. I can tell. But he only meets my gaze and gives a little nod, and then slides into his seat.

He seems to pay attention during class. Once he takes out his phone, but he holds it below desk level, like he used to in middle school, not wanting to be rude to the teacher. In this class, he’s had no such compunctions before. Now he does something with his phone concealed, and then puts it away and goes back to work.

Class ends and as he stands, he palms a note onto my desk, like a magician.

See that empty spot? Abracadabra, a note appears! Did I leave that? No, you must be mistaken. I’m already making a beeline out the door.

I slip into the bathroom before I open it. I’m thirteen again, when Jesse passed me a note for the first time, and I was so sure it was a goodbye. I knew it wasn’t easy for him, once others saw us hanging out together.

Jesse and Skye, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g.

Hey, Mandal, do you like hanging around girls? You do kinda seem the type, nudge-nudge, wink-wink.

When I open this note, I’m taken back to that first one, also read in a bathroom stall, so if it hurt, no one would see me cry.

It’s the same note. The same two words.

After school?

Then he goes on to suggest we meet by the gym doors. Between the invitation and the location, something has been crossed out. Heavily crossed out. When I lift it to the light, I can make out numbers.

GPS coordinates.

I remember him on his phone. He was finding those coordinates. Writing them down. Did he smile a bit as he did? Maybe. But then he changed his mind. Crossed them out as hard as he could and wrote the location in text.

I run my thumb over those crossed-off numbers, and my eyes prickle, just a little. Then I pocket the note and leave.

Jesse

Jesse is waiting behind the school when his trainer texts. He ignores it. He knows what it’ll say, some variation on the same thing his trainer has been texting all weekend, that they need to talk about Jesse’s underperformance at the meet.

Underperformance? He won, didn’t he?

That doesn’t matter. What matters is that there was a scout in the stands, who declared Jesse a perfectly decent high school athlete. In other words, not destined for anything greater. Which is fine with Jesse. That’s all he wants. It’s all his parents expect. But his trainer has been pushing for more. And getting more doesn’t mean adding ten pounds to his lifting regimen.

Cheat. Fake. Poseur.

It started innocently enough. A new trainer, promising to take Jesse to the next level. Supplements and vitamins to help in the off-season. Some guys need the extra boost to put on muscle. Jesse’s one of them. No shame in that. Not until he got his head out of his ass and realized he was getting more than B-12.

Steroids.

When he figured it out, he freaked. Steroids = cheating, it’s as simple as that. Not according to his trainer. Lots of athletes use steroids to bulk up in the off-season. Jesse wasn’t taking enough to see side effects. He rarely had an acne breakout. He didn’t get roid rage. See? No problem.

Or that’s what his trainer said. Jesse does get acne, which he never had before. Then there’s his hair-trigger temper, also new. Zits and fistfights might be normal for some teenage boys. But not Jesse. Not until the steroids.

“Question,” a voice cuts into his thoughts, and he jumps. It’s Skye, and as he sees her, he feels a flash of panic. He was supposed to be prepping his apology.

She continues, “Are you hiding or is that supposed to look cool?”

He blinks and straightens, and as he does, he pushes his hood back, and she says, “Yes, that. The hood-pulled-over-the-eyes thing. Is it hiding? Or trying to look cool? Because it doesn’t do either. Just so you know.”

Until yesterday, he’d forgotten this side of Skye. The abrasive, in-your-face side. And he’d definitely forgotten what it was like to be on the receiving end.

He’s done something. Or failed to do something. And he’s trying to figure out which thing it is, from a very long list. Judging by the look on her face, though, it isn’t anything specific, but rather the culmination of it all. She’s had enough of him, and she’s here to say so.

He opens his mouth to start his carefully rehearsed apology, but she says, “Forget that question. I’ve got another. Tell me what happened at Southfield.”

“What?”

“Everyone says you got kicked out for fighting. I wouldn’t have bought it, but I saw you Saturday. You can fight.”

So can you. That’s what he wants to say. On Saturday, she threw down one of those guys before he got there, and while Skye has always been more athletic than him, she’d never taken martial arts. But she has now, and while he hopes it’s just a newly developed interest, he knows better. He knows things have happened in the past three years that made her decide she needed to learn to defend herself.