The Cheerleaders(28)

Jen unfolded the paper. Recognized the words she’d written in her journal at the beginning of class. I’m not okay.

Ethan had scrawled out a response: Do you want to talk about it?

Jen flushed, even though it was impossible for anyone to know what had just happened. She stuffed the note in her pocket and headed to the cafeteria, forgetting that she and Ethan shared the same lunch period.

Her table was already packed; Mark Zhang had his arm draped over Bethany Steiger’s shoulders. Bethany rolled her eyes and pushed his arm off her, even though everyone knew they’d been hooking up since the summer.

When Mark saw Jen, his face lit up. Bethany looked like she tasted something foul, and Colleen examined her nails, trying to look as oblivious as possible.

Everyone also knew that Mark Zhang had had a thing for Jen since she was a freshman.

Jen didn’t look at them as she settled into her seat. Colleen looked up at her. “Have you been crying?”

Jen lifted a hand to her cheek. Her face was probably still beet red, and the tear or two that snuck out of her eyes in Mr. Ward’s class probably smudged her mascara. “No. Just don’t feel well.”

“You look like crap,” Bethany said. Colleen’s eyes widened with horror.

“Like you have a fever or something,” Bethany amended. Jen wasn’t going to take Bethany’s bait. She was always doing that—making nasty comments, diamond-knife-thin cuts that you didn’t realize stung until much later.

“I know what will make you laugh.” Bethany smirked over her iced tea, looking at something at the table behind Jen. “McCreepy is showing a full moon.”

Jen’s stomach puckered: Mark Zhang howled with laughter. “No way. He broke his belt after gym. Lemme see.”

Colleen tilted sideways, crushing her shoulder into Jen’s so Mark could lean across the table and gawk. Jen refused to turn around and look.

Mark’s laughing reached a crescendo, and his friend, some other jerk of a football player, joined in. “Yo, anyone got a quarter?”

Bethany dug a coin out of her change purse and handed it to Mark. Before Jen realized what he was doing, Mark stood up and lobbed the quarter at Ethan. Jen spun around in time to see it bounce off Ethan’s back and onto the floor. Ethan’s shoulders went stiff, but he didn’t turn to face them.

“Damn it,” Mark said. “Come on, Beth, you take a shot.”

The rest of the table laughed as Bethany held a quarter between her thumb and forefinger. As Bethany examined it, Colleen buried her head in her food. Jen watched Bethany in horror as she tossed the coin at Ethan.

Mark hooted. “So close! Who’s next?”

Jen’s throat was closing. She wanted to scream at them, but something was stopping her. And then Ethan stood up. Pulled his pants up and tugged his shirt down. His face was eerily calm as he strode over to the garbage can, holding his empty tray.

He stopped by their table and dropped a quarter in front of Mark. “I think this is yours.”

Mark held Ethan’s gaze as he reached and smacked the tray from Ethan’s hands. What was left in his carton of fruit punch spilled over Ethan’s sneakers. He held Mark’s gaze. And then he smirked.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Mark wasn’t smiling anymore. The table was silent. Ethan’s smirk seemed to have unnerved them.

Ethan didn’t answer. His gaze slid over Jen, as if he didn’t see her at all. She watched him walk away, and at the last moment, when the rest of the table had resumed conversation, laughing awkwardly, Jen saw it.

The way Ethan folded the fingers on one of his hands into the shape of a gun.





I haven’t texted Ethan McCready since I found the note he left in the house across the street. I don’t want him to know that I know who he is. He probably didn’t expect me to figure it out. He had saved something of Jen’s, but how would he know she saved something with his handwriting and that I had a way of tying it back to him?

I don’t want to scare him into doing anything. Especially not when he knows where we live. If I told my parents about Ethan being in the house across the street, about his taunts, Tom would go DEFCON 1 and Ethan would never be able to contact us again.

If I want to keep my family safe and get answers at the same time, I have to keep my mouth shut.

When I get last week’s AP chem quiz back on Friday, there’s a big fat “52%” at the top, circled in red pen. Practice is no better; Coach shouts at the sophomores for erupting into giggles during warm-up, and midway through our third run-through of the new competition routine, Coach stops the music.

Next to me, Rachel looks like she’s going to crap her pants. But Coach locks eyes with me instead. “Your fouettés are sloppy, Rayburn.”

The weekend feels like a small mercy. When I get downstairs on Saturday morning, Tom is coming through the front door, cradling a paper bag from the deli. Mango dances around his heels, smelling the bacon-and-egg sandwich he gets every weekend.

“Oh good, you’re up. Got your cinnamon raisin bagel.”

“Thanks.” My heart is beating in my throat. Tom looks at me, eyebrows pinched together. Do you know I took the phone?

As if he’d even say anything if he did. He falls into step with me on my way to the dining room.

“What do you think about coming to the range today?”