Hooked (Harlequin Teen) (17 page)

Chapter 31
Fred

I SURVIVED
HOMEROOM
and found my way across campus to English without
hyperventilating. I didn’t walk to English as much as float.

Along the way, I scanned the hallway for Ryan, trying not to
appear too eager but unable to ignore the fireworks bursting inside me. I’d
never been so exhilarated by a day that had barely begun.

I walked into English before the bell. Almost everyone was
seated, including Ryan. He sat in the last seat in my row, his head partially
hidden and lowered over an open book. He didn’t look up when I entered, and I
wondered whether to go back and say something.

Like
Hello.

The rules have changed,
I reminded
myself. I could do that now. He was my boyfriend, wasn’t he?

But then my eyes met Seth Winter’s. He sat next to Ryan. He
flashed one of his tight-lipped, icy smiles that made every hair prickle on the
back of my neck. I had to wonder what Ryan saw in Seth. Could Seth ever forgive
me for taking his spot on the golf team?

Then my eyes lowered to my seat, the empty one at the front of
the row. There was a folded newspaper waiting on my desk, maybe the same one
that Ryan had shown me in the library, and my stomach somersaulted all over
again.

Quickly, I placed my backpack underneath my desk and slipped
into the seat.

My smile faded when I found the photo on page three of the
sports section, the same one where I was holding my driver on the fourth tee.
Someone had used a black marker to draw a band around my forehead with feathers
on each side. A crude Indian headdress.

My nostrils flared and my breathing quickened.

The photo turned cloudy the longer I stared at it. I had to
swallow back the bile building deep in my throat. I folded and then crumpled the
newspaper and stuffed it inside my backpack. I wanted to shred it into a million
tiny pieces.

“Miss Oday?” Mrs. Weisz said. “Is something wrong?”

I froze. My eyes turned up. Then I remembered where I was.
“Wrong?” I mumbled.

“Yes, wrong,” Mrs. Weisz enunciated. “You keep rattling that
newspaper. Do you mind?” Her eyes looked like they could bulge through her
bifocals. A few students snickered behind me. One of them sounded like Seth.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

“Thank you,” Mrs. Weisz said with a flourish and then returned
to writing assignments on the whiteboard. Her black marker squeaked across the
surface.

Still struggling to control my breathing, I turned and peered
over my shoulder at Ryan. I needed to talk to him. I needed to tell him about
the newspaper. I figured he’d be as angry about it as I was. Instead of finding
Ryan’s eyes, I found Seth’s cold, empty ones. That icy grin still plastered
across his face.

I spun around and tried to focus. But concentration was
impossible. All I could see was the clock above Mrs. Weisz’s head. It was as if
somebody had smothered the clock’s hands in glue.

When the bell rang, I was one of the first students to stand. I
grabbed my backpack, stuffed my books inside and waited for Ryan to walk down
the row.

But Ryan sprang out of the back row in four long strides and
was the first one to reach the door.

He didn’t turn toward the front of my row like I’d figured he
would. His head and eyes stayed lowered. He didn’t acknowledge me in any way. I
was invisible.

My throat tightened as I watched him dart toward the door
without even a glance in my direction.

What is happening?

I had to talk to Ryan.

This can’t be happening, this can’t be
happening, this can’t be happening. This. Can’t. Be. Happening.

And yet it was.

Chapter 32
Ryan

I COULDN’T LEAVE
ENGLISH CLASS FAST
enough. It was like my head wanted to explode, and
sitting next to Seth only fueled my pent-up frustration. I couldn’t stop
thinking about what he’d said:
You’re only interested in Fred because you know it
will piss off your dad.

Was that why I liked her?

My mind raced throughout class, never once hearing Mrs.
Weisz’s lecture on Shakespeare.

As soon as the bell rang, I sprang from my seat and raced
for the door, my backpack already threaded over my shoulder. I ignored Seth’s
“Hold up” call.
Instead, I burst through the door and headed for the corner where I
planned to wait for Fred, alone. She would have to go that way to reach her next
class.

Except Gwyneth was already waiting for me outside the
door.

She had one hand resting on her hip and her backpack
threaded over her opposite shoulder. Her weight was shifted on her right leg
like she’d been waiting awhile. And she was smiling at me, the tight-lipped
kind.

I pulled up when I saw her. I had hoped not to talk to her
till fourth period. Nothing was going the way I had planned.

“We need to talk.” She grabbed my hand.
“Now.”
Her fingers were dry
and ice-cold.

She tugged, and I followed, grudgingly, to the corner where
I had planned to wait for Fred. It had a perfect view of the English classroom
door. Until people began streaming out of the rooms and brushed by us from all
directions. It was like being in a fish tank. In a matter of seconds, the
normally gray hallway erupted with color and voices.

I lowered my head toward Gwyneth so I could hear her,
keeping one eye on the door to watch for Fred. “Yeah,” I said, swallowing. “I
need to talk to you, too.” Her hair smelled like strawberry cough syrup,
suffocating me.

“Me, first,” Gwyneth said, predictably. Her chin lifted. She
left her hand on my forearm and began to rub her thumb nervously against my
wrist.

“You didn’t call me back yesterday.”

I swallowed. “Sorry.”

“Where were you Saturday night?”

“Out,” I said flatly. I wondered if I should tell her that I
knew she and Seth followed me.

“With who?”

“With Fred,” I said quickly.

Tears began to moisten Gwyneth’s eyes. That didn’t help.
“Fred?” Gwyneth said it like it was impossible. Her shiny pink lower lip began
to quiver.

Jeez. This is hard.

“Look, I know I should have told you. I’m sorry. But this
thing with Fred and me...” I paused. My voice lowered. “It just...happened.”

Gwyneth choked back a sob. “You lied to me!” She lifted her
hand to her face, rotating between hiding her eyes and glaring at me. “You’ve
been lying to me all along.”

“I’m so sorry, Gwyneth. Please don’t cry,” I said,
struggling for the right words but finding none. I mean, how do you get a girl
to stop crying once the tears start flowing? “But I like Fred. A lot.”

Oops. Totally wrong thing to say.

Gwyneth cried harder, muffling her sobs with her hand. She
leaned on me like she was about to faint. I couldn’t tell if she was being
overly dramatic or was truly upset. “But what about Homecoming next month?” She
sniffed against the back of her hand. “You promised.”

Instead of answering, I closed my eyes briefly. I didn’t
even like school dances. Gwyneth’s hand on my arm started to shake when I didn’t
say what she wanted to hear.

“Please, Ryan. Don’t do this....” She leaned against me,
squeezing my arm for balance, but then her voice changed. Peering around my
shoulder, she half blurted, half laughed, “Oh, no. Look who’s here....”

“What?” I turned.

“Skank,” Gywneth said, loud enough for everyone in the
hallway to hear.

Fred stared at us from across the hallway. Her lips parted
slightly as her dark eyes pulled together, confused. Angry. They darted between
Gwyneth and me. They took in Gwyneth’s hand resting on my arm, her entire body
leaning into mine. Fred blinked once, then twice. Her head began to shake.

“Fred,” I said. But then my eyes traveled above her
shoulders.

Sam Tracy appeared behind her, dwarfing Fred and just about
everyone else. He didn’t glare at me, but he didn’t look like he thought very
much of me either. He tapped Fred’s shoulder, and she turned to him. He lowered
his head to say something in her ear that I couldn’t hear above the roar of
voices filling the hallway. She nodded, and together they turned and walked down
the hallway, surrounded by frazzled students trying to beat the next bell.

“Fred!” my voice roared. “Wait!” I shook off Gwyneth’s
hand.

But Fred didn’t stop.

I abandoned Gwyneth and wedged my way through the crowd to
reach Fred, jostling the people around me with my backpack. Someone even yelled,
“Dude, chill!” but I ignored him.

Fred moved fast, and for a huge guy, so did Sam. I finally
caught up to them right before they reached the next doorway. I pulled back on
her shoulder till she had to stop. “Fred,” I said again. “Hold up. Please.”

This time, Sam spun around and glared at me, his black eyes
shiny with bottomless anger. We were both breathing pretty heavily, and my heart
began to pump in overtime.

“Hey, you got a problem?” Sam said, plucking my hand from
Fred’s shoulder. Then he replaced my hand with his beefy one. Like his belonged
on her shoulder, not mine.

Fred finally turned, not because she wanted to, but because
she had to. The three of us were causing quite a scene in the hallway.

I looked at Sam. “Can you just give us a second?”

Sam turned to Fred and frowned. But she nodded at him while
barely looking at me. “I’ll see you inside,” she said to Sam.

Sam sighed and walked inside the room backward, glowering at
me the whole time. I ignored him as students filed past us into the
classroom.

“It’s not what you think,” I said. “With Gwyneth, I
mean.”

Fred shook her head. “Really?” Her eyes pooled with hurt.
“You looked pretty cozy. And you ignored me in English.” She looked at me like
she was looking through me.

“Well, what’s with Tracy?” I retorted. I hated that she was
suddenly looking at me like I was some kind of stranger. “You two looked pretty
tight, too.” I wanted to swallow back the words, but my entire body was pumped
with enough adrenaline to fill an Olympic-size pool. Seeing them together, Sam’s
hand on her shoulder, even for an instant, was like a punch to the gut.

“Sam is just a—” But then Fred stopped herself. Her chin
lifted. “Sam and I date. Occasionally.”

It was like someone split open my chest and yanked out my
heart. I sure as hell wasn’t expecting that. “Wish you would have told me that.”
Before I fell
for you. Hard.

“Maybe it’s better if you just leave me alone, Ryan. Maybe
it’s better if we leave each other alone. We made a mistake. This is a
mistake.”

“What?” My voice turned raspy. I couldn’t believe what I was
hearing. I went speechless, and my eyes dropped to her right hand. She clutched
a piece of newspaper. It was wadded up into a ball inside her hand. But then my
eyes traveled from her hand back to her eyes. They were still wide. Hurt. And
suspicious. Finally, I took one step back and dragged my tongue across my lips,
sensing the brick wall building around her heart. It might have been invisible,
but I saw it as easily as I’d seen the rusted barbed wire at the end of Pecos
Road. “Okay,” I said, lifting my palms. “If that’s what you want. But you got it
all wrong. You got
me
all wrong.”

Fred opened her mouth to say something, and for an instant
my breath hitched with hope. But her lips snapped shut, and she said nothing
before turning into the classroom just before the bell rang. I couldn’t help but
notice that Sam had saved the seat beside him with his backpack.

And now I was late for class.

Standing frozen in the hallway, I watched Fred till she took
her seat next to Sam. She never looked back.

Behind me, Seth said, “Told you, dude. You should have
listened. The girl is weird. And totally wrong for you.” He paused, peering over
my shoulder into Fred’s classroom. “Indians always stick together. Don’t forget
that.”

Still speechless, I walked with Seth to our next class as a
familiar hollowness filled my chest all over again like it had never left.
Whatever opening in the sky that I’d thought I’d soared through on Saturday
night had slammed shut like a steel door right in my face.

Just like that.

Chapter 33
Fred

THE NEXT TWO
class periods muddled forward in a hazy blur.

Teachers prattled on about hydrogen and mercury, and then their
voices morphed into mind-numbing discussions about complementary angles and
trigonometric functions. Normally I wouldn’t have minded, but today it was all I
could do to stop from snapping my pen in two. For the first time in my whole
life, school held no appeal. I couldn’t concentrate on a single thing. I didn’t
care about chemicals and angles and numbers.

Sam asked me what was wrong, but I couldn’t tell him. I already
felt terrible for using him, whether he realized it or not. I owed him an
apology as much as I owed one to Ryan.

Why had I behaved like such an idiot after English? I’m sure
there was a perfectly understandable reason why Ryan was holding Gwyneth Riordan
in the hallway, right? It was just that it hurt so much seeing them together
like that, so intimate.

At lunch, I walked quickly into the school cafeteria. The room
buzzed with student voices, chairs scraping across the floor, trays slamming.
The fried smells wafting from the kitchen mixed with the unease roiling in my
stomach, and not in a good way. I had to press my palms below my ribs to hold
myself together.

I stopped inside the entrance and scanned the room. My eyes
swept the tables closest to the windows, a part of me hoping that I wouldn’t
find Ryan in his usual spot.

But there he was.

The sun streamed through the window behind him, brightening the
tips of his hair but shadowing his face. He was surrounded by all of his
friends, including Gwyneth. Still Gwyneth. Always Gwyneth.

I stood at the entrance, watching. Waiting for him to move.

But Ryan didn’t see me—or pretended not to.

I should have marched over to his table, but my legs froze.

Then the room morphed from light speed to slow motion. All of
the colors inside the cafeteria began to swirl and blur together, and the room
went completely silent—at least inside my head. That’s because I had to watch as
Ryan placed his arm behind Gwyneth’s chair like it belonged there. Like it had
never left.

Nothing had changed. Everything that I thought had changed,
hoped had changed, had returned to exactly as it was, as if it had been there
all along.

My eyes turned cloudy, watching, and it was like the cafeteria
started breathing for me, slow and heavy. Then my temples began to pound as
everybody’s faces blurred together in confusing patterns like they were one
great big blob at the end of a kaleidoscope. My hands pressed against my
stomach.

“This can’t be happening,” I muttered, fighting back nausea. It
was like living inside a nightmare. It
was
a
nightmare. Gwyneth must have been able to read my lips because she flashed me a
triumphant smile. “This isn’t real. I must be dreaming,” I mumbled, blinking
rapidly to clear my eyes. But then I let my mind think something even worse:
Ryan played me. He used me.

My knees began to buckle, and I had to reach one hand for the
wall. Just as I was about to leave, a hand pulled back my elbow.

“Fred?” a girl said close to my ear. Her voice was light and
airy. Steady. Achingly familiar.

I blinked again.

“Are you okay?”

I didn’t answer.
Am I okay?
The
answer was too painful.

“Want to eat lunch with Yolanda and me?”

I focused on her face. It was Kelly Oliver. I’d never been so
glad to see her in my entire life. Yolanda stood beside her, her eyes narrowing
before traveling over my shoulder toward Ryan’s table.

“Fuckers. Can’t trust ’em. None of ’em.”

“Watch your language, Yo. Not the time.”

“Well, it’s true. You know it’s true.”

Kelly rolled her eyes at her cousin. “Let’s just eat, okay.”
Her hand wrapped around my arm like a soft blanket. “Come on, Fred. You’re stuck
with your homegirls today.”

I nodded numbly as the room turned blurry again.

“Good,” Kelly said, guiding me to a table that faced away from
Ryan. “’Cause you look like you could use a friend.”