The comment stung. I thought of my sweet mother, all candy smiles and sticky skin as she stripped off her sweat-soaked lace g-string and six-inch heels after her shift and pulled on the cloud-pink pajamas I found for her in a thrift store. A hard lump rose in my throat. I shoved the image aside.Not now.
Wait until you get to your room, until you’re alone, then you can break down.
“I guess we’re not going to be braiding each other’s hair,” I muttered to Courtney.
“I wouldn’t touch that rat’s nest on your head if someone hid aFabergeegg inside,” Courtney sneered. “I bet it’s got real eggs in it, though. Insect eggs, laid by the gross things crawling around in there.”
Instinctively, my hand flew up to my face, to touch the dreadlock that always fell over my eye, to tuck it behind my ear – a gesture that Dante would so often do when he noticed my dreads in my eyes, which was all the time because I liked them unruly. Ever since the fire, I’d been touching my own hair more and more, seeking the comfort of the familiar weight of a hand moving the dreads. But it wasn’t the same. It would never be the same.
Courtney wrinkled her face in disgust, while Trey continued to smirk at me. The force of his loathing sank my stomach to my knees. He didn’t even know me, but it didn’t matter.
At the top of the stairs, the headmistress turned and frowned at me. “Don’t dawdle,” she snapped. “The school doesn’t bite.”
“She’s wrong,” Trey whispered. “Are you ready to find out just how bad we bite?”
The lump of hard, bitterness burned at the back of my throat. They were right. I didn’t belong here. I was the poor gutter-trash girl from the wrong side of the tracks, and they wereroyalty. They were the monarchs.They’re going to make my life miserable, and there’s nothing I can do.
Chapter Two
I followed Headmistress West beneath a pair of towering wooden doors into an enormous atrium. You could fit my entire Philly apartment building into this one room. Diffused light poured from a stained-glass dome in the roof, projecting prisms of colors across the marble floor. I noticed the red glass in the dome formed the school’s star-shaped crest. Hallways snaked off in both directions, and two sweeping staircases led to the second story. Glass French doors at the back of the atrium led into an enclosed courtyard at the center of the academic buildings and dormitories – open now, letting a cool breeze and a few stray fall leaves blow in. Class must’ve been in session, because apart from a man in academic dress crossing the upper landing and two black women in grey smocks polishing a gilt frame, the space was empty.
Headmistress West’s shoes clopped across the marble floor, echoing through the cavernous space. She stopped in front of three enormous electronic boards in gilt frames that hung above the staircase. They flashed a list of names with numbers, some of which flicked up or down a few points. Trey Bloomberg was at the top with 1163 points. Two below him, after someone named Ayaz Demir with 1102 points, was Courtney Haynes, with 1051 points.
“These are the class lists,” Headmistress West explained. “Every student is listed in their year, along with their current points total. Points are awarded based on academic excellence, distinction in extracurricular activities, and service to the school. Tardiness, rudeness, and behavior unbecoming of Derleth’s reputation will result in a loss of points. Teachers can give or deduct merit points at any time, for any reason. Your ranking will not only determine your place in the final end-of-year list, but throughout the year your ranking will determine rewards you receive, as well as punishments or privileges withheld for falling below certain thresholds. Here, we teach our students that all actions have consequences, and that their hard work offers tangible rewards.”
Oooo-kay.At my old school, we also had a class list. I was always the top. Only, students didn’t see that list until the end of the year, and it couldn’t be affected by how well you played sports or your phone usage or how you styled your hair. Our faculty was too busy worrying about kids bringing knives to school and gangs selling drugs in the cafeteria. At Derleth, I’d get a reminder every day as I walked past the boards exactly where I fell in the hierarchy.
Also, how can Trey have over eleven-hundred points already? It’s only three weeks into the quarter, and he doesn’t exactly look like a teacher’s pet.
Succeeding at Derleth already felt impossible, and I’d only been here twenty minutes. I scanned the list for my name, but before I got halfway down, the headmistress nodded to Trey. Without saying another word to me, she whipped around and hurried away, disappearing into a small door beneath the staircase labeled Faculty Only. I winced as the slamming door shattered the vast and silent space.
A hand grabbed my shoulder. “You’re ours now,” Trey whispered against my ear, his voice soft, menacing.
I hated the way my body reacted as his touch, to the tickle of his breath against my skin. My pulse quickened. A hot flush dropped through my stomach, scorching me between my legs. I chewed on my lip, forcing myself to remember that this guy hated me just because I existed, that his touch was meant to unnerve me, not excite me. “I told you not to touch me.”
Trey whirled me around, pressing my back against the carved balustrade. His gaze swept over my body, his lips curling into a sneer as he took in every inch of me.Cut a girl some slack, man.I’d been traveling for twelve hours, first on a smelly bus from Philly, and then the final three with the school’s driver on that wild road. My dreads were plastered to the back of my neck. My rumpled clothes – Dante’s old basketball tank and my cuffed red pants – hung off my narrow frame in an unflattering way. My scuffed black Docs looked ridiculous next to his and Courtney’s impossibly shiny dress shoes. Judging by the way Courtney sniffed the air and wrinkled her nose, I guessed that I smelled like a truck stop.
I sure do know how to make an excellent first impression.
“You need to understand a few things about your new school, Meat,” Trey said, his casual tone making his words even more sinister.Lovely, I’ve already got a nickname.“Number one – my parents donate the money that pays for your place at this school. If it weren’t for them, you’d be back in the gutter where you belong. You owe my family, and you owe me – don’t ever forget that. Number two – no one wants you here. The adults might think it’s a good idea to pretend to be good samaritans and lift some hopeless alley cat out of the gutter, but we know better. Trash like you is just going to screw up the curve and punish everyone. When standards slip, we all suffer, and since you’re at the bottom, you’ll suffer more than anyone. Number three, and this is the most important – Iamthis school. Courtney and I and our friends are the royalty. We’re your Kings and your Queens, and you’re the slave that licks our boots. You’d better start acting like it – your crackwhore mother should have taught you the best ways to pay reverence to your betters.” He grabbed his crotch, his cruel laugh like shattered glass against my already battered defenses.
“And don’t think about hiding from us or reporting to the teachers, because we have spies everywhere, don’t we, Trey?” Courtney beamed, tossing her golden blonde hair over her shoulder. “We can see your every move, Meat. Hell, we can see into your darkest dreams and innermost thoughts. So be very, very careful.”
“If you’re trying to scare me with your horror film introduction, you’ve failed dismally,” I retorted, yanking myself from Trey’s grasp. “This is a school, not some fucking cult.”
“Is that so?” Trey’s lips curled back into a twisted smile.
“Yeah, it is so. You don’t like me? Fine. I’ve known you for a couple of minutes and already you’re off my Christmas card list. I’m not here to make trouble or get in the way of your fun. I’m not going to tattle to your daddy or wreck your prom. As soon as I have my diploma in my hand, I’m out of your hair. All this ‘we own the school’ nonsense is a bit over-the-top. It’s a little pathetic, actually. Is it what you do to make yourselves feel good? Because personally, I’d just masturbate more. Especially you.” I grinned at Courtney. “A few flicks of the bean would make you so much happier.”
It turns out, rich bitches like Courtney didn’t find masturbation jokes particularly funny. Courtney made a growling noise in the back of her throat. She lunged at me, but Trey held out a lazy arm and shoved her back. “Leave her,” he said. “She’s not worth losing points over. We’ll get her in our own time.”
Their eyes blazed at each other, throwing down a battle of wills. Courtney looked like she was going to argue with him, but she lowered her arm and stepped back.Probably practicing for when she’s a submissive housewife,I thought, but wisely didn’t say. Trey wrung his triumph from her with an easy smile that made my knees wobble. Above our heads, a bell clanged.
“Saved by the bell,” Trey mused. “You’re lucky, Meat.”
The school erupted with the rumble of a stampeding herd. Doors banged, lockers jangled, voices echoed around the vaulted ceilings, and expensive soles scuffed the pristine marble. Students surged into the atrium, shoving and talking and laughing and passing notes. Someone bounced a tennis ball off the wall. It ricocheted off one of the portraits along the staircase and smashed a ceramic vase off a side table. The two women in grey smocks – who I guessed were on the cleaning staff – rushed over to pick up the pieces.
A sea of red and gold and tartan ebbed and flowed down the stairs, along the hallways and landing, surging and undulating as it spread to all corners. Students noticed me standing with Trey and Courtney. No one spoke directly to me or them, but a hundred unblinking eyes watched me. Whispers flew in all directions. I swallowed. I wanted to say something witty, but their attention unnerved me. Why did they care so much that I was here? Couldn’t they just ignore me?
