I blink and force a smile. “Of course I am. Have you tasted this delicious chocolate cake?” I push my mostly-eaten chicken aside and yank my dessert plate closer. “It’s begging to be devoured.”
My friends smile and dig into their cakes as well. The chefs here cook the most amazing food I’ve ever had. Most of the kids come from super-wealthy families and are used to eating this kind of food. But since my friends and I are scholarship students and come from middle-income families, every meal tastes like it was made for royalty. And even though Addie is technically rich now, she didn’t grow up that way and still feels like she doesn’t belong in that world.
The bell rings just when I scoop up my last bit of cake. My friends and I dump our trays in the discard pile and then head to our classrooms. I settle down in my history class and take out my stuff, and just as I place my pen down, I feel a sudden chill in the air.
My gaze flits to the door and my stomach drops to my toes. Because Kylen stands in the doorway, staring down at his phone with a frown, as though he’s not sure he’s in the right room.
“Please be in the wrong room,” I whisper.
He asks a student if this is Mr. Lewis’s class, and after she confirms that it is, he smiles in relief and walks inside.
“Darn,” I grumble.
When he passes my desk, he freezes and glances at me, then slowly moves his eyes to the empty desk across from me. It used to be occupied by another student, but she transferred out a few weeks after the semester started and it’s been empty ever since. I’m not exactly popular here.
Kylen opens his mouth, but then he closes it with a shake of his head and continues to a vacant seat in the back.
My heart sinks. He didn’t want to sit next to me.
Seriously, why do I care? Idon’twant him to sit next to me in history class. Idon’twant to interact with him. Idon’twant to be forced to see his face a few times a week.
But yet…it stings that he just walked away.
I shake my head, shoving any thought of him far, far away from my mind.
Chapter Four
Raven
“You’re going down!”
I pound on my controller buttons as the guy next to me continues to shout words he thinks will throw me off my game. His monkey character is far ahead of mine—way, way too far—but if he thinks I’m going to give up without a fight, he has another thing coming.
“You’regoing down,” I say through clenched teeth as I tilt my controller to the side and press hard on a button, causing my adorable monkey with a pink bow on her head to sprint forward.
The rec room is pretty full today, even though it’s a school night and not the weekend. Most kids wouldn’t choose the rec room as a place to hang out because it’s “not cool” or whatever, but it’s snowing outside and they’re probably bored out of their minds. They’re playing the arcade games or pool or foosball, and some are complaining that my opponent and I are hogging the Xbox all to ourselves. But do I care? Nope. I love video games and play to unwind and because it warms my soul.
“She’s gaining on you, Richie!” a boy sitting on the sofa armrest sputters like it’s the biggest crime in the world.
“Don’t worry, I’ve got this.”
I can’t see him because my focus is on the TV screen, but I feel him press his lips together and narrow his eyes as he concentrates hard. I want to tell him to calm down because he might burst a blood vessel, but I don’t want anything to cost me this win. I’m so close to beating his butt—
“Yeah!” Richie throws his controller on the sofa and jumps on top of it. “I win! I win! You lose!”
Some of the other kids cheer along with him, making him grin so widely I swear his face might split in half. Richie isa scholarship student, too, but unlike my friends and me, he desperately wants to fit in with the rest of the students. Sophie tried getting to know him better a few weeks ago, but he turned out to be just as rude as the rest of them.
Don’t ask me why I agreed to play against him.
I’m about to hold out my hand and say, “Good game,” but he punches the air and says, “See, what did I tell you, guys? You think this girl could beat me?” He snorts and then grins at me. “I have to admit, you do play good for a girl. You grew up with a lot of brothers?”
I can literally feel the steam shooting out of my ears. He said it. The three words that trigger me so bad. You play wellfor a girl. For. A. Girl. As if we live in the freakin’ 1980s.
“First of all, learn grammar,” I snap at him. “It’s playwell, not good. And second of all, no, I don’t have brothers. I have a little sister. And I certainly can whip your butt in another game.”
His eyes widen for a moment, totally thrown off by my words, but then he snickers to the guys he’s desperate to impress and says, “Ooh, I think I ticked her off.”
“Did the little girl get upset because the boys aren’t playing nice with her?” another one says before hollering.
