Odd One Out

CHAPTER 3

Bailey
Monday, September 22

Sunday's aftermath continued to follow me to Monday morning, where I winced in pain at all the loud voices bouncing off the school hallway.

The last thing I wanted to do was come to school, and I almost contemplated not showing up at all and telling my mom I got food poisoning or something, but I realized I needed to come see Francisco as soon as possible.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Kaitlyn asked beside me. "You still look pretty sick to me."

"It's all your fault for leaving me alone at that party," I protested, finally reaching my locker. "Why did you even take me if you were just going to abandon me for that blonde guy? What kind of friend does that?"

"And you're sure you don't remember anything?"

I sighed. "I'm sure, Kaitlyn."

Sunday consisted of me groaning in pain, vomiting every twenty minutes, drinking cup after cup of water, and wrecking my brain trying to figure out how I got Francisco's key chain around my house key.

After a while of hiding it from my parents, I decided to call Kaitlyn for help, and she finally brought over some painkillers to aid my pounding headache. She wasn't in my house for too long though, and as guilty as I felt for thinking this, I was really glad she had left. Her voice was loud to me, even though she had been semi-whispering the whole time.

Also, we weren't super close to begin with. I just didn't really have any other options. Having her leave was a relief to my head.

But left to my own devices, alone in my room, I did something I never thought I'd do: I went on Francisco Salazar's Twitter page. For information about the night of the party, of course.

But to my grand surprise, he hadn't posted anything at all, which was freakishly odd for none other than the king of drama at Roosevelt High.

"I just need to find Francisco to give him his stupid key chain back."

The many noises of the hallway echoed in my head, causing a mini-headache that would turn into a migraine if I didn't find a quieter space soon.

"I think it's clever though," Kaitlyn went on beside me, "his key chain? I mean come on, the Eye of Horus? Like seriously, you've gotta see the resemblance—"

"I'm seriously not in the mood to talk about his clever thinking, Kaitlyn."

I passed Naya Mendoza on my way to Francisco's first period, which he made public on his social media accounts every year. As if anyone actually cared about his class schedule.

Even in the aftermath of this party, Naya was stylish as ever, wearing dark purple sunglasses and a light pink baseball cap to match her lily pink high waisted shorts. Her group of friends seemed to be busy buzzing about some celebrity couple, but Naya seemed distracted. Her pointer finger was twirling a strand of her curly hair around, until she finally saw me passing by, where we both exchanged glances before I turned back around and continued my way to Francisco's art class.

"Why do you think you spun out of control?"

"I literally only had one drink, Kate. One alcoholic drink, and suddenly I can't remember what happened afterwards."

"You really are a lightweight, girl," Kaitlyn teased, but I had no patience for jokes. I just wanted to find Cisco, give him his key chain back, and then never speak to him again. I didn't even want to talk to him about what happened at the party, or see if he remembered anything from it.

The furthest away I was from him, the better my life would be.

Once I reached the art class though, I froze in my tracks. There was an older couple there who was in their early forties at most, along with two tall police officers, worriedly speaking to the art teacher. The students who were in class were already on their phones, probably posting about it on some social media platform.