Dead Lines

2: Insecure Little Girl

Unedited.

“You want to tell me what that was about?”

Well, at least he waited until we got to the privacy of my locker to ask. I slipped the piece of paper Cecil gave me into my pocket and then started switching out my books for class. Doing this as gently as possible, I said, “Nothing to worry about. I just don’t want to go.”

“You can’t bullshit a bullshitter, Nat.” He moved around to my other side since the locker door was sort of obstructing his face. “And certainly not one who knows you so well. Try again.”

“I just don’t want to deal with drunk teenagers, ok?”

“Again with the bullshit.” He was getting annoyed and he had every right to. Hell I would too if he dodged my questions constantly. For the past couple of weeks, every time he would ask me something concerning Cecil, the Elite, or Andrzej I would just answer with something vague or change the subject completely. At first he just brushed it off as me getting used to being Elite but now, it was getting to the point where he was taking it personally. “Just tell me why you don’t want to go. Something truthful and I’ll let it go.”

I closed the locker door and faced him, wanting him to get that me not telling him everything was not personal. It was just the Elite world was slowly taking over my life and finding a balance was becoming difficult.

“Schy…I just don’t want to go, ok? The corn maze just doesn’t have the same appeal as it used to and…”

“You looked completely freaked out when Bev ousted you about being able to go. You haven’t looked that panicked since I forced you to go to your first party after…that thing happened. So tell me what’s going on or I swear…”

“Just leave her alone, string bean.” Allie walked up next to me, threading her arm through mine. “She doesn’t want to go to a stupid corn maze, so what? Why do you always have to think there’s an ulterior motive? Why can’t she simply not want to go?”

“Stay out of this, Allie,” Schylar warned. “This is an A and B conversation. C your way out of it.”

In an attempt to pull me away, Schylar grabbed my other arm and tugged. At the same time, that usual feeling that I’d come to associate with my particular started in the center of my chest. Why couldn’t I have just one fight with my friends without that annoying power of mine kicking in? Then again, I never usually fought with Schylar. We always had heated discussions about stuff, usually about my not-so-secret crush for Cecil but this fight felt very much different.

Schylar wasn’t content any longer with being kept in the dark. He knew I was hiding something from him, something important, and he wanted in on it. It wasn’t hard to tell that Allie knew about it and he wasn’t having it anymore. He was used to me spilling the beans over the most simplest of things, this keeping secrets situation was new and not sitting well with him.

“What are we? In third grade? Get over yourself, Schylar. What is so wrong with her keeping something to herself for once? You don’t need to know everything about her. You’re not her diary.”

“Allie.” Even to me, I sounded tired and annoyed. The two of them were fighting more often now that Schylar was around all the time. I was starting to really wish he was still dating Brittany. It would make this so much easier. “Stop.”

“I’ll stop when he stops.”

“And I’ll stop when you actually tell me what the hell is going on.” He yanked me a little so I was facing him and no one else. He wasn’t being rough about it but his movements were a lot more forceful than they usually were. His frustration was showing and not in a good way. “Ever since that weekend you spent in Florida, you’ve been acting differently, strange. And I don’t like it. You never used to give me the brush off…”