The Badboy and The Jailbird

Chapter 4 "Cry Me a River"

"Well look who it is." I try to keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

He looks over to me, a smirk forming on his face.

"Are you stalking me, Brody, or should I say, Bridget?" He scrunched his face in mock disgust when saying, Bridget.

"Do not use my real name. And how the fuck do you know what it is? " To be honest it sort of hurt my feelings because in middle school before I changed my name, that's what people would taunt me about. I had a name that didn't fit me and I hated it but for them, it was just funny.

"It's a great name, but Brody doesn't fit you." That hurt me more than I thought it would, but I didn't show it.

"Oh cry me a river." I snapped turning to look at the list of assignments we got to choose from.

I hear a small whisper come from Taylor, "I will." Surely I wasn't supposed to hear that.

Ignoring the comment, I read:

Day Assignment Choices:

Surrealism Painting: Paint an image that you choose but add your own twist to it.

Realism Painting: Paint an image that you choose and try to make them as identical as you can.

Black and White Portrait: Draw a Portrait of your table partner.

Color/Abstract Portrait: Draw an abstract portrait of your table partner.

I decided to do a Realism Painting. The only thing was, what to draw.

After about 10 minutes of searching, I finally found a photographer I liked and chose one of her photos.

I chose a photo of a waterfall in Yosemite.

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By the end of class, I am just finishing the details on the waterfall. Looking over my work I feel like I have done quite a good job. It looks somwhat like the photo.

Signing it at the bottom, I hand it to the teacher.

I glance at Taylor while collecting my stuff. I see that he is almost done with his but his back is shielding it.

Stuffing my stuff in my backpack I walk out of the classroom, ready to make my way to Spanish I. In the hallway, I hear my name being called and turn around. It's Taylor... running towards me... with a piece of paper in his hand. Ignoring him I continue to walk forwards towards room 133.

Feeling a hand on my arm, I turn around ready to punch the person but pull away when I see what is in front of me.

A painting. Taylor's painting. The title at the top: Cry me a river by Taylor Cartel. It is beautiful. Below the title is a gorgeous river scene with a huge cloud at the top. You can just barely make out a face in it. A crying face that strangely resembles Taylor. Tears or Raindrops are falling into the river. This is truly a work of art, although it is not perfect. Being me, I like to find the little flaws in everything. A mess-up here, a mess-up there, I just feel like nothing is perfect without imperfections.

I lower the painting seeing a smirking Taylor.

"What is this?" I say hiding all emotions welling up inside of me.

"A painting."

"And why are you showing me it?"

By now we are attracting a crowd.

"You said to cry you a river, so I did." He says this while gesturing to the face in the clouds.

"You were supposed to turn that in." Obnoxiously, I cross my arms, putting on a blank expression. Totally ignoring the warm feeling spreading throughout me.

"So."

There is a high-pitched squeal from the crowd. An angry one.

Barbie girl from my bio class pushes her way through the crowd, standing right in front of me, her back to Taylor.

"Go to HELL! Crazy jail bitch!" She yells at me.

Everyone seems a bit taken aback by this comment, including me.

"Why should I, Barbie doll?" I hear a few snickers from the crowd.

She glares at me. "Taylor is mine and you can't have him!" Another high-pitched squeal at the end, which makes me wince.

"You can have him, I certainly don't want him. That asshole is all yours."

She doesn't look convinced so I yell at everyone, "Go to class!"

Walking through the parting crowd, Miguel and Carla join me in walking to Spanish, explaining to me how that was Michelle Christo and that she practically rules the school.

"Not anymore," I say this looking at all of the teens looking at me as we enter the classroom.

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Spanish isn't my strong suit, so I blanked out most of the time thinking about Taylor's painting, and the same warmness spreads through me, but I quickly stop it, not liking the feeling at all. Just like that school is over and I am heading out to my bike. My beautiful red Yamaha.

"What a crappy bike." Scoffing, I turn around to meet the eyes of the bad boy.

"Is that so?" he nods, "Well what do you drive?"

Taylor points to the last car in the world I wanted to see.

Jessie's silver-blue Toyota pickup truck. With the defining dent telling me it was his.

As swiftly as I can, I hop on my bike and speed off leaving Taylor with no explanation. Looking behind me I see the truck about 50 meters back. I speed up. Tears running down my cheeks, I remember when he first got it, and we told our parents we were going on a school trip, but instead took a road trip to Canada and skied for a couple of days then came home to mad parents.

Finally arriving home I see that my mother is not yet, so I open the garage and park my bike. Remembering Taylor, I look down the road to see the Toyota speeding down the drive. Quickly I hide behind the motorcycle realizing that won't do much since he knows what it looks like, and move to shut the garage, but it's too late. Pulling into my driveway is Taylor Cartel.

As soon as he gets out, not knowing what to do I scream at him, "Go away!" I drop onto the lawn, into a coughing fit of tears.

Taylor rushes over to me.

Great, now 3 people have seen me cry. This day just keeps getting better and better.