Wild Ride - The Alternative Version (Book 2)

Chapter 62~For This I Gave Up Trying

Monday morning, Kaylee, Dustin, and I stood at the end of the driveway waiting for the bus to come pick us up. Dustin comes over and waits with us instead of waiting in his driveway and just crossing the road. Everything felt kind of awkward this morning while we were eating breakfast. I'm not sure Kaylee really noticed, but I did. Yesterday, Mom and Dad would barely look at each other or be found in the same room together. Dad spent most of his time downstairs. This morning they were the same way, so whatever that argument was about that scared Kaylee, it was pretty big. 

I haven't yet apologized to Dad for what I said about Danika being lucky he wasn't her dad. I really wanted to, it nagged at me every second of the day, but I didn't really know how. I was afraid of approaching him again, I'm afraid he won't accept my apology or something. We've barely spoken since then, and every time he looks at me I can see the hurt in his eyes and it's killing me. My heart drops all over again every time I see it, and I know it's not the hurt from fighting with Mom. He shows that through his actions. We haven't talked about the whole dating thing again, like he said we would. I don't really want to talk about it because I'm afraid of getting in an argument with him and saying something to hurt him further. I have thought that maybe because he's hurt me I shouldn't have to apologize for hurting him, but maybe he just doesn't know that he's hurt me. He did ask why I was angry with him, after all. And that's really kind of cruel not to apologize for what I said, because it was pretty much saying that I'm not grateful to have him as my father, and that's not true.

I let Kaylee get on the bus first, and she sat down in the first seat as usual. She normally has a friend that she sits with that gets on before us, but she wasn't there today, so Kaylee sat by herself and she seemed perfectly content anyway. I made my way to the back, reaching seat eleven and sitting down with Dustin right behind me. 

We'd been talking for a while when I noticed the huge bruise on his right arm. "Dustin, what happened to your arm?"

He grinned sheepishly. "Oh, uh, I was playing Call Of Duty the other night, and I got the last kill, so I kind of did this victory dance thing while I was sitting on my bed. But, I was sitting a little too close to the edge... and I fell off." 

I laughed. "Oh yeah, some badass you are." 

Dustin gave me a playful glare, flicking my shoulder. "Don't rub it in."

I was about to say something back to him when I quickly glanced out over the seats filled with kids, when something happening at the first two seats on the driver's side stopped me. There was a little boy in the second seat, and he kept reaching up over the top of the seat into the first, where Kaylee was sitting. I couldn't really see what he was doing to her, maybe he was pulling her hair or something, but I could see and faintly hear Kaylee telling him to stop multiple times. The kid just didn't get the message and kept bothering her.

I recognized the little boy, though I don't know his name. He's scared of me for some reason, I'm not really sure why. Maybe it's the way I dress, or my height or some crap like that, but I'm about to use it to my advantage to get him to stop picking on my sister.

"Hold on, Dustin. I'll be right back." I said as the bus pulled up to a house, and he got out of the seat so I could get out into the aisle. I quickly walked up to the front of the bus, and slid into the seat with the little boy who was bothering Kaylee smoothly.

"Hey, buddy. Do you think it's fun to pick on my sister?" I said to him, and his eyes widened when he turned to look at me. 

"Uh oh." He mumbled with fear.

I gave an innocent smile. "Uh oh is right. Listen, if you stop tormenting my sister, I'll let you off easy with a warning. If you don't, I'm gonna beat the snot out of you. She asked you to stop a few times already, so I think it would be best if you stop."