Scarlett Everwood isn't necessarily your average 17-year-old girl, but she's managed to get by. After a year of pulling herself back together, she's finally able to go back to school, ready to put the past in the past and move on. With a past so dar...
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"What's wrong Scarlett?" Dad asked as I came through the door.
"Nothing's wrong." I answered.
"Are you sure?" He asked coming a little closer.
"Yeah, dad I'm fine. Where's mom? Is she still at the office?" I asked tilting my head.
"Yeah... so?" He said with a shrug.
"What do you mean? It's 9:00." I said checking the time on my phone. Before I came home, I drove around a little. To clear my mind.
"Work takes up all our time Scarlett you know that."
"Well it doesn't have to." I said walking up the stairs. "Mom and you choose to drown yourself in work! Maybe as a distraction?" I said stomping up into my room.
Once I finally reached my room I closed the door with a slam. I need to think. I need to think this all trough. Why do I feel like I have to vomit? I barely made it to the toilet before I emptied out the contents in my stomach.
Why was I freaking out?
It's all in your head Scarlett. He's not coming for you.
That's what Dr. Ryan would always say to me. Maybe it's not all in my head. Now what do I do? I can't tell anyone about Alex. Not Leo, not Cassie, not Ava and definitely not Jace. They are best friends with him aside from Ava. It's not like I can tell them I think Alex's a total creep. He's definitely after something no question in that. But what exactly? I mean Jace already saw me running out of his house. What will he think? Especially because he saw me cry in front of him. Why? Why did I do that. It doesn't make sense. Maybe it's the memory. Not being able to remember. . . .
---
"So what did you do last night?" Ava asked chewing on a big slice of pizza.
I shrugged not paying much attention to what she was saying. I was sitting at the table with Cassie, Bella, Blake, Zoey, Leo and of course Ava. She finally decided to come sit here with me. All of her Leo drama is in the past. But Jace and Alex weren't here, which was strange to say the least. Did he know something? When it came to his friends Jace would do anything for them. But could I even consider myself as his friend?
"Hey, where's Jace?" I asked.
"Don't know." Bella shrugged. "He said something about taking care of something with Alex." She paused for a moment. "Pretty strange if you ask me."
I nodded slowly. "Yeah," He definitely knew something I didn't.
"To be honest you never know what Jace is up to." Cassie said. "He looked really mad though. He also said that Alex and him needed to have a little talk." Cassie smiled, "Whatever that means."
My face burned. Why would he need to have a little talk with Alex after what happened yesterday? No, I'm being crazy. First of all, Jace and Alex are really great friends! Right? All of them were. Everyone sitting at this table has been friends for years, well that's at least what they told me. There's probably a lot I didn't know. I need to remember that I'm just the new girl.
I laughed not because something was funny, but because I was nervous. I did that a lot when I was nervous. "What does that even mean?" I asked eyeing everyone at the table looking for answers somewhere hidden.
"Guys! You know my brother, he's an ass." Blake laughed. "He got into an argument with Alex, and they needed to blow off a little steam."
"That's so true!" Zoey said leaning forward giving me reassuring look. "Don't worry, he just needs time."
"Exactly!" Leo said while grabbing a fry from Cassie's lunch, while she squatted his hand away in annoyance. "Give him like ten minutes then he'll be good as new."
"Are you sure he's okay?" I said with a sigh. "He always seems so tense, mostly around me."
"Hey don't worry about it! He's like with everyone at first. He just needs a little time to warm up that's all." Cassie said with a wide smile.
I shrugged. Maybe Jace would lighten up. After all he did just meet me. I mean it was expected. "Sure." I answered.
The bell suddenly rang, a loud sound, indicating that we all needed to get to class.
"Hey Scarlett, want to walk together?" Cassie asked as I stood up.
"Sure." I said re-checking my schedule. "But you're not in my science class which I have now, but Zoey is."
"Yeah," She said shrugging her shoulders. "Zoey and I switched, we made a little deal."
"I lot of people have been switching classes lately." I laughed. "Cough, cough Vanessa."
"Ah don't worry about her, she's like a little bug that won't go away."
"Are you sure? I mean look what happened." I laughed.
We continued to walk to class, talking. . . well mostly Cassie was talking. She was a chatterbox. I think she forgot I was even there.
We were about to walk into class when a cold flat voice called Cassie's name. I knew exactly who it was. I took a quick look into the class but of course Alex and Jace weren't there. Then I spun my head around to see Jace. His face red and his lip slightly cut.
"We need to go." Jace said firmly. "Cassidy right now."
"Wait, what Jace? I can't leave-" She stopped when his face went colder, colder then it already was. "Scarlett, I'll see you later." She said quickly before trailing off behind Jace.
"Wait Cassie, you can't just leave school!" I called after her. She turned around quickly, and gave me a sympathetic smile.
What was that all about? I don't get it. Ever since I came it's been secrets on top of secrets. Can I even trust them? I mean, aside from Ava but even she didn't tell me that she was dating my brother. On top of that she was previously dating Leo! I mean why would she lie about that. She always talked about Jace and his friends like she didn't know them. But she did. I wanted to come to this school for less drama, but I guess I was wrong, really wrong.
"Hey Scarlett!" An annoyingly high pitched voice said.
Before I even turned around I knew my eyes would meet with Vanessa's hazel ones, so I slowly turned around.
What a treat.
"Vanessa why are you even talking to me?" I asked and the tone of my voice sounded annoyed because I was.
"That's no way to talk to me." She said laughing.
"Yes it is! How could you push me like that?" I always wanted to ask her that.
"I did no such thing Scarlett." She said simply shrugging. "Okay but anyway that's not the point. You don't happen to know where a certain black book or maybe even a diary would be would you?" She asked with a smirk on her face, but I got the sense that she was more telling me then asking me.
"No," I automatically said maybe too quickly. "I mean, I don't even know what you're talking about Vanessa. I have to get to class so if you don't mind." I said pushing pass her.
This was not good.
"I'm sure you will now." Vanessa's voice get louder and I turned back toward her. Automatically my heart started beating faster. "Listen everyone. . ." She laughed and pointed at me, "This girl had to steal Jace's diary just so that he could like her. What are you a creep?"
I looked at her completely shocked. The halls weren't filled but there were definitely students looking at me and some were even laughing. "I can't believe you Vanessa." I hissed at her before I quickly walked away out to my car without even looking back. I didn't feel like going to class anymore.
I hope Ava, Zoey, Blake, Leo, and Bella weren't there.
