The Bystander Effect

Chapter 1

TWELVE YEARS AGO

Hayden's little fingers were coated with blue paint. She drew a line on the paper. Not a perfect line, but it was as good line, she thought while she inspected it. It was going to be an ocean, and oceans are sometimes a little wavy anyway.

Other four year-olds in Miss Goldman's preschool class splattered and splashed paint on their papers. Everyone except the pretty little brown haired girl beside Hayden, who sat frowning at her paint jar.

"Why aren't you painting?" Hayden asked.

"I don't like red," the girl said.

Hayden wanted to help the little girl, but how? She looked at the uneven surface of her ocean, bright blue against the white background. Maybe she can, just this once, color the ocean red. She can pretend a wicked sea witch put a spell on the ocean, one that turned the water red and all the fishes inside the red ocean evil. Then she can draw a pretty mermaid that has come to break the spell. The idea excited her.

"Here," she said, holding out the small jar of blue to the little girl. "We can trade."

***

Hayden felt sentimental thinking about that day when she first met her best friend Kelly. Since that day, they'd been like sisters and always had each other's backs. Hayden wiped a tear from her cheek. She loved her friend so much, and had made such a terrible, idiotic mistake.

Rocky hillside creeped slowly past the right windows of her sensible 2011 Camry. Her side mirror glimpsed the glittery maroon exterior side of her car and no other vehicles on the winding road behind her. The speed limit on Ocean Road was forty-five, even though one side was basically solid wall and the other was a high cliff with the fierce ocean waves crashing below. Narrow and curvy, a tourist, unsure of the bends, would likely never reach above thirty miles an hour. Hayden wasn't a tourist. Her family had lived in Rosewood Valley since before she was born. On any other day, she wouldn't be driving slow, but this wasn't a normal occasion.

Hayden was driving somewhere to make a confession. She had done something awful, and she was terribly sorry for it. She did this kind of thing often, but never to Kelly. She should have told Kelly long before now, but at the time, she had thought she was doing a kinder thing by not telling. Sort of the way you don't tell a friend if you really don't like the new dress she bought because you don't want to hurt her feelings. At the time, she didn't even think of later, when the friend wears the dress to a party and maybe people make fun of her. When the secret kept getting more serious and complicated, Hayden began to think of the future Kelly's feelings more than the right-now Kelly's feelings. Now she knew she was wrong. Hayden's fingers gripped the steering wheel tighter. Her hands were sweaty and slipping as she turned.

***

TWO WEEKS AGO

There was loud music and people dancing. Hayden had drank four whiskey and sodas, even though her limit was usually three. Someone bumped into her in the overpacked room and caused the contents of her fifth glass to splash all on her.

"Party foul!" Lucas, Kelly's boyfriend said loudly in her ear.

His words made her jump, but looking around, nobody else was moved. The music had been loud enough to drown him out. Besides, the Dandrige twins were making a scene as usual, dancing provocatively in the center of the room. Girls glowered and boys drooled their way. Hayden and Lucas hardly fell on their radar at the moment.

"Come on klutz, we'll raid Karen's closet," Lucas said.

Karen was Lucas's sister. Debonair wasn't a word used for women, but if Hayden had used one word to describe Karen that would be it. Her strong, classy personality definitely flashed in her wardrobe. Currently, Karen was away at college, and Hayden's drunken eyes flashed excitedly at the thought of peeking into her abandoned closet. She had followed Lucas into his sister's bedroom willingly albeit a bit crookedly as the walls seemed to sway around her.

"Wear this one, it'll look good on you," he said.

It was a green sleeveless, v-neck shirt. Hayden remembered Karen wearing it underneath a pale pink button-up shirt. She had left the first few buttons open so her bosom would only slightly show. The sleeveless shirt would be cute even without the button-up, Hayden thought. Even though her chest was much larger than Karen's, and Hayden knew it would look different on her, she couldn't resist.

"I'll close my eyes," he said.

"Huh-uh," she slurred, her pointer finger thrusting toward the door.

She turned back to the closet, thinking of hunting down the button-up. She know he would only pretend to leave the room. He opened the door and shut it. She never turned around as he hid in the shadows at the corner instead.

Hayden's shirt slipped up over her head and she dropped it on the floor. A bright flash momentarily blinded her. At first she saw brightness, then spots as she wondered what happened. Her eyes stung. She pulled the clean green shirt protectively against her, but it was too late. Lucas came into focus in the dim light.

"What are you doing?" she slurred.

"You're so hot, Hayden," he said. "Sometimes I wonder why I'm dating Kelly instead of you..."

***

Hayden felt sick. If there was anywhere to pull over and vomit, she would have. The same question came to her dozens of times: How could she have gotten in this situation? The betrayal didn't end there. It went on and on. So far. For too long.

Her phone buzzed and she glanced down at it, careful to keep her eyes mainly on the road. It was a text from Lucas.

"Please don't do this, Hayden. It won't go well..."

Well screw him, Hayden thought. She was done listening to him, done playing his games. This was all going to end now.

She didn't know how serious things were about to become or what Lucas had already done to cover his own ass. She had no idea how unwell things were going to go.