Rules Of The Game

Chapter 2: Rules of High School

After the girls walked me to eight hour, I sat down next to Zachary. Assigned seats of course, not my choice. I turned around and saw his friends goofing around, nudging each other and laughing about some dumb meme of off Instagram. Zachary stood up, walked his husky body around my desk and kneeled down to my height. 

"You know uh, if you ever need someone to help you in chemistry, I can help you. Like an....um.. personal tutor."

He looked at me with that sexy grin that made me fall for him in the first place. I couldn't bear look him in the eyes. 

"Thanks, but no thanks. I think I can manage on my own, just as I did all summer."

His goofy friends said their OO's, slapped him on the back a few times and sat down.

Matthew, being his outgoing self, commented,"Better tame your girl, I know you like them feisty."

"Rawr," Noah co-signed, mimicking a cats claws scratching against something.

 The bell rang with an unusual piercing to the ears, which made me jump a little. As everyone scurried to their seats, Mr.Rhodeson called for attendance. I struggled to stay awake as I took notes on the quantum theory. For some odd reason, I had this really weird urge to check my phone. Without thinking, I made direct eye contact with Zachary. With his cocky personality, he just had to make a big deal out of it.

"I caught you staring at me during chemistry class. Don't be embarrassed, it's normal for someone to miss their perfect ex," he bragged. This was another reason we broke up, I just couldn't stand the way he always flaunted himself. 

"Do us all a favor, and take a long walk off a short cliff." 

"Ouch. Bet that didn't hurt as much as you did when we broke up."

"Bet it hurt when you found out you were such a late bloomer. Tell me, how was it being 4'11 all of Freshman year?" I shot back. 

"Whatever, Claire, just remember..." he whispered close to my ear, so close I could hear him breathing.

"There are rules in this school, and you know what happens when you break the rules."

Zachary slammed shut my locker, then walked off to the guy's locker room. 

He was talking about the unwritten rules. Our school has a system. Jocks hang with their own, computer geeks with their own and so on. There was only a few occasions where these groups mixed, like me, Jasmine and Zora. Jasmine was the artistic and visual arts type, while Zora and I were cheerleaders. I'm not sure why, but we were the only exclusion. Things have always been this way, and whenever someone tries to break this barrier...things get ugly. But I couldn't understand why it pertained to me so much.

Realizing I hadn't checked my phone in a while, I pulled it out, unlocked it and looked at my messages. As im leaving the school, I'm also reading the message from the unknown number. It was a paragraph. I scrolled, and scrolled, and scrolled. I couldn't tell who it was from, but it was scary, like really scary. As I read more and more of the text, I realized this person knew so much about me, and my secrets. I wasn't sure how to feel or what to do, but the end of the text said,

Time to take off that hideous mask of yours. You and 7 other people will play this game to ultimately save each other, your friends, your family, yourselves and your secrets. If you think this is a joke, try me. If you take this to the police, or talk about it to anyone else but you team members, like every game, there are rules: no shortcuts, x marks the spot and cheating has consequences. You will meet your team members soon. 

And always remember the Rules Of The Game. 

I couldn't tell what was scarier, the text or the fact that in the midst of reading the text I had stepped in something, ruining my stilettos. I quickly ran back into the school and into the girls locker room. I grabbed my extra pair of heels. Looking into my shoe, I noticed the small red letter "X" in my shoe. In fear, I threw the shoes away and walked the flight of stairs back to my real locker.

Holding my head down, my heart was beating what felt like a thousand beats per second. It was scary just knowing that if I didn't do something in a few days my reputation would be shattered , exactly the way my heart did just a few months ago. Knowing that whoever was doing this, had a way of making my stomach flop made me even more sick. Holding back tears, with a smile plastered on my face, I strut to my locker.

"03-18-14"

And out fell the note, causing me to whimper in shock.

I'm watching you. And always the Rules of the game."