A WHOLE NEW CROWD
TIJAN
CHAPTER ONE
“Taryn.”
I rolled my eyes at hearing my sister’s screech. I didn’t wait for her and I kept going down the school’s hallway. She could screech all she wanted. I wasn’t going to help her, at least not in the way she wanted me to.
“Taryn,” Mandy shouted again. She was running now. The sound of her heels hitting the floor went from a normal clitter-clatter, but it was now a constant staccato. I rolled my eyes. My sister was an idiot. No one should run when wearing high heels, at least those high heels—they arched halfway up to her calves, but that was Mandy Matthews. She wore high heels, clingy tank tops, miniskirts, and on some days, a cheerleading outfit.
She was one of those people.
I had been adopted into a family that was the opposite of everything I was and had been all my life—the God blessed, rich kids. Mandy was the epitome of the golden child: blonde, petite, smart and popular by all accounts. She wasn’t the head of her clique, but she was one of them. The highest of the high. There was always a popular group at the top, but there was another circle within that circle. She was in there.
“Taryn, stop!”
I ignored her, opening my locker as I heard her stumble to a halt, panting beside me. My eyebrows went up. “Thought you were in shape. All those late night activities with Devon, right?”
“I’m not here to talk about Devon.”
I grinned, but I knew what she was there to talk about. “I heard Devon hooked up with Stephanie Markswith at Brent’s party.”
“Not gonna work, Taryn,” she said, but it had. I saw the twitch in her eye. She knew I was trying to distract her and she was fighting. I saw the play of emotions over her face, then smirked when she surrendered. Her eyebrows had been fixed, bunched together and her mouth was pressed in a flatline, but then it all changed. Her eyebrows shot up and she let out a dramatic sigh. “There’s no chance in hell that he would hook up with her. No way in hell!”
“Not what I heard.”
“She’s not suicidal.”
“She was drunk. I don’t think she was thinking sober.” I shut my locker and moved away.
Mandy latched to my side, seething at the same time. “The girl’s dead.”
I saw Stephanie turn the corner up ahead, along with her mini-Stephanie-wanna-be friends tagging behind: Jackie, Slappy, and Curlie. Those weren’t their real names, that’s just what I called them. They were like walking skeletons. They had no personalities and their two missions in life were to remain like skeletons and to become popular. Stephanie wasn’t where my sister was in the social status, but she wasn’t far behind.
That was perfect timing. “Better tell her that.”
Mandy didn’t say goodbye, she just veered in her direction.
I stopped to watch this. I had to. Stephanie spread a rumor my first week at Rawley High School that I stole a biology exam. It wasn’t true. Her boyfriend hit on me and she wanted revenge. When I got called into the principal’s office, my history was pulled up. Being known as a thief and being sent from too many foster homes to count, I wasn’t dumb. I looked guilty. He didn’t care to hear any argument on my behalf and gave me detention for two months. They couldn’t prove it was me, but it didn’t matter. Stephanie had tarnished my name and all my intents and purposes to be a ‘good’ kid had gone down the drain.
