The Saving Bailey Trilogy 1: The Bullet List

Chapter 8

                                                            Chapter 8

        The locker room is buzzing with gossip of the confrontation between Miemah and I yesterday. I try to hide the bruise on my stomach by dressing with my back to the other girls, but Nessa pushes me, exposing the purple and yellow bruise.

        “Look guys! Bailey has a stomach disease,” Nessa shouts and the girls train their eyes on my stomach. I’m past crying, past emotional breakdowns.

        “Her stomach looks fine to me,” one girl says and turns back around.

        “She’s got a pretty body,” another says, complimenting me.

        “You guys are dumbasses, I was talking about the giant bruise. You can’t miss it, and Miemah gave it to her, because she’s a boyfriend stealer,” Nessa says.

        But they have all stopped listening and have returned to dressing for gym. I do the same. I am fortunate that Nessa has no one to back her up; Cecil must be in the bathroom.

        It is raining when we step outside: raining and cold, the perfect combination. Mrs. Stewart likes to work us hard. She starts us off with a half-mile run and then we are to do the plank.

        “I want to time you Bailey, can you run a mile today?” Mrs. Stewart asks, stopwatch in hand.

        I raise my heels off the ground feeling the pain of the cuts on the bottom of my feet. I look at the dreary track, being pelted with icy drops of rain, and I think, I’ve run under worse conditions.

        “Yeah,” I say, up for the challenge. “I can.”

        “Okay. Go when you’re ready,” Mrs. Stewart says.

        I break into a run before she says the word “when.” My feet feel like they don’t even touch the track, I’m soaring through the mile like it is nothing. My peers are struggling to just walk their half-mile. I make it around the track twice and pass Trenton on my third lap. He smiles and winks at me. I slow down a bit to return a smile.

        The fourth lap is trying, but I make it through. My feet are searing, my hair and clothes are drenched, but if feels good to prove myself.

        “Whoa,” Stewart says as if she is reigning in a horse. She reads the stop-watch. “Five minutes and thirty seconds exactly.”

        “Told ya’,” I laugh, and head to the drinking fountain.

        Stewart follows me.

        “Will you join the track team? We’d be really happy to have you,” she says.

        I gulp down the water too fast and it makes my stomach hurt.

        “Sorry, I stopped running competitively a few years ago. I just do it for fun,” I say.

        “Please. We really need a runner like you, especially because you are such a fast female runner. You would be a very valuable asset to the team.”

        “I don’t want to be somebody’s asset. That’s why I stopped track in the first place. It became less about the joy of running and more about me being a winning streak for the team.”

        Her expression hardens. “Whatever, Sykes. You’re turning down a good offer,” she says. Her tone is teetering between threat and malice, sending chills down my spine.