Bad

Excerpt

My eyes scanned my body in the mirror nearest the front door. I took in the sight, startling myself, in fact. Black tights covered my tan legs, dark heels surrounding my toes. I stumbled, my fingers curling around the wood table to steady myself. When I looked back up, my eyes falling upon myself once more, I blinked, taking in my long straight hair, and the dark eye makeup surrounding my eyes. I ran a finger through my hair, before flinging my backpack over my shoulder and moving out the front door.

As I moved down the front steps, my eyes landed upon where his house sat, perched upon the beautiful summer grass across the street. Soon, the green that surrounded the area would be covered in autumn leaves, and after that, a white coat of snow. That part of life was something I knew would never change. Only this past summer had made me realize that while life was constantly hurling itself at you at hundreds of miles per hour, you had the chances—the choices—to change yourself.

I had never wanted to change myself before now, and even in this moment, I wasn’t sure I really did want to. Was I trying to win him back? I bit my lip, as I turned left onto the sidewalk when it met my front walkway. I heard the large wooden door I had became accustomed to opening at all hours of the day, and night, open. It took all of my willpower not to look up and give Caden one of those sad smiles I had been giving everyone the past few days.

I knew that while I was definitely dressed differently, and I sure looked the complete opposite of the way I had looked the past 17 years, deep down, my tough-girl act was just that—an act. I was still the silly, nerdy girl with a load of advanced placement study guides tucked into her backpack. The only difference between this year and last was my girly style and pink everything had faded to blacks and tans. I wasn’t sad, per say, and I wasn’t depressed, for sure, but I wasn’t as different, deep down, as I was pretending to be.

“Mattie,” I heard someone call out, but I kept my head down, ignoring him as he spoke. I was still annoyed with the approach he had taken in calling off our relationship. While he claimed this was temporary, we both knew that there was no guarantee. We’d still be friends, he said, like always, but I knew that after this, our friendship would take a hard hit.

“Mattie!” It was habit to turn my head when I was being called, and I struggled to continue to focus on the ground.  “Mattson, stop walking! I know you hear me!” My feet betrayed me, and my body froze, unfortunately. I turned slowly, a smile plastered on my face.

“Hey,” Caden’s eyes raked over my body, and I squirmed slightly. “You look,” He paused, narrowing his eyes, “Different.”

“Yeah,” I nodded, falling into step with him.

We moved toward the bus stop, and it was hard for me not to reach down and tangle his fingers into mine like I had been doing for nearly two years.

“Is this…” He trailed off, biting his lip, “This look, is it for me?”

“We broke up, why would it be for you?” I snapped, my feet moving faster now.  He jogged to catch up to me, his fingers curling around my wrist, giving it a tug.

“Listen,” He frowned, “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I know. You didn’t,” I shrugged, obviously lying. I hoped it wasn’t that obvious to him.

My mind flashed back to the previous week, where we sat, hands tangled, my head resting on his shoulder.

“Do you ever think of what it would be like to date someone else?”

“No,” I lifted my head, looking at him, “Do you?”

“I don’t know.” He looked down, my hand falling from his. I frowned, my eyes focusing on his.

“Caden, what are you talking about?”

“I don’t know. You’re a great girl, and you’ve been my best friend forever, but…” He trailed off, forcing me to prompt him to continue. “…I just was thinking, it’d be fun to date someone different.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. Mattie,” He set his hand on my knee, laughing, “It’s not like I have someone else in mind. You’re just so quiet, and I love that about you.”

“Obviously you don’t.” I spoke up, smiling. I wasn’t sure where he was going with this.

“No, I do. It’s so cute.” He shook his head, “Forget it, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, keep going.” I nudged my shoulder against his.

“I just, I love your cute dresses, and your curly hair, and you’re gorgeous without makeup.”

“But…”

“But, I think it’d be different to be with someone more…sexy.”

“Like who?”

“You’re just such a good girl,” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, kissing my cheek, “But don’t worry about it.”

I stood up, shaking my head. “No, I will worry about it, though. Go find a bad girl,” I encouraged, moving into the house and shutting the door.

I hadn’t said more than a few words to him since that. I looked over at him as we moved to the bus stop.

“You look,” He hesitated, as we both stopped at the corner. I crossed my arms over my chest, watching him. “Really good.”

“Thank you,” I smiled.

“I just can’t help but feel it’s because of me,”

“Maybe it is,” I shrugged. Was it?

“I hope you’re not changing because of what I said. I loved who you were.”

“I don’t want your love, Caden.” I bit my lip.

“Okay. So what are you, like, a bad girl now?”

“Yeah,” I smiled, realizing that while I was sure a small part of me was trying to win him back, most of me was only trying to prove that I could be just as sexy as any other girl in our school. I wasn’t just some lame nerdy girl. I had the potential to be whoever I wanted to be, so the answer to his question was yes. “I guess I am.”