Chapter 5 #3
I took a breath and pushed one of the doors open.
Inside, the room had a long lineup of food selections that overlooked an arrangement of long tables.
Most were filled, though a few others did have smaller groups and pairs of friends keeping to themselves.
I could actually feel the shift in the room when I joined the lineup and grabbed a tray.
I could hear whispers hissing around the room behind me as I checked over the food options.
I immediately ruled out anything cooked directly from the kitchen.
The smell coming from the warming pans was sour, and everything resembled weird coloured soup, despite the claims that it was meatballs, macaroni and cheese, and what I could only think was supposed to be some sort of fettuccine alfredo, but the noodles were swimming in a watery-looking white sauce.
There were a bunch of foiled wrapped hot dogs, some pre-ordered sandwiches and bags of chips, cookies, apples, bananas, and a small selection of pop and drinks.
I ended up grabbing a turkey sandwich, an apple, and a small carton of chocolate milk.
I knew better than to eat a banana in public.
In the past, I always made eye contact with the wrong person, and it got real awkward real fast.
I found a seat at the end of a long table, close to the far wall, where four other pairs of friends were eating together. I figured here in my little corner, I’d be ignored, and I could eat in peace.
Should have known better. From the moment I sat down and pulled out my notebook to doodle on, a shadow from the other side of the table was casting a shadow over the page.
“So… you’re the new princess of Harley?” a voice said, and when I peered up from where I’d been sitting alone in the cafeteria, I saw the same group of girls from this morning who had knocked me down as they stood right beside me.
The girl at the front with the dyed red and purple hair had her arms crossed, and she was looking at me with pure disgust.
“Uh, hi.” I tried to keep it civil and smiled at her as I held out my hand. “I’m Casey-”
“I know who you are,” she practically spat at me and ignored my hand. “… you’re the new girl… the one from The Hill, am I right? And you transferred from some preppy private school?”
I retracted my hand slowly and frowned slightly, feeling the animosity rolling off of her.
I said nothing. How the hell did she figure out I was from The Hill?
Around her bony frame, a slight movement caught my eye, and I quickly glanced over to see that Hunter, Bryce, and a group of terrifying-looking guys were watching this interaction go down.
They had definitely mentioned to her about what happened in English.
“Well, watch your back, new girl,” she sneered at me, and I held back a laugh, hardly believing that this was actually happening.
“Miss Truffle slumming it in Harley. I give her... what do you think, ladies? A week before she moves back to where she came from, crying like the spoiled brat she is?” She let out a loud, shrill laugh that caught the attention of nearly everyone who was sitting within twenty feet of us.
It was starting to feel a little like West Side Story.
I was kind of worried she was about to start snapping her fingers in rhythm before challenging me to a rumble.
She leaned forward, palms on the table, and all traces of humour gone.
“Any rich bitch who comes into my school and thinks she can look down on me needs a reality cheque.” And yet, you were the one looking down at me right now, I thought to myself.
“This school is ours,” she gestured at the girls behind her.
“And you don’t belong here. If you do anything that pisses me off, I’ll come after you.
You insult me? You won’t fucking get away with it, you understand? We’ll make you disappear.”
“Okayyyy,” I said slowly, trying to follow. “How will I know if I’m doing something that you consider insulting or stepping on your toes?”
She smirked at me. “Don’t worry, we’ll always be around to remind you.”
I glimpsed at the other girls. They were all pretty skinny, save for a few curvy ones in the back.
Though it had been years since I last scrapped with someone, I had been hopeful that it would come back to me.
However, taking on this group, especially on my own, would be the worst way to start my temporary life in Harley.
I couldn’t risk fucking it up, or else I wouldn’t ever be able to leave here.
“I’m sorry if I give the impression that I look down at you,” I said, my eyes on the table.
I felt a sense of anger awaken in my chest as I meekly apologized to this bitch.
“I don’t at all. I just want to go to class and graduate like the rest of you. ”
She cackled and shook her head. “Oh, honey.” The way she said it made me want to slap her. “You are a long way from home, aren’t you?”
“So… I guess you aren’t part of the welcoming committee, hey?” I said before I could stop myself.
She raised an overly plucked brow at me. “Excuse me?”
“Nothing. Just, you don’t exactly scream positive vibes.” I shrugged, trying to appear relaxed, but I was definitely tense as hell. Nearly everyone in the cafeteria was watching us now.
She peeked over her shoulder at the other girls and laughed, “Are you serious? Who do you think you are?”
“Well, I tried to introduce myself, but you kind of cut me off. I’m Casey Cooper, Senior-”
She narrowed her dark blue eyes at me. “You’ve got some nerve starting this shit with me!”
I shook my head, now regretting my smart-mouth.
“No, I haven’t done anything. You’re the one who approached me and started things off this way, so I just went along with it.
” I shrugged. “I don’t have the energy to try to get someone like you to like me.
If you don’t want to bother making nice, then fine. I don’t care.”
Her friends teetered and whispered to each other.
I went on, “I have zero desire to…” I shook my head, trying to think of the right word, “… usurp your position in this school. I just want to go to class and be left alone.”
She smiled at me, but it wasn’t genuine in any way. It’d been malicious and twisted. She scanned me over one last time before she murmured, “Nice earrings.” She walked away with her minions following after that.
I rolled my eyes, shook my head, and resumed my reading.
A huge shadow loomed over me before I could even get a paragraph in, and I slowly peered up into a familiar face.
Fucking Hunter Tremblay. Seeing him standing now, I could make out how huge he’d become.
He had always been taller and bigger than the other kids in our old neighborhood, but now his bulk had turned into muscle.
He was dressed in a black long-sleeved shirt with a torn army jacket and relaxed, worn jeans.
My eyes slid from him to the rest of his group, searching for another face I might have recognized, but they were all strangers. Even Mark DeLuca was absent.
“Casey,” he said, his voice now deep and baritone. He smirked at me as his dark amber eyes moved up and down my body, “you’ve grown up.”
I glared at him and sat up straighter. “Well, obviously, numbnuts. That’s what typically happens as you age.”
I thought he’d glower at me or come up with some sort of insult or sarcastic quip. Instead, he actually smiled as though he was enjoying this. “Still the same dirty mouth you had back then. Only…” he tilted his head to the side, “… now that I look at it, it’s got me thinking other dirty thoughts…”
I rolled my eyes, knowing he was just trying to get a rise out of me, and returned my attention to my book. “Please. Like, I haven’t heard that before. Go get some original material, and try again, maybe, never?”
Knockback the sass, Casey, I scolded myself. This sort of backtalk was just going to get me into trouble, but it was coming out of me like word vomit. My stubborn side won before I could stop and think.
Sure enough, one of his huge hands had come crashing down on the table in front of my tray, causing everything to rattle, and then hovered so close over me, it was suffocating.
Especially when the smell of his body spray was overwhelming the space.
I was so startled by the reaction that I looked up from my book, eyes wide as I watched him tilt his head to the side, a lock of his dark brown hair falling over his forehead, and he murmured, “You’re a hot piece of ass, Case…
who would have thought that a scrawny tomboy would become so fuckable? ”
Honestly, the look he was giving me sent shivers up and down my spine. His dark eyes were empty, his expression humourless and intense.
“Can you back up a bit? I can see up your nose from this angle,” I blurted out but held my composure, praying he wouldn’t see that he’d managed to intimidate the fuck out of me. We weren’t kids anymore. Hunter had become a beast. If he wanted to hurt me now, he could. Easily.
His eyes tightened, and he did actually back away, but only a little. “Well, princess , you’re going to have to align yourself to a crew sooner or later. No one survives Harley Institute as a loner.”
I clenched my teeth at his words but kept my eyes on the page of my book.
“I suggest you decide quickly,” he said, his tone soft and threatening all at once, and left back to his own table filled with huge, frightening-looking bastards.
It didn’t surprise me that Hunter ended up joining a group like that…
a crew, as he said. A gang, most likely.
I noticed that the “mean girl” who had been here right before Hunter, was draping herself over his shoulders, but he didn’t seem to notice her.
He simply murmured something to the other guys at the table until he finally had enough of her and shoved her back.
She pouted, shooting me a nasty look as though it were my fault he rebuffed her, and went back to her skank squad.
Hah! I smirked to myself… skank squad . I was definitely going to keep that nickname. It was better than “Mean Girls.” I shook my head and took a sip of my chocolate milk, and went back to my book.