Chapter 1 #2
“Maisie!” I call to her.
Maisie stops and looks around. When she sees me, her eyebrows shoot up. She nudges her boyfriend to wait, then threads her way through the crowd toward me.
“Ruby!” she says. “Hi, what’s up?”
“Do you know where Ember is?” I ask. My voice sounds perfectly normal, and I wonder how that’s even possible when everything inside me is broken.
“I thought Ember was ill,” Maisie says with a frown. “She wasn’t in school today.”
“What?”
That’s impossible. Ember and I left at the same time this morning. If she didn’t go to school, then where the hell is she?
“She messaged me that she was in bed with a sore throat.” Maisie shrugs and glances over her shoulder to her boyfriend. “So she must be at home, right? Sorry, I have to go. Do you mind…?”
I nod hastily. “Yeah, sure.”
She gives me another wave, then walks down the steps and links arms with the boy. I watch them go, my mind racing. If Ember had a sore throat this morning, I’d have known. She didn’t look ill, and she was acting normal. Everything was fine at breakfast.
I pull my phone out of my pocket. Three missed calls from James. My cheeks flush as I dismiss the notifications.
I took the photos. I can hear his voice in my mind, but I’m trying to ignore the oppressive feeling in my chest. I click on Ember’s name in my favorites. It’s ringing, so her phone can’t be switched off. But she doesn’t pick up, even after ten rings. I hang up and text her:
Please call me. I need to speak to you. It’s urgent.
I send the message and slip my phone back into my blazer pocket, then I walk down the steps and turn back to look at the school one last time. I feel out of place. I don’t belong here anymore. But I don’t belong at Maxton Hall anymore either.
The words I don’t belong anywhere shoot through my head.
With that thought, I leave the school grounds. On autopilot, I turn left and walk down High Street toward our neighborhood, even though home is the last place I want to be right now. I couldn’t bear it if Mum looked at me with the disappointment she showed in Lexington’s office.
The events of the day are running through my mind on a loop. I replay the head teacher’s voice again and again. Those few words that shattered the future I’ve been working toward for years.
As I pass a row of cafés and little shops, I catch fragments of conversation between people on their way home from school.
They’re discussing homework, getting angry at teachers, or laughing about things that happened at break.
Numbly, I realize that I have nobody to chat like that with anymore.
All I can do is walk along with the warm sun mocking me, knowing deep down that there’s nothing left in my life. No school, no family, no boyfriend.
Tears fill my eyes, and I try in vain to blink them away. I need my sister. I need someone to tell me that everything’s going to be OK, even if I don’t believe that for a moment.
I’m about to pull my phone out again when a car stops at the curb beside me. I can see that it’s a dark green beater, with rusty rims and grubby windows. I don’t know anyone who drives a car like that, so I walk on, not paying it any attention.
But the car follows me. I turn to take a closer look, and the driver winds down the window.
The face I then see is the last person I’d have expected. I stop in surprise.
“Ruby?” asks Wren. I must look as shit as I feel, because Wren leans out of the window to squint at me more closely. “Are you OK?”
I press my lips together. There are few people on earth I want to speak to less at the moment than Wren Fitzgerald.
The more I think about it, the more I know why he’s looking at me like that.
I must be the talk of the school by now.
A wave of unpleasant heat washes over me, and I walk on without replying.
A car door slams behind me, and I hear hasty footsteps. “Ruby, wait!”
I stop and shut my eyes. Then I take two, three deep breaths. I turn to Wren, trying not to show how messed-up I am or what I’m thinking.
“You look like you’re about to pass out,” he says with a frown. “Do you need help?”
I snort. “Help?” I croak. “From you?”
At that, Wren grits his teeth. He stares at the ground for a moment, then looks up. “Alistair told me what happened. That’s shit.”
I stiffen and turn away. Just as I thought. Everyone at Maxton Hall knows about it. Marvelous. I stare at the gym over the road. There are people running on treadmills and others lifting weights. Maybe I should crawl in there to hide. Nobody would find me there.
“Great,” I mutter.
I want to turn and walk away, but something makes me pause.
Maybe it’s the fact that he’s not driving around here in a flashy car, but one that looks like it’s on its last legs.
Maybe it’s the expression in his eyes, which seems serious and genuine, not like he’s laughing at me.
Or maybe it’s just the fact that we’re here in Gormsey, where I’d never have expected to meet Wren Fitzgerald.
“What are you doing here, anyway?”
Wren shrugs. “I was just passing through.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Just passing through. In Gormsey?”
“Hey.” Wren changes the subject. “Listen, I refuse to believe that James had anything to do with it.”
“Did he send you to talk me round?” I ask, my voice trembling.
Wren shakes his head. “No. But I know James. He’s my best friend. He’d never do a thing like that.”
“The photos make it look like I’m kissing a teacher, Wren. And James admitted taking them.”
“Maybe he did. But that doesn’t mean it was him who sent them to Lexie.”
I press my lips together.
“James would never do a thing like that,” Wren insists.
“What makes you so certain?” I ask.
“Because I know how James feels about you. He’d never do anything to hurt you.”
He says it with such certainty that my thoughts and feelings are stirred right up again. Would it change things if James didn’t send the photos? But why did he even take them?
“I’m on my way to his place now,” says Wren. “I want to know what the fuck is going on too. Come with me, Ruby. Then you can find out for certain.”
I stare at Wren. I’m about to ask him if he’s out of his mind. But I bite the words back.
Today has been the worst possible. It can’t get any worse. I have nothing left to lose.
I ignore the alarm bells that start ringing in my head. Without another thought, I walk over to Wren’s rusty car and get in.