Chapter 1 #2
You’re welcome! I would’ve said hi sooner but I had to be a little careful since I so don’t wanna get on the bad side of Principal Carlisle.
Yeah, I don’t blame her. Leah can be a little intimidating with all her rules and punishments and lectures and ambitions. I mean, what else do you expect from the principal of a reform school?
I, myself, am totally afraid of her and I lived with her for eight years.
But I guess she’s only intimidating to girls like us, who break the rules and are perpetually bad.
I write down my reply, feeling light for the first time in almost seven days.
It’s okay. Principal Carlisle scares me too.
A second later, her reply comes.
Right?! She is scary. Like, she never smiles. By the way, if you sit with us in the cafeteria, we’ll make sure no one will bother you.
I’m about to ask who ‘us’ is, when the bell rings and the day ends thankfully. Everyone dives down for their backpacks like they’re diving in to save their lives, which could very well be true because God, this class was killing me.
I turn to Callie, the first girl to talk to me at St. Mary’s, and say, “Thanks for having my back.”
She smiles brightly. “Of course. I’ve been there. Miller is so fucking boring.”
“Did I hear someone dissing Miller?”
This comes from a girl with black hair and glasses. She’s got a husky voice and a mischievous face, and she’s wiggling her eyebrows at us.
Callie rolls her eyes. “Poe here has a great aversion to Miller.”
“Duh.” Poe zips up her backpack and skips over to us.
“She’s evil. And my guidance counselor. So I’m super lucky.
” She turns to me then, curious. “I’m Poe, by the way, as Callie said.
Poe Austen Blyton. My mom was an Austen fan.
And a Poe fan. And that.” She points to a third girl.
“Is Bronwyn. Bronwyn Littleton. Isn’t that the greatest name ever? ”
The girl she’s pointing at has the longest hair that I’ve ever seen. Like Rapunzel. Her light brown braid goes down to her ass but when she looks at Poe and shakes her head in a very indulgent and patient manner, I completely forget about the length of her hair and marvel over her eyes.
Because her eyes are silver and so ethereal looking.
She slings her backpack over her shoulder and looks at me. “But people call me Wyn. Because I hate Bronwyn, which Poe already knows.” She swings her gaze to Poe. “Doesn’t she?”
Poe sticks her tongue out at her.
“It’s okay,” I say, chuckling at their antics. “I hate my name too. Salem. It sounds witchy.”
Wyn smiles at me gently. “I like it.”
Second smile of the day. I can’t believe it.
This is turning out to be the best day ever.
“Can I ask you a question?” Poe jumps in but before I can answer either way, she continues, “Why would Principal Carlisle send her own ward to St. Mary’s? I mean, she could very easily discipline you back at home, right?”
Well, I guess I spoke too quickly.
All my earlier lightness evaporates as Poe and Callie and Wyn look at me with curious gazes.
It’s a genuine question.
Very, very genuine.
So I don’t blame them for asking me that. In fact, I’m surprised it hasn’t come up before. But then, these girls are the only ones who have talked to me at St. Mary’s.
It’s just that I’m a little conscious about my crime.
A lot conscious, okay?
It’s not as if I do what I did everyday. But I had to do it.
I had to.
“Because I stole some money from Leah – Uh, Principal Carlisle – and sort of ran away,” I say. “Or at least, I tried to. Before they caught me.”
The cops.
I was at the bus station, ready to board and get out of this town once and for all when they caught up to me and brought me back.
I mean, I still don’t understand how it all happened.
I was so careful while getting out of the house.
It wasn’t the first time I was sneaking out in the middle of the night anyway.
I’m an expert, for God’s sake. But somehow, Leah woke up and when she found me missing, along with my sunshine-yellow bike and one hundred and sixty-seven dollars from her wallet, she called the cops.
And since she’d had enough of my bad girl ways and she didn’t want me to ruin my life any further, she sent me here.
To become good.
“I’ve been doing you and your mother a disservice. I should’ve been more strict with you and sent you here sooner. If I had, then none of this would be happening. So you’re going to St. Mary’s.”
That’s what Leah told me.
I could’ve refused. I’m eighteen now; turned eighteen a few weeks ago.
I could’ve just walked out but I didn’t have any money. Whatever money I had, I used that to buy the bus ticket and the rest, Leah confiscated.
So here I am.
“But I was going to return the money,” I continue. “I was going to get out of town and get a job and once I had enough savings, I was going to give the money back to her.”
Which is all true.
I actually have a part-time job, or had one. At a restaurant in town where I worked as a waitress. But I’d just blown my savings and I really needed the cash. And I really, really needed to run away.
“Why were you running away?” Poe asks, her eyes wide.
Damn it.
I never should’ve let out that information. That I was running away.
My heart swells and pounds inside my rib cage.
My witchy heart with a thousand secrets.
“Uh, I… was…” I try to think of an acceptable lie.
Maybe I can tell them what I told Leah, that I hated this town and my old school and everything else so I was just hauling ass.
She bought it. I bet they’d buy it too.
But Wyn gives me an out. “It’s okay. You don’t have to explain.”
Callie smiles. “Yeah, we all have our secrets.”
“Yeah.” Poe nods, putting her hands up. “Sorry if I came on a little too strong there. It’s one of my weaknesses. I talk too much. And I always ask too many questions.”
Just like that the tension breaks and I can breathe easily.
Thank God.
I just met them. These are the first people to actually be friendly and talk to me in here. I don’t want them to hate me too.
And they will if I tell them why I was running away.
If I tell them my secret.
“Okay,” Callie chirps. “Let’s go to dinner. And you can definitely sit with us, if you want.”
Suddenly, Poe bursts into a series of gasps and actions. She looks at the clock hanging over the blackboard. “Oh my God, we have to go. Now. Forget dinner for a sec. I’ve got something to show you guys.”
“Show us what?” Callie asks.
“Hello? What else? Eye candy.” Poe wiggles her eyebrows again.
“Oh my God. Yes! I needed something nice the first week back to this hellhole.” Callie grins.
“I know. Apparently, there’s a press conference that we should see. This girl from junior year tipped me off. We gotta go.”
I’m confused. “What eye candy?”
At my question, Poe’s eyes go wide again as she takes me in. Not only that, she gasps too before lunging for my arm.
“Oh my God. This is perfect.” Then she turns to Callie and Wyn. “Isn’t this perfect? She knows him!”
I have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about. But Callie catches on and whips her eyes to me.
“Yes, she does,” she breathes out to Poe before turning to me. “You do!”
“I do what?” I ask, now more confused than ever.
Wyn is shaking her head again in that indulgent manner of hers that I’ve seen before. “Leave her alone, guys. She doesn’t know what you’re talking about.”
So Poe explains it to me. “You know him. You know the Principal’s hot son. Our eye candy.”
All right. I still don’t know what they’re talking about.
Principal’s hot son.
Who the fuck…
Principal’s hot son.
Him.
Oh my God.
The boy with sun-struck hair and summer blue eyes.
He’s the principal’s hot son now, isn’t he?
He is.
Because I’m stupidly at St. Mary’s and Leah Carlisle, along with being my guardian, is now my principal as well.
“You lived with him,” Poe says. “You lived with a soccer superstar.”
“Yes. The Blond Arrow,” Callie tags on.
The Blond Arrow.
That’s his soccer nickname.
That’s what they call him, his fans, the critics, the sports people, whatever. They gave it to him when he debuted last season. When he free-kicked the ball from the center of the field and it went soaring through the air, past all the players and hit the net, right in the center.
Holy fuck, they’re talking about Arrow.
My Arrow.
Before I can say anything though, Poe and Callie are dragging me out of the classroom with Wyn tailing behind and discussing how I can tell them everything there is to know about Arrow Carlisle, the celebrity athlete, because I lived with him before he went pro.
I’m not listening to them though.
I mean, I am, here and there but I’m mostly in… shock.
Which is stupid because I should’ve thought of this.
I should’ve known.
That he’d come up in conversations or that I’d hear his name in passing. It used to happen a lot, back in my old high school, normal high school.
He’s pretty famous around these parts.
He’s The Blond Arrow, the pro soccer player. Of course he’s famous. And of course he’d be famous here as well, at a girl’s reform/therapeutic school. His mom is the principal, isn’t she?
So yeah, I should’ve expected this.
But somehow I didn’t.
And now I’m here. In the third-floor bathroom.
Because Poe wants to show us something. A press conference, she said.
The reason we’re in the third-floor bathroom is because it’s always out of order so no one goes here. No one who’s up to any good anyway and we fit the bill perfectly.
Because Poe has a cell phone in her hand, which everyone knows is super duper forbidden, here at St. Mary’s. If we get caught, we will probably lose all our privileges and God only knows what else.
But Poe is hitting all the keys on her phone like she’s done it a thousand times before and Callie and Wyn don’t seem to care and I’m in such shock that I don’t care either.
Especially not when the video Poe was trying to get loads and I’m staring directly at him.
His dirty blond, sun-struck hair is the first thing I see.