Chapter 7 Juliet
JULIET
Animals can smell fear, and I’ve often wondered, why not humans? We’re all animals after all.
Then, I step through the doors of Silverwood Public and I realize—we can.
Fear smells like a combination of sweat, bleach, and cheap perfume. It clings to the walls, the lockers, and the students that pretend not to stare at me as the guys and I walk towards our lockers.
If I thought shit was bad back when my dad was just a thief—that’s nothing compared to what those eyes are saying now.
Murderer.
Psycho.
Whore.
They don’t say it out loud. Cowards never do. But I hear it anyway. I’m no longer just guilty by association. In these people’s eyes, I’m a killer. It’s almost ironic that they’re right—just not about who I’ve killed.
The hallway stretches in front of me like a damn execution march.
Each step I take is met with a strange sort of silence that’s too loud to ignore.
It’s not the complete absence of sound. There are far too many whispers and other noises—sneakers squeaking on the tiled floors, the sharp banging of a vending machine releasing its goods, and the clang of locker doors—for that to be the case.
The silence is coming from somewhere else. From the students themselves. There are no shouts, no mocking jeers. Even the teachers avoid looking at me as I pass them.
I’m not sure if I should be grateful for the guys’ positions on either side and behind me. A part of me is a little annoyed. I need to know what to expect when they’re not around. I need to be able to anticipate and protect myself. Right now, I’m struggling to read any of the people I see.
Sharp gazes crawl over my skin like cockroaches, hungry for blood, for a hint of the truth. That is… if the truth is what they’re hoping for.
Truth and reality are two very different things. These people don’t want reality. They want the truth as they know it.
My fingers curl at my sides, nails biting into my palms, but I don’t stop walking. Not when Nolan moves up from my back and around to the front of me, taking the lead. Not when I spy some of Megan’s old cronies. Not when Lex reaches out and takes my hand, redirecting my attention to him.
He lifts my hand up until his lips are on my knuckles. I blink and nearly stumble as he opens his mouth and sets the edge of his teeth on my skin.
“Lex.” I hiss his name and yank my hand away. Not that he seems to care. His laugh is a deep vibrato that dives deep into me and heads straight for my core.
With a scowl of frustration, I turn forward and pick up speed, pacing past Nolan as I head for my own locker—if it’s still even mine. I hear one of the guys call my name—maybe Nolan, maybe Gio—but I ignore it and stomp forward.
When I reach the hallway and row of lockers that houses my own, I move to it and am grateful to see that it still has the same lock I left on it.
Twisting the knob back and forth until it pops, the door swings outward to reveal my notebooks and textbooks, all of which had been left behind when I moved into Morpheus’ house.
Even though I’d continued schooling online, he’d made sure that it had included everything online—textbooks and notes included were only available digitally.
He’d been in the process of getting the physical things for me to finish school when he’d died.
Oh well. It was a wasted effort.
A male body smacks against the locker next to mine and my lips twitch in amusement. “This brings me back,” I murmur as I pick out what I’ll need for classes before lunch.
Gio grins at me. “To the good ol’ days, I’m sure,” he replies.
I roll my eyes. “Those ‘good ol’ days’,” I say, “were, like, three months ago.”
He shrugs, crossing his arms over his chest as I finish and close the door, relocking it. “Hey, things are different now than they were then, aren’t they?”
He’s not wrong about that, but I don’t respond as I move down the hall towards my first class.
“Jules.” The sound of Nolan’s voice draws me up. I glance over my shoulder, arching a brow as both he and Lex stop next to Gio. “You gonna be okay?” he asks, casting a dark look at the onlookers as he does.
“Don’t worry, big man.” I lift my hand, waving him and the others off. “I’m no damsel in distress. See you in class.”
The students of Silverwood aren’t the only ones surprised by my sudden reintroduction to the rest of the school.
Several of the teachers do a double take when I walk into their classrooms. Most stop me when the bell rings, signaling the end of the period, to inquire about my studies while I wasn’t in class.
I lose count of how many times I have to explain the online schoolwork that Morpheus had me do even though I’m almost certain they all must have been informed. They had to be in order to send information and grade my previous work.
What they want is information. I wonder if they think stopping me to talk about something else will get me to slip up. It doesn’t.
I didn’t kill Morpheus—no matter how much I wish it had been me.
By the end of the last class, there’s a steady throb behind my temples, like a rubber band has been wrapped around my skull and is tightening every second.
I’m tired, thirsty, hungry, and all around cranky.
Still, I’m grateful to be back at Silverwood.
Never thought I’d say that, but it beats being locked up in Morpheus’ mansion.
I walk towards my locker, ignoring the gazes spearing into me as well as the whispers that have picked up in volume. I was right—the second the Scorpion Kings are gone, they get brave.
“Murderer…”
The hissed word doesn’t piss me off. In fact, I’m only surprised I haven’t heard it more. Why not? I’ve been their whipping girl for months now anyway. Daughter of a criminal, why not a murderer too?
Exchanging my books for what I’ll need to do my homework, I snap my locker shut and head towards the end of the hall. The guys will be getting ready for practice now. Their last game is coming up—a fact I didn’t know until I saw one of the hand-painted banners hanging up in the front hall.
The normalcy of it all is foreign to me now. Even though I’ve craved it, wanted it, demanded it—nothing is going to be normal anymore. It fucking hurts to realize that. No matter what I do, no matter what I say—Silverwood is always going to see me as the villain.
“Juliet?”
I’m so focused on getting out of the building that I don’t recognize my name until I nearly push through the double glass doors that lead into the student parking lot. It isn’t spoken in a whisper and there’s no venom in the tone. That’s what has me pausing and turning back.
Wide, pale blue eyes meet mine. Mads. She’s halfway down the hallway, holding a couple of textbooks against a gray sweater with the collar of a white shirt peeking out underneath.
She blinks as if she’s surprised to see me here.
Then, before I can open my mouth or lift my hand in a wave, she’s moving.
Walking towards me at a fast clip, people dodge her and shuffle out of her way when it becomes clear she’s not going to stop to go around them.
Then, she’s running. Mads draws nearer, dropping her textbooks when she’s only a few feet away and throwing out her arms. I let out a low “oomph” as she slams into me, gripping me tight.
“Oh my god,” she says against me. “You’re back.”
“I… am?” The statement comes out as an unintentional question, but I clear my throat and repeat. “I mean, yeah, I am.”
She squeezes me tighter. I hesitate in hugging her back.
The few students left in the hall watch us, some with scowls of disapproval.
One brave girl—a freshman by the look of her—lifts her cell as if to take a picture of the two of us.
I glare the bitch down and raise one hand behind Mads’ back and flip her off.
The girl pales and quickly puts her phone down before dashing off.
“Fucking vultures,” I mutter to myself as I wrap my arms around my friend, returning her affection.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” Mads says, her words sounding watery.
Okay? I struggle not to chuckle at that. I’ve got anger issues, three boyfriends, and am probably suffering from an undiagnosed disorder of some kind. But if she wants to think I’m okay because I’m standing here in front of her, who am I to tell her otherwise?
Pulling away in the next instant, Mads reaches up and quickly wipes beneath her eyes. Is she… crying? No, I decide, but her gaze is a bit glassy as she turns away and picks up the books she dropped when she threw herself at me.
I bend and help, handing her some of the pages that had fallen out of the covers.
Through the glass doors, there’s already a line of cars waiting to leave the lot.
More people hang around the tailgates of various cars, some chatting and oblivious, but others have their gazes turned towards the glass doors I know we can be seen from. Vultures was too kind a description.
“So…” Lifting the last textbook, I hand it over and she thanks me in her usual quiet voice. “What’ve you been up to?”
Mads laughs again as we head outside. Thankfully, when she looks at me this time, her eyes are clear of any tears. “Seriously?” She scoffs and shakes her head. “No, we’re not doing that. We’re not those kind of girls.”
“What kind of girls?”
“The kind that don’t actually care about the shit show of their friends’ lives.” My eyes widen as she reaches out and wraps a firm hand around my wrist. “Come on, let’s go out to the football field. We can talk there.”
“Madison Torres,” I murmur as she pulls me along and I stumble after her. She’s stronger than she looks, but I don’t attempt to break her hold. “Are you skipping your extracurricular activities for me?”
Mads shoots a dark look at me over her shoulder, but otherwise doesn’t reply.
My lips twitch. It’s a nice feeling having a friend care about you, knowing they worried when you weren’t around.
And yeah, she’s right—maybe in the past I would’ve been one of those girls that faked her way through friendships, not actually giving a shit about the other person.
I’m not that girl anymore.
I never will be again.