Chapter 38
THIRTY-EIGHT
HARPER
I pull into the school parking lot in Helen’s Lexus and park in one of the spots reserved for seniors, even though I’m technically not supposed to use them without a sticker, and I don’t have one for this car.
Fuck it. After the morning I’ve had, I’ll take the parking ticket.
I reach for my phone, only to find Helen’s phone is still in the cupholder.
Damn. We swapped them for navigation and forgot to switch back when I dropped her off with Silas.
He was just waking up after his late-night shift at their club to help with the after-chemo nausea.
My phone must be in my backpack in the trunk.
I pop the trunk and step out into the November chill. The asphalt still has that rain-slick shine from this morning’s drizzle, and everything smells like wet pavement and exhaust.
Helen’s treatment has been hell on everyone.
Of course, Helen most of all, but Dad and Caleb insist on being there, holding back her hair for the hours she’s sick after every chemo appointment, and I know it kills both of them watching her feel so bad and not be able to do more for her.
Caleb thinks I don’t notice the way he clicks his pen in repetitive patterns.
Or scribbles more and more rules in that damn notebook of his.
Sometimes I’ll even catch him blinking in patterns, and I know he’s counting.
God, I hope his day has been going okay.
I know he’s not that stressed about Regionals—not compared to the real shit in his life like his mom’s cancer recurrence and the sixty-two percent survival rate he’s probably calculated down to the decimal point.
But it’s still important to him. After four years of debate team, as captain this year, Harvard acceptance is hanging in the balance, even though he already got in.
Caleb doesn’t do anything halfway. Including worry.
Still, the debate championship is a nice distraction. Something he can control when everything else is spinning out.
And I want him to feel like I’m there for him.
Even if I can’t sit in the front row cheering—because that would be weird, his stepsister showing up to regionals like some kind of groupie—I can at least squeeze his hand under the cafeteria table.
Maybe steal one of those quick kisses in the empty debate room before the bus leaves.
Maybe remind him that someone sees past the perfect golden boy routine to the terrified kid underneath who just wants his mom to live.
I grab my backpack from the trunk, the leather worn and familiar against my palm. It’s the one thing I brought from Grass Valley that I actually like—Z gave it to me two birthdays ago, saved up his money from odd jobs to buy it.
Z.
He’s been a real rock lately. Picking up the slack around the house while everyone else has been so worried about Helen. He even cooks dinner for everyone once a week now. Hamburger Helper, but still. It’s meant a lot that he’s stepped up.
I pause just long enough to dig out my phone, fingers searching through the zippered pocket where I always keep it.
The screen lights up.
Fifty-three notifications.
I blink. Refresh. Still fifty-three.
What the actual fuck?
My heart starts beating faster—that animal instinct that says danger before your brain catches up. I unlock the phone with shaking hands.
Most of the notifications are from Snapchat. Some from Instagram. A few texts from numbers I don’t recognize.
I click on the first Snapchat message.
That’s trash af. Just like her rep now
My stomach drops.
Next message:
Community pussy
The words slam into me. But I’ve been called worse. Much worse. This is nothing new. I just— Where the hell is this coming from?
I keep scrolling.
Not her fuckin her brother
Three crying-laughing emojis. Like it’s the funniest thing they’ve ever seen.
All the air punches out of my lungs.
Brother.
Oh god. Oh fuck.
My hands are shaking so bad that I almost drop the phone. I scroll frantically, trying to find the source, trying to understand what happened, when I see it.
A text from Marie. Just two words.
MARIE: I’m sorry
And then the video itself.
Five seconds. On loop.
Caleb and me. His basement stairs—the ones with the loose third step Helen keeps meaning to fix. My arms around his neck. One of those quick, stolen kisses we sneak when we think no one’s looking.
His hand on my ass. Squeezing.
My vision tunnels. Everything goes fuzzy at the edges except for that video, playing on repeat, destroying everything.
Sure, people are calling me a slut. That’s nothing new. I’ve been called worse since I was fourteen and Jared Bishop started the rumor that I blew half the football team behind the bleachers. (I didn’t. I’d never even seen a dick at that point.)
But I’m not the one with anything real to lose.
Caleb.
Oh god, Caleb.
The debate team. His perfect reputation. His mother’s pride. Everything he’s worked for since he was twelve years old and decided being perfect was the only way to keep her alive.
All of it is gone. In five seconds. Because of me.
I sprint toward the front entrance of the school, backpack bouncing against my spine. My boots slap against wet pavement, and my breath comes in short, panicked gasps.
I’ve got to find him. It’s lunch time—he should be in the cafeteria at our usual table. Unless he’s hiding somewhere because of the video. Unless he’s already been pulled into the principal’s office or—
My mind races through scenarios, each one worse than the last.
The debate bus leaves in two hours. Will they even let him on it? Will they strip him of his captain position? God, could this get back to Harvard even?
All because I couldn’t keep my hands to myself. All because I’m exactly the trash everyone’s always said I am.
I shove through the wide double doors at the front of the school, and immediately the atmosphere hits me—that particular buzz of scandal, the way student bodies hum when something juicy drops.
Heads turn. Whispers ripple outward from wherever I walk.
“—that’s her—”
“—can’t believe—”
“—her own brother—”
I ignore them. I’m good at ignoring shit like this. Had plenty of practice.
Naturally, the first person I run into when I barrel through is McKenzie fucking Davis, standing in the main hallway with her little entourage fanned out behind her like she’s posing for a magazine cover.
And she’s got this smile. This giant, self-satisfied, cat-that-ate-the-canary smile that tells me everything I need to know.
“Out of my way,” I growl, in absolutely no mood to deal with Queen Bitch today.
“I knew there was something going on between you two,” she sneers, blocking my path. Her uniform is perfect as always—skirt hem exactly regulation length, sweater vest pressed within an inch of its life, hair curled in those stupid perfect ringlets that probably take an hour every morning.
I want to rip those ringlets right out of her skull.
“Seriously, McKenzie, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll move your ass.”
I try to shove past her, but she stops me with her next words.
“I saw him cowering by your locker, in case you’re wondering where he is.”
My head wrenches around to look over my shoulder at her suspiciously.
She just blinks at me all innocently—lashes fluttering, expression blank—and my stomach does another sick swoosh.
This is obviously a trap. Has to be. McKenzie doesn’t do helpful. McKenzie does vindictive.
But I have to know. And my locker is on the way to the cafeteria anyway. Close enough that I can check both.
So I keep running.
My boots echo in the hallway. Students press themselves against lockers as I pass, phones out, filming. Always fucking filming.
I round the corner toward my locker and stop short.
Students crowd the hallway, cutting off the path behind me. The whispers explode into full-volume commentary.
And in the center of it all, like a spotlight on a stage I never auditioned for, are two police officers.
They’re pulling shit from my locker. So much shit.
Plastic bags. Big ones. Gallon-sized freezer bags stuffed full of weed. The cheap stuff—brown and stemmy, the kind you buy in bulk to flip for profit.
Pounds of it. Has to be at least three, maybe four pounds.
And smaller baggies. Dozens of them. Pre-portioned into eighths and quarters, ready to sell.
My hands start shaking. Then my whole body.
“That’s not mine,” I say.
My voice comes out too loud. Too desperate. It brings every eye in the hallway snapping toward me.
Including the cops.
“That’s not mine,” I repeat, and I hear how it sounds—exactly like every guilty person who’s ever said those words. “I don’t know how that got there. I’ve never seen that before in my life—”
Someone whistles behind me. Low and mocking.
“She’ll be expelled for sure.”
“More like jail. You see all that?”
More whispers. More phones. More eyes.
I’m drowning in it. In the attention, in the accusation, in the wrongness of it all.
And then I feel it—breath against my ear, hot and victorious.
“Wish you were dead yet?”
I spin so fast I almost knock into the person behind me.
McKenzie. Of course, it’s McKenzie.
“You,” I growl. The word comes out feral. Barely human.
She tilts her head, examining me like I’m a bug under glass. “Yes, me.”
“What is wrong with you?” My voice drops low. Deadly. The way it used to get back in Grass Valley when someone was about to get hurt. “Caleb’s mom is sick.”
I want her to flinch. Want her to show even a flicker of humanity. Of remorse.
Instead, she makes a mocking, sad face—bottom lip stuck out, eyes wide with fake sympathy.
“Awww,” she coos. “You really shouldn’t have messed with me then, huh?”
And something inside me just... snaps.
All the control I’ve been clinging to—the girl who’s trying so hard to be good enough for Helen, clean enough for Caleb, different enough from Darlene—evaporates like it was never there.
Because I’m not different. I’m exactly who I’ve always been.
The girl from the trailer park. The one who knows how to fight because fighting’s the only language some people understand.
The girl who protects the people she loves with teeth and claws and whatever the fuck it takes.
I launch myself at McKenzie, screeching in fury with my nails out like claws.
I’m going for her eyes. For that perfect fucking face. For anything I can reach.
Everyone around us erupts—screaming, shoving, phones recording this too because of course they are.
My nails catch her cheek. Draw blood. Four perfect lines blooming red against her foundation.
McKenzie shrieks—high and genuine this time, not performative—and tries to shove me off.
But I’m smaller, scrappier, meaner. I’ve been in real fights. She’s only been in the kind where someone breaks it up before anyone actually gets hurt.
This isn’t that kind of fight.
“You fucking BITCH!” I scream, and I don’t even recognize my own voice. “His mother has CANCER! What is WRONG with you?!”
My fist connects with something—her jaw, her shoulder, I can’t tell—and the impact jolts up my arm in a way that feels good.
Hands grab at me. Students trying to pull me off, shouting, everyone talking at once.
I don’t stop. Can’t stop. Because if I stop fighting McKenzie, I’ll have to face what she’s done. What I’ve done. How thoroughly we’ve destroyed Caleb’s life.
And I can’t. I can’t.
Someone gets an arm around my waist—thick and strong and definitely not a student.
One of the cops.
“That’s enough!” His voice booms in my ear. “That’s ENOUGH!”
I’m still thrashing, still trying to get to McKenzie, when the second cop grabs my arms and twists them behind my back.
The cold bite of handcuffs against my wrists is shockingly familiar. Like coming home to a place I never wanted to see again.
“Harper Tucker,” the first cop says, and his voice is tired. Professional. Like he’s done this a hundred times before. “You’re under arrest for assault and battery and for possession of controlled substances with intent to distribute.”
Intent to distribute? Those aren’t even my—
But it doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter that I’m being framed. Doesn’t matter that McKenzie planted that shit in my locker.
Because who are they going to believe? The rich girl with the perfect record and the designer clothes? Or the trash from East Texas with a criminal father and a drug-addict mother?
We both know the answer to that.
McKenzie’s standing there with her hand pressed to her bleeding cheek, tears streaming down her face. But when she looks at me, her eyes are dry. Triumphant.
“I told you,” she whispers, just loud enough for me to hear over the chaos. “I told you I’d make you wish you were dead.”
And as the cops march me down the hallway—past my locker, past gawking students, past teachers who won’t quite meet my eyes—I realize something terrible.
She already has.
Because this isn’t about me. It never was.
It’s about Caleb. About destroying the person I love most in this fucked-up world. About taking away everything that matters to him—his reputation, his future, his carefully constructed perfect life—and leaving him with nothing.
Just like everyone always leaves me with nothing.
I’m sorry, I think, even though he can’t hear me. Even though by the time these cops are done processing me, it’ll be too late. I’m so sorry, Caleb. This is all my fault.
Just like everything always is.
The cop pushes my head down as I’m loaded into the back of the squad car, the way they do in movies. Like I’m a real criminal instead of a girl who just wanted to protect the people she loves.
Because oh god, I do.
I love you, Caleb, I think uselessly. Now I’m so sure, right when it won’t do either of us any good. I’ve loved you from the very beginning.