What I’m Not (Porter Brothers #3)

Prologue

NINE YEARS AGO

Sophomore Year of High School

A niyah’s fingers drummed against the oak desk, each tap sharp enough to echo.

Her teacher’s voice floated somewhere above her—a monotone buzz blending into the hum of the radiator—the scrape of pencils and the soft snores coming from the back row.

Nothing made sense today. Or maybe everything made too much sense, and she was tired of pretending it didn’t.

She wasn’t confused by the lesson, she could probably teach it.

Aniyah was in the top ten percent of her class with a full AP course load, and a GPA that made guidance counselors beam with pride.

She was so good that she could almost touch the hem of Yale’s skirts, even with only being a sophomore.

School was supposed to be her one guaranteed win.

But today?

Yeah, today wasn’t her day.

If anyone dared to ask her what was wrong, she’d probably spit out an answer so sharp it would slice the “ sweet, innocent Aniyah ” image people loved to wrap around her like some pretty ribbon. The girl who didn’t curse. The girl who didn’t talk back. The girl who always did what she was told.

She scoffed under her breath and tugged at the sleeves of her navy sweater, yanking them over her hands like armor.

Irritation buzzed beneath her ribs, tight and hot.

The clock on the wall mocked her, its minute hand creeping like it had all the time in the damn world.

Only an hour had passed. There were still thirty minutes to go.

She wasn’t sure she’d make it.

“I hate this place,” she whispered, not caring if anyone heard.

High school was a prison, and AP Statistics was solitary confinement.

Not because it was difficult, she could recite probability distributions in her sleep, but because it was mind-numbing repetition.

Five days a week of the same routine. The same expectations.

The same silence from her parents, unless it was to remind her not to mess up.

Rodger Henderson, her father, believed in discipline. “ Do what you have to do, in order to do what you want to do. ” He said it so often she heard it in her dreams. He quoted it like he’d coined the phrase himself. Her mother, Patrice, echoed him like a shadow. And the result?

No social life.

No sleepovers.

No phone past eight.

No boys.

No friends if they weren’t on the honor roll.

Nothing “unproductive.”

The only person who ever told her differently was Papa Earl .

Her chest loosened at the thought of him.

Earl Henderson, was 75 years old but didn’t look a day over 60, and he was Aniyah’s world.

Her safe space. Of course he came with a sharp tongue and a softer heart.

He was one of those old men who called everyone “baby” and meant it.

He smelled like peppermint and aftershave, wore flannels year-round, and believed that a kid deserved at least one thing of their own.

He snuck her candy when Rodger wasn’t looking.

He taught her how to play spades. He praised her for existing, something her parents never learned how to do.

“Don’t let them steal your spark, Firecracker,” he always says. “Life is bigger than their rules.”

She missed him today. She hadn’t seen him in two months, not since her dad forbade her saying that Earl was making her “lazy”. She needed him today. Because the spark he talked about felt like it had dimmed to a flicker under all the obligations and restrictions her life currently held against her.

Aniyah tugged her hood over her head, letting her long black hair spill forward like a curtain. Maybe if she was lucky she could sleep until the bell rang. But the moment she let her cheek hit the desk, her chest tightened instead of relaxing. Restlessness clawed at her ribs.

She was wound too tight and moving like a restless, trapped animal.

And then came the sound.

Giggling.

It was high-pitched and very obnoxious. The kind of sound people made when they were flirting too hard or trying to get attention by laughing extra loud at someone’s corny ass jokes. Aniyah lifted her head and looked across the room and her eyes landed on the culprit.

Katelyn Castello, the sophomore class’s “Puerto Rican princess”(that was an inside joke that made Aniyah laugh every time she snuck to watch Love and Hip Hop when her parents weren’t home). Aniyah was surprised that the girl passed any classes the way she was always sniffing behind someone’s son.

And here she was perched on someone’s lap like the chair beneath them didn’t exist, twirling a curl of glossy brown hair around her finger, her baby tee clinging for dear life and her mini skirt doing nothing to protect her from the February cold settling over Brooklyn.

Katelyn wasn’t shivering though. Not when she had Trevor Porter’s arms around her.

Aniyah’s stomach clenched.

Trevor leaned back in his seat like he owned it.

Like he owned the oxygen in the room. His fade was perfect, every line crisp.

Smooth almond brown skin. Thick brows. Dark, sharp eyes that always looked amused or lustful or both.

His mouth curved with that stupid, dangerous charm that had half the girls in school ready to risk their GPA for him.

Those dimples were weapons, really. He used them like he knew the damage they caused.

And, okay…he was fine. Annoyingly fine. The kind of fine that made other girls lose their minds, which only made him worse. Pretty boys always thought the world spun around them. Trevor Porter was Exhibit A.

He was spoiled, too. The youngest Porter brother.

Rumor had it his older brothers, Jackson and Angelou, did everything for him.

Protected him. Covered for him. Sacrificed for him.

So, naturally the girls lined up for him and the boys envied him.

Teachers forgave him for things they’d crucify other students over. Typical.

If anyone hesitated to give him what he wanted, all he had to do was smile and he got his way. He was just that good.

Aniyah rolled her eyes.

Boys like him were her father’s worst nightmare and her secret weakness.

Not because she wanted a boy like Trevor, but because she wanted the freedom to make her own mistakes, like he could do so easily.

She wanted to be able to want what she wanted, even if it wasn’t “appropriate” without having to be ridiculed and disrespected for it.

She wanted to be a writer. Her father said it was the stupidest thing he’d ever heard. There was no future in it.

When she expressed that she was interested in teaching, her father didn’t speak to her for a week because that wasn’t the future he planned.

She was supposed to be a doctor, like him.

Her mother didn’t ignore her, but Aniyah wished she had.

The way her nose stayed in the air anytime Aniyah was in the room let her know that her mother absolutely felt the same way as her father.

She just wanted to be herself even if it didn’t make sense.

That’s what Trevor had and that’s what she craved.

She tried to look away, but Trevor’s laugh carried across the room. It was loud, confident and easy. Like he didn’t have a care in the world. Joy surrounded him everywhere he went. And here he was, flashing those pearly whites pretending to be amused by whatever Katelyn was whispering.

Even though Aniyah knew—everyone knew—he got bored easily. Katelyn was the girlfriend of the month, maybe the week. Trevor treated girls like seasonal trends. He bragged about it. Bragged about his brothers’ advice.

She could practically hear it now, that ridiculous line he parroted from his brother Angelou: “ A girl is only as good as how far her legs will spread. ” Disgust curled in her throat at the memory of Trevor stating those words during their first week of freshman year.

All his homeboys laughed in response and dapped him up.

Typical mannish behavior.

She was about to drop her head back onto her desk when Trevor’s gaze slid over to hers slowly.

A deliberate sweep like he’d felt her looking.

When their eyes connected, she could feel the jolt of electricity travel down her spine as if she was listening to her favorite ASMR creator.

They stared for a beat too long before his plush lips turned into a full-blown smirk.

The hair on Aniyah’s arms raised in response, she had always told herself she was immune to Trevor.

They had been in the same classes since the 4th grade.

But moments like this proved that there was a small, very small, part of her that could feel the charm he should everyone else.

The moment would've been sweet, if Aniyah didn’t know any better, but she did.

And because Trevor was the kind of boy who couldn’t resist adding gasoline to a spark, he spoke.

“Take a picture,” he drawled, dimples on full display. “It’ll last longer.”

Mrs. Hillstrom, the middle-aged teacher, halted mid-sentence.

Her chalk froze against the board, she turned to see that it was Trevor speaking to Aniyah.

She immediately geared up to go in defense mode because Aniyah was too sweet to be bullied in her class.

The rest of the class fell into that delicious hush students lived for when they knew something was about to go down.

The kind of hush that meant drama was on the rise.

Aniyah sat up straighter, her annoyance spiking into something sharp.

How dare he try to play in her face, as if they weren’t the reason she was distracted.

Normally she would let it go. But after the morning she had battling it out with her parents, getting caught in the rain and having to walk to school because her dad was pissed, and currently dealing with an HS flare the size of a golf ball under her breast while having to act like she wasn’t in extreme pain every time she moved—yeah, she was over everything.

Today was the wrong day. And she was the wrong girl.

She stared at him coolly. “Maybe you should take tutoring,” she said, voice smooth as glass. “It might actually help your dumb ass pass this class.”

A collective gasp rippled across the room.

Trevor’s mouth parted like he wasn’t sure what to feel.

He had not expected Aniyah to respond to him.

She was always so quiet and mild. The laughs that bellowed throughout the room didn’t help his conflicted feelings either.

Should he be offended or impressed or…turned on?

His eyes narrowed, but there was heat there.

A small flicker. Something he wasn’t used to feeling from a girl he’d been baiting.

He reached to move Katelyn out of his lap.

However, before he could respond, the intercom crackled.

BZZZT.

The long-awaited tone buzzed through the speakers.

Class was dismissed.

Aniyah didn’t wait. She stuffed her books into her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and walked out like she hadn’t just shocked thirty students and a grown adult.

She didn’t look back.

But Trevor kept his eyes on her.

“Babe!” Katelyn called out to him, rolling her eyes because he seemed entranced by Aniyah. Her call went ignored.

He watched her until the door swung shut behind her. Watched the sway of her auburn ponytail, the roll of her shoulders, the deliberate way she didn’t give him her attention.

And something unfamiliar curled low in his stomach.

Because for the first time in a long time, a girl hadn’t melted under his smile.

He gave and she returned it as naturally as breathing.

She didn’t shy away or blush in front of him.

She stood her ground and that was appealing.

She didn’t look at him like he was the sun.

No, she’d looked at him like he was a nuisance–an inconvenience.

A boy too beneath her to give the time of day.

Trevor Porter didn’t know if he hated it…or if he wanted to chase that feeling all the way down.