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“How about we brighten it up for you?”
I raised my head.
Their paint balloons hit the sidewalks in successive splats, decorating their shoes.
“Fuck, not her!”
“Get away from her!”
“Run!”
The Victoria Day kids scattered in every direction like they thought I was going to chase after them.
Picking up my feet, I continued on to school.
Four stories of red brick, white columns, and large double-paned windows loomed ahead. Students streamed in from everywhere. Running up the steps, climbing the fence, reclining on the steps, breezing through the double doors and breezing out—Haris Day was a sea of brown.
I stopped at the foot of the steps, throat tightening. I could turn around now. Walk away and sayfuck youto my senior year. Mom paid the full four-year tuition in advance. Administration had been happy to keep their tight fists around the money for thetwo years I didn’t attend. They shouldn’t care if I was absent for the third.
Or so I tried to argue.
Principal Jeager claimed she wouldn’t accept virtual school credit anymore. If I wanted to graduate, I had to put on my hideous uniform and attend classes with everyone else. I no longer had an excuse not to.
Do I want to graduate?My grip tightened on my backpack straps.What’s it even matter if I do?
Mom wanted me to,a small voice whispered.She gushed on and on about the amazing graduation present she had planned for me. I can’t let her down again.
Letting out a long breath, I climbed the stairs, hanging my head low. I just needed to get through the double doors and into homeroom. Then I’ll be just another quiet student in the back who only speaks when called on.
I made it to the top of the stairs. Only ten more feet to go.
“What the fuck’s this? Are you kidding me?”
My head snapped up. Wide eyes beheld the group of four girls and three guys that surrounded me—coming up so fast I had no chance to get away.
“Jeager can’t be serious.” Dina sneered. “What the fuck is she thinking letting a murderer back into our school?”
“This has got to be a joke,” Kylie said. “The killer bitch must be here for one of those assemblies when they have the criminal trash lecture us on going down the right path so we don’t end up like them.”
“No chance of that,” Dina replied. “Because we won’t go psycho, kill our own mothers, and then blame it on three-headed dogs and mermaids.”
My expression was as blank as my soul staring at my two best friends in the world. The last couple years had been good to them. Dina grew out her hair and dyed the ends silver,something she’d always wanted to do, but her mother wouldn’t allow. Turning eighteen gave her the freedom to do that, pierce her nose, and stamp a butterfly tattoo on her ankle. She looked more mature and beautiful than she ever had.
And the same had to be said for Kylie. She filled out in all the right places. Her shoes were Louboutin. Her makeup enhanced her full lips and brought more attention to her jewel-tone eyes, and the guy on her arm was just the right amount of popular, handsome, and adoring.
Justin Lewis nibbled on her neck and smirked at me while he did it.
“Let me through,” I said flatly. “I don’t want any trouble.”
“Then you shouldn’t have come here, Lizzie B,” one of the girls taunted.
“Lizzie B?”
“Lizzie Borden,” Dina helpfully clarified. “Trouble is all a murderous bitch like you is going to get.”
I tried sidestepping and going around, but they snapped in tighter around me, boxing me in.
“You’re not even going to deny it?” Kylie scoffed. “I told you. I said it was her. She was pissed because she’d been bragging all day about the amazing, expensive gift her mom was going to give her, then she opens the box, and it’s just a rusty old knife.”
