Page 49 of Her Passionate Hero

“Look, they have holes. I told you she would have the ugliest undies in school. Smelly too.”

Aliana stared at them in horrified disbelief. This couldn’t be happening. This couldn’t be happening. Her panties didn’t smell. She was in charge of laundry at home. But it was true, they had holes in them.

“They’re granny panties. Look at how big they are. They’re ugly as fuck,” Heather crowed.

“Wait ’til we show the others. We’ll win for sure.”

This couldn’t be real. Say it wasn’t happening.

“Thanks, Alley Fat, we’ve won the bet. We’re going to win for finding the Ugly Undies for sure,” Lupita smirked.

“Come on, let’s show everybody our prize.”

As soon as she heard them leave, she jumped up and tried to lock the door. The lock was broken. She did the best she could to clean up while holding the door shut. Trembling and shaking, she left the stall and went to wash her hands. She couldn’t look at herself in the mirror.

She was halfway to the door when her stomach rebelled. She ran to another stall and bent over and everything she’d eaten for lunch came bubbling up and out. Again and again, she heaved. Snot came out her nose, her eyes watered. When she was done, she went to the sink and tried to clean up again, this time forced to look in the mirror. They were right, she was Alley Fat. She was pathetic. She needed a place to hide. Everybody was in class. She knew where to go.

“Jesus, I’ll kill them.”

“You would never hit a girl, Hunter.”

“I’ll make an exception.” She had never seen him so angry. “Come on, I’m driving you home. Don’t come to school for the rest of the week. It’ll be taken care of by Monday.”

Her eyes got wide. “But you don’t hurt girls, not ever.”

“I’m not. But those bitches are going down.”

“Others will take their place. Mama and Papa won’t let me dress like the other kids. I still talk funny. I try not to talk with an accent, but they only let me speak Czech at home. And I’m fat. It doesn’t matter what you do.”

“You’re not fat. There’s a lot of girls in this school who weigh as much as you do and people don’t call them fat.”

“That’s because they’re popular. They don’t dress funny. I’m always going to be the funny dressing, funny talking, fat girl.”

“Stop talking like that! You’re special, Alia. You’ve always been special.”

She felt like crying again. He was so wrong. But maybe if someone like Hunter thought she was special, then maybe she might be close to normal.

“So, do we have a deal?”

“Huh?”

“I drive you home. You call in sick. I take care of things.”

She bit her lip. What choice did she have? If she told a teacher or the principal, it would just get worse. She nodded. Hunter squeezed her shoulder.

“You’re brave Alia. You’re special and brave.”

“You need glasses.”

***

“You were remembering, weren’t you?”

She looked up and saw the grown-up Hunter. Somehow, she didn’t remember it happening, she was crushed up beside him. He hadn’t moved, but his arm was around her, and he was stroking her shoulder. She nodded her head.

“I can help you now like I did back then.” His voice was rich and gentle.

“You have girl gang members you can sic on the bitches in my life?” She hiccoughed a wet laugh. “As I remember it, Rita was pretty darn vicious.”