Chapter One
Parker’s POV
“Did you hear?” “They’re supposed to be adorable!” “How many of them?” “I heard they’re British!”
I slowly closed my locker, the metallic click echoing in the crowded hallway. The lock snapped shut. It was all anyone had been talking about for weeks. The new kids. I adjusted the strap of my orange bag, letting it fall onto my shoulder, and turned away from the chipped red paint of the lockers. My gaze collided with Demi’s.
Perfect.
“Hey, slut!” Her voice sliced through the chatter, high-pitched and grating. It felt like nails on a chalkboard.
I stared at my scuffed sneakers, picking at a loose thread on the canvas. Nervous energy made my fingers tremble.
“Are you going to talk, or wimp out again and walk away crying?” Demi’s arms were crossed, a practiced sneer twisting her lips. Amusement glittered in her carefully applied makeup.
“Maybe we can make her pretty so people will actually talk to her,” one of Demi’s shadows, Olivia – Liv, as Demi always called her – chimed in. “It would take a lot of makeup though.”
“Surgery wouldn’t even make her pretty, Liv.” Sara, the third in Demi’s little circle, flipped her bleached blonde hair over her shoulder with a dismissive flick of her wrist.
“Girls, girls,” Demi said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. She placed a hand on her hip, silencing their bickering. “Let’s have someone decide for us…”
She smirked, and a cold knot tightened in my stomach. I knew, instinctively, that something bad was about to happen. Demi’s eyes scanned the hallway, finally landing on someone.
She moved with a predatory grace, her heels clicking on the linoleum, disappearing for a fleeting moment around the corner.
Then I saw what she was doing.
“Jesse!” she called, latching onto his arm. “I need you to do something for me.”
Jesse is the football captain… and has been the owner of every waking thought I’ve had since eighth grade. Six feet tall, with black hair that always looked windblown, perpetually sticking up in defiance of gravity. He was built like a linebacker, broad shoulders and a jawline that could cut glass. He was intimidating, even when he wasn’t trying to be.
Demi stopped directly in front of me, Sara and Liv flanking her like bodyguards. She gave me a saccharine smile, then turned to Jesse, batting her eyelashes.
My back pressed against the cold metal of my locker. I felt like I couldn’t breathe.
“Jesse,” she purred, her voice suddenly soft. “We were just talking to –” Demi faltered, her expression momentarily blank.
She didn’t even know my name. After ten years of torment, you’d think she’d at least acknowledge my existence.
She recovered quickly. “We were all just talking, and Liv brought up a very good question. Will anything – even surgery – make *her* pretty?”
Jesse glanced at me, and my heart lurched against my ribs. It hammered so hard I was afraid it would shatter my sternum. All I could hear was the frantic drumbeat in my ears.
I locked eyes with him, waiting for his verdict. Suddenly, his expression turned cold, a flicker of disgust crossing his features. He looked away.
“Nothing in a million years could make her pretty.”
That was it. The breaking point.
Thank God school was finally over.
I spun around and bolted, running past clusters of chattering students, ignoring the stares. I didn’t stop until I reached my car, fumbling with the keys until I found them buried at the bottom of my bag.
I threw the bag onto the passenger seat and collapsed into the driver’s seat, slamming the door shut. I pressed my forehead against the cool leather of the steering wheel.
Why me? Why always me? I’d been picked on for years, and I hadn’t done anything to deserve it. I hadn’t bullied anyone else. I had no idea what I’d done to provoke this endless stream of cruelty.
I jammed the key into the ignition and started the car. I turned on the radio, and my favorite song was playing.
“21 Guns” by Green Day. The perfect song. I sang along, trying to drown out the echo of Jesse’s words.
“Does the pain weigh out the pride? And you can't get another try. Did someone break your heart inside, you're in ruins…”
“One, twenty one guns! Lay down your arms! Give up the fight! One, twenty one guns! Throw up your arms! Into the sky! You and I!”
As I turned onto my block, something caught my eye. I slammed on the brakes, staring in disbelief.
The house on the corner… there was a moving truck parked outside it.