Chapter Sixteen

On Monday morning I carefully combed my hair until it was sleek and shiny. I put on a short skirt and tight t-shirt and slipped on my new pair of ballet flats. I glanced at the mirror and saw my dead friend in the reflection, but that didn't stop me. There was no going back now that I'd crossed the line.

I entered the school fully expecting dirty looks and whispers behind hands when I walked down the hall. I had a made a fool of myself at Luke's party. That was not what I found though on that super sunny day. I received warm smiles, and high fives, and a few flirty winks from boys who would've never looked at me before. Not that I cared about that much.

Jenna and Paige greeted me with hearty hugs at my locker.

"Did you get my text?" Paige asked.

"I did. I just ah, was busy."

"That's okay. It doesn't matter." She waved her hand.

"I'm ah sorry for how I behaved at Luke's party. I hope you weren't too embarrassed."

Paige frowned. "What? The party was epic. Everyone's talking about it."

"You were so much fun. Surprisingly." Jenna beamed at her. "Haven never really drank. And she didn't really like it when we did. So, having you around is so much better."

"Jenna?!" Paige frowned.

"What? I'm sorry, okay? It's just that Haven is dead, and we need to move on. That's what my therapist keeps telling me. To move on. It's the healthy thing to do." She grabbed onto my arm. "So that's what I'm doing."

For the rest of the day, I just got swept along. I walked the halls with Jenna and Paige like we owned it. I sat in my classes and smiled at everyone, ignoring the fact that my cheeks hurt and that I wanted to dig the tip of my pencil into the palm of my hand.

When I was in Mr. Craig's math class, I laughed with the rest of the class at his inane jokes and when he handed back test papers I didn't appear surprised at my good mark even though I hadn't even answered some of the long answer questions. I just looked up at his beaming face and gave him a satisfied nod of my head. This seemed to please him because he almost had a jaunty bounce in his step when he returned to the blackboard to start the next lesson.

As he scribbled equations on the board, I had to refrain from throwing my textbook at him. I wanted to scream, "How dare you give me extra marks for being popular!" It was no wonder Haven had been on the honor roll. Because I knew for a fact that my friend didn't do much homework and hadn't studied for her tests despite all the 'studying' we had done together at night. It had all been a farce.

At lunch, I sat with my friends, Luke and others at our table on the quad and tried to maintain a façade of interest. Especially as Luke was telling a story about the time he and a couple of his buddies drank a case of beer then drove down to the lake and went boating. Everyone laughed at the punchline. When I didn't, everyone looked at me expectantly. I glanced at the others, then smiled. Then laughed. Really hard. This made everyone laugh again, and Luke threw his arm around my shoulders. I let him pretend we were a thing, an item. I congratulated myself for not bending over and vomiting on the grass.

After school was cheerleading practice. I squeezed into the uniform, unconcerned with the flesh rolling out from under the shirt and over the band of the skirt. I lined up with my fellow cheer sisters and followed Paige's lead with mind numbing sameness. I didn't hit all my marks, and I didn't kick my leg as high, and my arms were soggy like wet noodles most of the time, but I went along with it. A quiet numbness cocooned me as I went through the motions of being whom everyone wanted me to be.

When I went home, I stripped off the uniform and put on my favorite pair of sweatpants and t-shirt, washed my face of the makeup, put my hair in a ponytail and climbed onto my bed. I grabbed a pillow and hugged it tight. I felt like crying. I felt like screaming. But I didn't do either. I laid there, staring at the open window, the curtains billowing out, praying to whoever would listen that Haven would crawl through the opening and tell me how much she missed me today.

But she didn't. And was never going to again.

For the next few days, I carried on in same manner. I met Jenna and Paige and sometimes Ashley at my locker in the morning. We strutted down the hallways greeting our minions. I went to class, got praise and good grades from teachers who had ignored me in the past. And at lunch I sat in the quad with my crew, Luke's arm around my shoulders. I laughed when appropriate and flipped my hair at least three times an hour. No one noticed that I was drowning in my own hypocrisy.

Haven would've noticed if she had been around.

On Friday, I helped man the table for the annual bake sale to raise money for prom. My mother had been overjoyed when I had asked her to bake some cookies for me to take to school. She'd been so enthusiastic about it, I had ended up with 120 cookies. Ten dozen of all my 'favorites'.

I held up a plate of gingersnaps. "Buy some cookies!" I shouted at the four people who approached the table.

They all stopped in the tracks, then after a few nervous glances at each other, turned and went the other way.

I set the plate down, then caught the gaze of Paige who was standing next to me.

"I guess they didn't want any cookies," I said, as I grabbed one for myself.

Paige didn't say anything just gave me an uneasy smile.

More students approached the table. Jenna and Paige sold some brownies and a few of the cookies.

After I finished chowing down on my cookie, I picked up a plate of brownies and decided to be more aggressive in my sales pitch. I'd always heard about the hard sell in my marketing class.

As students passed by, I stepped in their way and thrusted the plate into their faces. "Brownies? They're good. The money goes to prom so you should buy some if you don't want prom to be cancelled."

Two of the girls nodded and nervously dug into their purses for some money. They handed me a ten and I happily gave them five brownies wrapped haphazardly in plastic wrap. They scurried off, and I mentally patted myself on the back.

As I turned to grab more baked goods to shove into people's faces, I spied Dylan leaning against the wall watching me. I suddenly felt self-conscious in my short skirt and tight top and fake smile. Was he judging me? He had that smug half grin on his face. The one he used when we used to make fun of Jenna and Paige and their ilk.

I tugged at my shirt, aware that my gut was showing, and frowned at him.

"What are you looking at loser?"

He pushed away from the wall and walked away, shaking his head.

An intense rage bubbled up inside me. I hated that he looked at me like that. Like I was the loser. Like I should be pitied.

I grabbed the closest thing to me, which was apple tartlets, one in each hand, and I threw them as hard as I could at Dylan. One hit him in the ass, and the other in the back of the head. The force of the impact cracked open their thin crusts and gooey apple gunk spewed onto him.

Everyone in the halls froze and went absolutely silent. Like the mute button had been pushed.

Slowly Dylan turned around, bits of pie squishing under his scuffed up Converse high tops.

I stared at him. I had another tart in my hand ready to be launched.

"What the hell is your problem?!" he spit out between clenched teeth.

I'm dying. Can't you see that?

I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to beg him to save me.

Instead I squished the tart between my fingers and said nothing.

Finally Paige crept up to my side and wiped the apple from my palm with a napkin. "C'mon Daisy. You can handle the money instead of the baked goods."

A collective sigh rushed through the hallways, and then like the resume button was pushed, everyone went back to what they had been doing seconds before I had launched a first strike.

Dylan continued to stare at me, but others moved around him like he wasn't there.

Paige ushered me to the side and cleaned me up.

"Are you okay?" she asked. "He must've said something awful to you."

"He didn't say anything," I mumbled while I stared at my shoes.

"Well, he must've done something then. Everyone knows he deserved it."

I raised my head and looked Paige in the eyes. "No. He didn't deserve it."

Paige patted me on the shoulder. "C'mon, I think you're not feeling well. I'll take you to the infirmary and you can lie down."

I let Paige usher me down to the nurse's office. It was like I was drifting along. As if I was a big yellow balloon and Paige was tugging on my string so I wouldn't float away.

Ms. Hart, the nurse, took over for Paige and helped me onto one of the cots in the cramped dusty room that masqueraded as the infirmary.

"Are you having cramps, hon?"

I shook my head, wondering why that was always the first question. Are you on your period? Are you PMSing? Couldn't a girl just go insane without her menstrual blood clogging up her brainwaves?

"Did you take something?"

Ms. Hart stuck the ear thermometer into my right ear cannel.

"What do you mean?"

"You know, Xanax or Valium, or Adderall. I thought all you kids were using something."

"No, I'm not using anything."

Ms. Hart looked at the thermometer. "Well, you don't have a fever."

I rolled over onto my side and put my knees up.

"Are you stressed?"

"Maybe. I guess."

Yes! I'm so fucking stressed my insides are going to explode all over you!

"Stress can be really harmful to your body. It can mimic all kinds of different ailments." Ms. Hart went to cabinet in the corner and opened it. "Would you like a Xanax?" She rummaged through some pill bottles. "I have Valium as well."

I closed my eyes and pretended she wasn't there.