Happenstance 2 (Happenstance #2)(7)
Author: Jamie McGuire

I shrugged and proceeded to the truck. “I didn’t have time to read the directions. I don’t know how.”

After Weston and I settled into our seats and buckled our seat belts, he held out his hand. I took it. Then he held out his other hand.

I frowned. “Are we making a secret handshake?”

His amusement turned into a full-blown cackle. “The phone, Erin! Give me your phone so I can give you the crash course.”

I handed it over, and he instructed me on how to turn it on, add contacts, and send text messages. He even added a couple of songs and showed me how to listen to them.

“The most important thing during school is this,” he said, flipping a tiny switch on the side with the little bit of thumbnail he had. “It makes your ringer silent. You can change your ring tone if you want. I can show you that later.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s just something people do to make it their own. You don’t have to if you don’t want to, but you should definitely keep it on silent. If your ringer goes off during class, you might get your phone taken away.”

“Who’s going to call me during school?”

“I might text you if I knew your number.” He tapped the screen twice and then grabbed his phone, punching in more numbers. “Never mind. Got it.”

I took back the phone. “Maybe I didn’t want you to have it,” I teased, but then realization dawned on me, and I felt a little sad. “You’re probably the only person who’ll use it.” The phone buzzed in my hand, and I looked down. It was a text message.

Weston leaned over and showed me how to open it.

It’s Sam (Dad). Don’t forget about dinner. See you tonight. Have a good day at school.

Will do, I typed back, and let the phone fall in my lap. The corners of my mouth curled up.

“Who was it?” Weston asked, clearly unhappy about the look on my face.

“Sam,” I said. “He was reminding me about dinner tonight.”

“Oh yeah,” he said, his brows still furrowed. He drove away from our neighborhood toward the school. He seemed lost in thought, using his signal and going the speed limit like he’d done a hundred times before. But he didn’t say anything else until we parked in the student lot and walked inside.

This time he didn’t try to hold my hand. He put his arm around me, walked me to my locker, and kissed my hair.

“See you after class,” he said, walking away. The juniors and sophomores who had lockers along the same unit stared at me, surprised at the unusual show of affection.

I put my backpack in my locker, grabbed my bio textbook, and headed to class. My table was empty when I arrived, but then so were several others. I was early, so it was a good time to put my homework on Mrs. Merit’s desk. Thinking ahead and doing things in a way that would draw the least amount of attention was a part of me. It would probably always be.

Just as I returned to my chair, Brady Beck strolled in and sat in Sara Glenn’s seat across from me. Instinct had me recoiling, and then I was immediately embarrassed that I did so.

He seemed to enjoy it. “Did you ask him?”

“Ask who what?”

“Weston. Why he’s so interested in you all of a sudden.”

“We’ve already talked about all of that.”

“Then he didn’t tell you the truth.”

“Why don’t you just say what you want me to hear, and we can be through with it?”

Brady’s eyes sparkled with the many things playing out behind them. He was considering his options, what he wanted to say, and whether the outcome would be what he wanted.

“Nah,” he said, pushing back the chair and standing up. He sat down in his own chair, still staring at me. “You can take the girl out of the trailer park…”

I looked down at my phone and pressed the button Weston showed me to push. His name was on the screen, and I smiled, knowing he’d put his number into my contacts. It was nice to have a short conversation with him to keep me distracted while the class filled with sleepy students.

“Did the Aldermans get you that?” Brady asked.

The dozen or so students who had filtered in and sat down all turned to look at me.

I didn’t look up.

“What does it feel like to benefit from the death of someone else?”

I still didn’t respond.

“I can’t believe they’re just letting you take over her life like that, as if she never existed.”

I pressed different buttons on my phone, anything to distract myself.

“Julianne has never been that smart—”

“Shut your fucking mouth!” The words pushed from my throat before I could stop them. My ribs were pressed against the table, my palms flat against the many inscriptions that past and present students had carved into the black, slate surface.

Brady sat back with smug satisfaction unlike anything I’d seen on his face before. He knew now how to get to me. I’d exposed my weakness, and he would undoubtedly exploit it every chance he got.

Sara’s eyes drifted behind me, and I turned around. Mrs. Merit had heard my vulgar outburst, and I awaited punishment.

“Open your books to page two hundred and eighty-three,” she said, walking behind her desk.

During the break between second and third periods, Weston came to my locker with a very different look on his face than he had that morning on the way to school. His cheeks were red, and he was breathing fast.

“What did Brady say to you?” he asked.

I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters. I heard he said you were happy that Alder died, and that you were benefiting from her death, and that he also mouthed off about Julianne, and you freaked out in class. Is any of that true?”

“Close enough.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, a little hurt.

“Are you upset?”

“No, I’m pissed off. I’m bordering on rage.”

“That’s why.”

He shifted. “Why let him get away with it, Erin? Why keep letting him treat you that way? He should get a fist in the face, his ass kicked, trip and fall face-first…something. People like that don’t just get to treat people like trash and go on with their life with no repercussions.”

“Didn’t you say the other day to feel sorry for them?”

“Brady makes it really hard to feel anything toward him but extreme loathing. It’s not just you. What about that impression he does of Annie Black every time she motors by in her wheelchair? What about Jenny Squires?”