Page 2 of Free Fall

Ms. Lyons appraises me. She looks me up and down, taking in my appearance, which even I admit has drastically changed from last year to this year. There’s no hint of disapproval in her eyes or dissatisfaction in her face or next words, but I still feel the weight of her gaze. “You remember you’re to come see me during your study hall period, right?”

“Yes, Ms. Lyons, I’ll be there.”

She gives me a small smile, but then turns on her short heels and walks away. A few of the male students turn around to check her ass out as she turns down the next hall toward her office. It makes me roll my eyes, but at least it spurs me into motion. I finally unlock my locker and put the books I won’t need until later in the day there just in time for the bell to ring.Oh goody. I’m late for homeroom.The old me would die before she was tardy to anything, but this new me couldn’t care less. There are too many other thoughts swimming around in my brain to make room for worry over being late to an arbitrary class that means nothing in the grand scheme of things.

The first few periods drag by at the speed of a snail in a race for last place. Everywhere I go, people stare at me. It might be the drastic black-as-night hair I dyed just recently or the fact that I think everyone can smell my sorrow, but I wish they would stop. I want to blend into the background. I want to slip by unnoticed.

This is why I did what I did.

When I walk into the lunchroom, it’s loud and overcrowded. The deafening hum of hundreds of conversations taking place right this very second only serves to remind me that I’m more alone than I’ve ever been. I scan the crowd for Jules, but I don’t see her. I carefully avoid the table my brother would be sitting at and go all the way to the back corner, setting my tray down on the far end of a table, away from another group that’s taking solace here. I accidentally look up at them and when I do, their eyes widen, and they immediately turn to look at one another and hide their lips with their hands while they talk.

Real subtle.I wonder if they’re defining me to one another as the girl whose brother died? Or the girl who couldn’t stand it here, so she had to run away?

Maybe I should ask them…

It doesn’t matter. I sit, take out my cell phone, and type out a text to Jules, telling her I’m in the back corner of the room so she knows where to go when she gets in here. Who knows with Juliet though? She could’ve stayed after class to get direction on homework or any number of things. My brother’s death had somewhat of the opposite effect on her than it did me. Instead of wanting to “throw her life away”, she flipped a switch to good girl gone great in everything she does. Trust me, I’m a bit of a connoisseur on grief now, and I’ve heard—in many different forms recently—that we all heal differently.

Just not like me, apparently.

I push around the chicken on my plate after eating a few mouthfuls of the carrots that came with it. I set my fork down and stare at my plate. The buzz of electricity that’s coming from my back is almost impossible to ignore even though I’m trying like hell to block it out. The football table is too loud though, too alive. Just last year, my brother would’ve been in the thick of things. He would’ve been right in his glory, eating and talking with his teammates, strategizing, and dreaming.

“It’s okay, I’ll get her,” a familiar voice says, breaking into my thoughts.

My back tightens, and I sit up straighter.

“Oh, come on,” another voice says. I’d know it as well as the back of my own hand.

I recognize it like I recognize my own. I squeeze my eyes shut to block it out, but it only keeps getting closer.

Moving to my feet, I pull my bookbag toward me and step away from the table. I turn in the opposite direction, but then I hear my name called by that same voice and it makes me want to vomit.

“It’s okay, Cade,” I hear Jules say. She’s trying to intercept, and I kind of love her in that moment. The last thing I want is to come face-to-face with my brother’s best friends.

“What the hell?” Cade says. Strong fingers grip my arm as I try to make my escape. The fingers tighten and pull back until I’m forced to look up at Cade, to see his face. His brows are pulled together as his stare peruses me. He cocks his head. “I didn’t even know it was you at first. What the hell are you wearing, Briar?” His stare moves up, and his eyes widen at my now raven black hair. “What did you do?”

“Shut up, Cade,” Jules says, giving me an apologetic look.

Cade barks out a laugh as he does another once-over of my clothes, hair, and makeup like he’s a judge of a modeling show. To be fair, if he wasn’t the best tight end Spring Hill High has ever seen, he could probably judge a modeling contest. He sure seems to get the prettiest girls in school without even trying.

I don’t know if it’s the way he’s looking at me, the humor dancing in his eyes, or because he seems so familiar, but my hackles rise. “Screw you, Farmer,” I say, hugging my backpack tightly to my chest, his last name rolls off my lips like it would have if I were my brother. He never called him Cade, always preferring to use his last name.

Cade’s gaze narrows. After a beat, he says, “Reid says you should come sit with us.”

Reid, Reid, Reid… I’m not even going to look back at their table. I know what I’ll find. Reid Parker, quarterback of the Spring Hill High Varsity football team, reigning over his table with his girlfriend by his side.

“No,” I say simply.

His expression tightens. I’m sure he thinks they’re doing me a huge favor, but I don’t want to be coddled, and I certainly don’t want to be treated differently just because my brother died and they have some sort of misplaced integrity to treat the little sister of their late best friend with sympathy. Fuck that shit.

“Get your ass to the table, Briar,” Cade says through clenched teeth.

The nerve of him. The nerve of them all. “I’m sorry, I don’t think you heard me the first time. I said fuck you.” I smile. “Actually, I said, no, but I meant fuck you.”

He shakes his head, his lips pulling up in an incredulous smirk. “You think you’re all grown up now, huh? Because you went to the big city by yourself for a whole week?”

I swallow bile rising up my throat. “No, IknowI’m all grown up now, and I don’t need to sit with you or Reid or Lex, okay?”

He frowns down at me, but it’s all just for show. I’m dead to them. The thing connecting us is gone, so I’m gone too. “Grown up, but can’t even wash your hair for your first day of school or put on decent clothes?”

---