Page 59 of Free Fall

I turn toward her. All the petty shit that’s happened with her since Brady died rushes over me. “You know, you’d think I’d get some sort of reprieve from the likes of you after the year I’ve had. You never once sounded sorry about Brady. Not once. Hell, Reid told the whole school you fucked someone else because he couldn’t do it.”

“So, because someone dies, I’m supposed to not go after what I want?” Her eyebrows pull together. “As far as I saw it, Brady only hindered Reid and me. He never liked me,” she says, her voice hard.

Can’t imagine why. But I’ve heard this story before. Brady didn’t like Sasha, and when she and Reid first got together, he was opposed to it. I know he and Reid got into several arguments because of her. I’m not sure what happened, but eventually, it died down and Reid and Sasha had their own thing.

Maybe that’s why Sasha doesn’t like me? Because she sees me as being connected to my brother. She probably despises the fact that Reid is with me moreso than if he’d gone after someone else.

“Your brother was never any concern to me,” she says, straightening her shoulders. “But Reid is.”

“Why?” I ask, not getting it. The way I see it, she could still have pretty much any guy she wants. I’m sure a lot of them would be thrilled to get a striptease from her for their birthday. Reid’s just not it.

I say as much to her and she turns toward me with almost black eyes. “He is though, and you’re going to break up with him, or I’m going to make sure he breaks up with you.”

My heart starts thundering in my chest. “You’re insane.”

She smiles politely. “Recognize this?” she asks. She pulls her cell phone out and shows me a picture. The color drains from my face. It’s the same picture I sent to Ezra, the one with my fingers covering most of my breast, but not all of it.

“Where the hell did you get that?” I try to snatch her phone away, but she pulls it out of reach. “Did you hack me?”

She turns the screen off, hiding the picture away. I could take her phone right now and smash it, but that wouldn’t do any good. If she hacked me, all she’d have to do is log on to her online storage somewhere else. I’m sure she has it saved in a bunch of places.

My face heats up. To think that Sasha has seen that picture, probably all of her fucking cheerleader friends too. My stomach drops and then twists when I think that she may have read my messages too. All that grief. All that bare pain just laid out there, and she’s read it. She seems that maniacal to have planned all this out.

“I’m going to show Reid this picture. You know what he thinks about his girl showing themselves off…”

It dawns on me now what she said at the party. How I’m not the girl he thinks I am.

Shame washes over me. She’s had that picture for so long. My eyes track over to where Reid, Cade, and Lex are. They’re oblivious to what’s going on up here, but I feel like the world is coming down on me now. I should never have taken that. I should never have sent it. It was in a fit of despair, of truly feeling low and needing someone to fill me up. That’s not really how it works though. Someone else can’t fill you up. Someone else can’t take your pain away. If that was the case, all the help Reid and the guys tried to give me in the beginning would’ve been enough, but it wasn’t. It wasn’t until I started to accept it, until I started to turn myself around that I finally was able to let them in.

“If you don’t do it, I’ll make sure the whole school sees this picture,” Sasha taunts.

“You wouldn’t,” I say, glaring at her.

She shrugs. “Test me. If you think Reid didn’t like it when I stripped in front of a few people at a party, how do you think he’s going to take it when everyone sees you like this?”

“You can’t even tell it’s me,” I say.

She laughs. “You think this is the only picture I took? I have screenshots of everything you said to your boyfriend. I can prove it’s you.” She stands, her pom-poms rustling as she places her hands behind her back. “By tomorrow, Reid will come into school alone, without your skank ass in tow, or I’m sending it to everyone.”

“He doesn’t want you,” I say through clenched teeth. Why is she even bothering? What’s the point? Why want someone who doesn’t want anything to do with you?

“He’ll want you even less soon,” she says, shrugging. She skips down the bleacher steps, the purple and yellow of her pom-poms trailing behind her.

I want to go after her. I want to punch her in the face, make her pay for what she’s doing to me right now. I had a few blissful days of finally feeling okay again, but it’s gone.

Just like that, it’s gone.

26

Sasha’s only giving me until tomorrow to figure this shit out, so I don’t waste any time. Reid expects me to be there after practice, so I am, sitting in the grass by the Brady Page dedicated flagpole.It’s just a picture, I keep telling myself, but it doesn’t feel that way, even to me. It feels like a direct representation of a sad, lost girl. It feels like if I tell Reid what I did, I’ll be laying myself bare to him. Or even worse, if Sasha shows the picture to the school, she’ll be laying me bare to everyone. I’ll no longer be able to keep quiet and just be Brady’s little sister or Reid’s girlfriend, I’ll be someone. They’ll have a memory peg to remember me by, so even when it’s our ten-year reunion, they’ll be saying, “Briar Page? Yeah, you remember, she’s the girl who got caught sexting a picture of her breast.”

I spy Reid, Cade, and Lex walking from the locker room and turn away. All three of them. Wonderful. So many times, the sight of all three of them used to bring me happiness, but now, it feels like a weight on my shoulder. Even if I tell Reid privately, he’ll just tell them. They’re all about to know what happens when a sad girl has very little self-esteem and no one to turn to.

How fucking embarrassing.

“Hey,” Cade says. He kicks the underside of my shoes playfully. “Did you see that run?”

I lift my gaze to meet his and shake my head. He tilts his head to the side, but it’s Lex who’s immediately there. He crouches next to me, taking my hand in his. “What’s wrong?”

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