Page 69 of Revenge At Raleigh High
“You’re wrong,” I wheeze. “No one’s ever loved you. How…could they? It’s impossible to love something so twisted and…dysfunctional. Your own mother couldn’t even bring herself to give a shit about you.”
Talking about his mother isn’t going to do me any favors, but…when he was pinning me down and raping me all those months ago, I didn’t think he was going to kill me. Hurt and humiliate me, yes. He was going to force himself on me and laugh about it afterwards. I knew I was walking out of that bathroom at some point, though. Tonight, he has something different in mind. He’s planning on brutalizing me, and then he’s going to take my life. He told me so much in those text messages. It’s plain to see in his eyes, here in the shadows of the boy’s locker rooms, where he carried me when I was unconscious. I won’t be leaving this cold, damp room, reeking of sweat, so fuck it. I’ll bait and antagonize him. If these are my final moments on this earth, then I won’t waste them cowering like a frightened, injured little bird.
Jake wants to taste my fear. I refused to give it to him when he roughly threw my legs open and thrust himself inside me at that party, and he hasn’t been able to swallow the fact that I defied and denied him ever since. He thinks that tonight, that wrong will be righted. He’s bigger than me. Stronger. He thinks he’ll be able to hold the threat of more pain over me until I crack and supply the fuel that he’s been craving for months now. But he’s wrong.
If I die tonight, then let the act be naught but ash and death on your tongue. Let my steel cut you to the quick, even as I fade…
Am I afraid of dying? Yes. A thousand times, yes. But more than that, I regret not getting to see what comes next. All the places I haven’t explored. All of the life events I won’t experience. I’ll never know the kind of person Max becomes. I’ll never know if my parents find happiness again. And Alex…Alex will go on and live without me. Once all of the hurt and the anger subsides, and the world no longer feels like it’s crumbling down around him, there’ll come a day when he wakes up and the pain feels just that little bit less. Someday, some girl will come along, who makes him feel the way I make him feel, and that…god, it hurts more than I can bear, but it’s a good thing. He deserves to be happy, after all the shit he’s been through. So I can do this. I can get through the next few hours with Jacob Weaving, and I can make sure he never gets what he wants from me. He’s going to rot in prison for what he’s about to do. He’s going to spend those long days and even longer nights trapped behind the bars of his cell, having never won his victory over me.
Fuck. Him.
Jake’s lips peel back, exposing his perfect, twenty-thousand-dollar teeth. My defiance is getting under his skin. He fists my hair, getting to his feet, and I have no choice but to follow along with him, biting back a cry as I struggle to stand. Before he knocked me unconscious, he hit me. He wound his arm back and he hit me, giving each swing everything he had. He knocked me off my feet, only to lift me back up so he could knock me down again, and when he finally left me on the ground, disoriented and bleeding, he laid into my ribs with his boots. He kicked until the both of us felt my bones splinter, and then he kicked me some more. I’ve never known pain like this before.
My head swims, my vision warping, darkness pressing down on me, trying to force back down to the ground. God, I’m going to throw up. My stomach squeezes, nausea rolling over me like a wave, but I clamp my mouth shut, drawing a deep breath in through my nose. Expanding my ribs is agony, but the extra oxygen helps me stop myself from retching. My vision stabilizes, but I’m so damn weak.
“I know what you did to Sam’s headstone.” Jake leans down, spitting the words viciously into my face. “Shouldn’t have done that. He was a fucking moron most of the time, but he was one of my best friends. Now people are whispering behind my back, giving me dirty looks. They’rewondering, and I can’t have that. It’s only a matter of time before the busy bodies in this Podunk fucking town start asking questions.
“He told me you did your best to clean yourself up after we were done with you that night. He stood outside the bathroom door and listened to you sobbing like a little bitch in the shower. I was almost sad I didn’t hang back to hear it. That kind of abject misery is fascinating to me.” He leans even closer—so close that his lips brush against my cheek as he pours his vitriol into my ear. “You were right. My dick really only does get hard when other people are suffering. I know that’s messed up. I know that’s not normal, but hey. Telling the truth can be cathartic, right? It can be healing.”
God, he’s such a fucking joke. I give up trying to pull my head free, letting myself fall limp. “Don’t play games, Jake. You don’t care about healing. You like yourself just the way you are.”
His wide grin reminds me of a shark, opening its maw to expose its teeth just before it bites. “Looks like you know me well, Second Place. Come on, now. I figured we’d go and take a shower together. For old times’ sake.”
* * *
I fight. I fight like I’ve never fought before. I kick and scream, lashing out with as much fury as I can muster as Jake drags me through the boys’ locker rooms toward the showers. In the end, all of the thrashing and hollering is futile. Jake knows I’ll take an opportunity I get to slip free from him and do him some damage. I taught him that in the hallway, when I climbed on top of him and laid into him with my fists. He’s not taking any chances now. He holds me close to his body, pinning me to his side, which makes it impossible to gain any momentum to hit or land a proper kick.
The harder I struggle, the harder he laughs.
“That’s it, Parisi. Let it aaaaall out. Scream at the top of those whore lungs. Doesn’t make any difference. No one’s gonna hear you. No one’s gonna find you. This place is gonna be deserted until Monday morning. And then? The janitor’s gonna find himself a nasty surprise when he unlocks the place, that’s for sure.”
The boys’ showers are a mirror to the girls’ showers, except the smell is much worse—damp and mildew, punctuated with the overripe tang of adolescent male sweat. My cries echo off the tiled walls. My numb, bare feet can’t make purchase as Jake hauls me toward the bank of showers, still laughing under his breath. Moonlight pours in through the strip of narrow windows at the top of the walls. I can see the night sky through the glass, a scattering of stars burning brightly in the midnight blue.
My pulse is racing out of control. It’s freezing inside the shower room, but it gets infinitely colder when Jake fumbles for a shower handle, and a jet of frigid, icy water pelts down on me. The temperature is so shocking that I let out a strangled, frightened gasp.
I’m drenched in seconds. Jake is too, but he doesn’t seem to care.
“Darhower insisted we get some hot water in here, but Coach Quentin’s a hard ass. He thinks making us shower in cold water will toughen us up. Make us real men. What do you reckon, Parisi? No fun, huh?”
I strain away from the water, but Jake has me by the back of the head. He forces me into the torrent, angling my face so that the cold, stinging beads of water drive into my eyes, nose and mouth. It’s hard to breathe. Impossible, almost. I cough and splutter, attempting to drag in a sip of air any way I can, and Jake doesn’t let up. He croons like a madman, imparting the most vile, hateful things into my ear. Eventually, just as I’m about to pass out, he jerks me out of the stream of water and shoves me, sending me crashing into the wall.
I land in a heap on the dirty tile. My clothes cling to my broken, stinging skin, the water still pouring down on me. Jake stands back, placing his hands on his hips. He’s breathing hard, his shoulders hitching up and down. Using the back of his hand, he wipes his nose, then clears his throat. “All right, Parisi. Get undressed.”
I stare up at him dumbly. He wants me to get undressed? Strip for him? Stupefied laughter bubbles up the back of my throat. “You…you can’t be serious. No fucking way. I’m not…I’m not getting undressed.”
Malice flashes in Jake’s eyes. “I’m not asking, you stupid cunt. That was an order. Get on your feet and take off your fucking clothes. You wanted to be a Siren again, so here. I’m making you one.” I haven’t noticed the clothing hanging from the hook by the door. Jake snatches it up, throwing the fabric down onto the floor, just beyond the gathering pool of water.
It’s a Raleigh High cheerleading uniform. How nice of him to try and keep it dry for me.
“No.” If he thinks I’m going to help him fulfill some sort of sick fantasy, then he is out of his ever-loving mind.
Jake digs his teeth into his bottom lip, scraping it through his teeth. The front of his t-shirt is plastered to his skin, his jeans so dark with water that they look almost black. “Don’t you think I could make you, Silver? Don’t you think I’d enjoy stripping you naked? You remember the last time?”
I was wearing a dress at Leon Wickman’s party. It was easy for him to relieve me of it. Now I’m wearing my space pajamas, and he’s going to have to fucking fight me for them. “Why the hell would you want to watch me change anyway?” I lean to one side, nearly toppling over, and a spasm of pain fires through my ribs. Shiiiiiit. I taste blood again. “You think it matters to me anymore if you see me naked? You’ve already seen everything there is to see. I haven’t grown another pair of tits since the last time.”
“I couldn’t give a shit about your body.I. Am. Going. To. Burn. Your. Clothes.”He says the last part slowly, enunciating every word as if I’m too stupid to comprehend what he’s saying. “My blood’s all over them, too. Why make forensics’ job easier for them.”
Another burst of laughter rattles out from deep within my broken-ribbed chest. “Jake, I called 911 back at the house. I gave them your name. I’ve got half your skin under my finger nails. Your hair’s probably all over me. Your hands are gonna match the bruises you’ve planted all over my skin. Nothing you do will separate you from this.You’refucked.”
