Despicable, p.19
Despicable, page 19
“You are so bloody small,” she grunted as she nearly ripped the sides of my skirt, “No one is a double zero.” She made another ferocious growl and sucked her stomach in fiercely, and then she sighed, “This will never work.”
Vi hurried in with three more skirts donated by different girls in our dorm for her to try on. Katrina didn’t like the “oversized one” from Hannah Martin and she complained that Violet’s was “slutty” because Violet hemmed hers up two inches. Eventually, Violet got huffy with her and Katrina wore one of Ella’s, which fit perfectly.
Katrina didn’t agree and muttered they made her thighs look chunky and Vi gave her a lecture on body positivity. Ella, forever insecure about her thighs, thankfully heard none of this. Our trio walked to the dining hall for breakfast together. Crispin didn’t look up when I entered. His tie was undone and he looked like he didn’t get any sleep. I nearly raised my hand to wave at him but when he looked at me, he just glanced away. Secret. Right.
I had some oatmeal — to make Katrina happy — but I couldn’t bring myself to eat anything more. I sipped on black tea instead, ignoring the gross discomfort in my stomach from wanting food. Everything before the vandal the previous night had been perfect and so... satisfying – the food and the conversation.
Breakfast was painful in contrast because we were all in a sour mood over the previous night’s events. Someone broke into our room. Who the hell would do something like that?
We’d barely slept between cleaning up the mess, telling the story to all the girls in LR, and fearing for our lives. Dean Leonard assumed the responsibility of investigating and got a public safety officer to patrol outside our dormitory. Her suspects were bullies and LR didn’t have a bullying problem, Emily determined. The problem must have come from outside our dorm, which seemed obvious. According to Vi and Katrina, this was either the football boys or Dani and they traded theories in hushed whispers.
Katrina gave up investigating after a few minutes. She’d done nothing wrong and there wasn’t a good reason for someone to do this to her. Thus, discussion was hopeless. Katrina slumped over the table, exhausted from a night of cleaning and crying.
“I don’t want to do this,” she whispered, “Today will be horrible.”
“Everyone’s helping,” Vi comforted her, “Don’t worry. No one blames you. You were victimized.”
“I’m a loser,” Katrina whined, “And I know who did this to me.”
I guess we were back to discussing it.
Vi sat up, her blunt haircut dusting her chin, “Who?”
Katrina snapped, “It’s that idiot, Crispin. I totally showed him up the other day in class and he was such a prick. Plus he’s an arsehole.”
“I hate him,” Violet agreed, “he cut Amina and he tried to rape her. I mean how creepy is it that sociopaths like him go to this school.”
“It could have been anyone,” I said, hoping I sounded casual.
Katrina glared at me, “If you’d been in our room it wouldn’t have happened at all.”
“Katrina!” Vi exclaimed, trying to hold her back.
Why was Katrina getting mad at me? I’d been within my rights to hang out with who I wanted and do what I wanted. I couldn’t have stopped this mysterious vandal.
“This isn’t my fault,” I said.
“I’ll say what everyone’s thinking then,” Katrina snapped, “Why are you lying about where you were?”
“I’m not lying.”
My heart pounded. I couldn’t tell them about Crispin. They wouldn’t understand. They hated him so much they probably wouldn’t believe how sweet he’d been. How honest.
“You haven’t told us though,” Violet agreed.
Blood rushed past my ears. Rage. And guilt. I shouldn’t have been with Crispin. But I didn’t have to account for every moment of my time because Katrina was my roommate.
“I don’t need to listen to this,” I snapped, standing up and putting my bag over my shoulder.
Katrina rolled her eyes, “Here we go again. Storm off because people try to talk to you. It’s like you think you’re better than everyone.”
“Screw you, Katrina,” I snapped, “I don’t think I’m better than everyone. You go around swinging your Bible and thinking you’re holier than thou. But you’re not.”
Katrina grew furious and her voice got louder. I’d never seen her this angry before.
“They wrote ‘whore’ on my mirror. I can’t think of a good reason they’d say that about me. You on the other hand have chlamydia.”
Everyone heard. The nasty Year 13 boy who asked me to flash him clapped over at the art freak table. The football boys were quiet and Devin stared at us, stroking his chin. Crispin didn’t look up from his plate.
Sarah Clifford’s friends laughed and furiously clicked away at their phones. Did nobody know that Sarah had chlamydia too? Whatever. I was just sick of this shit. Sick of everything. I made an anguished half-scream sound and then... I flipped Katrina’s tray.
Katrina shrieked as water and cereal spilled all over her uniform.
“Bitch!” She shrieked.
“Bitch. Whore. Call me whatever you want, Katrina.”
“You BITCH!” She screamed.
Katrina stood up, grabbed my hair and then pushed me. I screamed and fell over. She took one of the dining hall chairs and with rage that I’ve never seen, she lifted it over my head. I rolled over to the side as she slammed it into the ground.
The rugby boys chanted, “Fight! Fight! Fight!”
My heart pumped. Oatmeal was not enough food on my stomach to fight Katrina off. I was weak. Katrina was bigger than me. I got to my feet and ducked behind an empty table. Katrina threw her tray at my head and it made contact with a thud.
“OW!”
“Katrina, stop it!” Violet pleaded, sounding like she was on the verge of tears.
Katrina grabbed my hair again and snapped, “Slut! You ruined my life. What gives you the right?”
I pushed her off and lunged for her, running into Crispin Barclay who jumped between us. His large, imposing body blocked me from doing anything rash, which was exactly what I planned to do. I didn’t want Crispin to stop me. He stuck his hands out.
He said softly, “Amina, stop.”
“Get out of here!” I said, shoving him.
“Bastard!” Katrina snapped, “hoping she’ll shag you too?”
I tried to throw Crispin out of the way but he grabbed me, picking me up and squeezing my arms at my sides as he lifted me out of the way. I shrieked like I was dying.
“PUT ME DOWN! Crispin, I’m going to kill you! I’m going to beat her ass! Mess with Texas, you watch what happens, you Bible-thumping ass bitch.”
I wasn’t making sense. Crispin set me down outside the dining hall and I shoved him against the wall. Hard. I yelled at him, “What the hell!”
“What the fuck are you doing?” He said.
“None of your business.”
“You’re off the fucking rails,” Crispin said, “Cool it.”
“She called me a slut!”
“She’s your friend. She’s a girl. That’s what girls do.”
I grunted and pushed him again. Crispin pushed back. Not hard, but enough to stun me.
“Dean Leonard’s going to have you in her office,” he said.
I didn’t need a reminder that what I was doing was both stupid and impulsive. I threw cereal all over her uniform after what she’d been through. What the hell was I thinking? I wasn’t. That was the problem. I’d learned to keep my emotions bottled up when I was a kid. My mother hated my feelings and my father only cared about using them to his advantage. But all that bottling up meant I could explode sometimes.
When the rage spilled out of me I couldn’t control it. I felt like a more feral and unhinged version of myself and it scared me.
But I was still angry, especially at stupid Crispin for getting between us. My friends didn’t even know we’d hung out and they were already digging into me over defending him.
“I don’t give a shit,” I snarled, “Now leave me alone, Crispin. Katrina’s right. I won’t shag you.”
I stomped off, my head rushing. I’d let my stupid temper get the better of me. I was hot with rage and still wanted to hurt someone. But Katrina? My roommate was too poised not to have a volcano of rage just beneath the surface. I stormed into math class. Vi didn’t sit next to me. I wouldn’t have minded that but she sat next to Sarah Clifford and they started laughing together at something on Sarah’s phone.
They’re laughing at you.
I was queasy and buried my head in my hands. I needed to cool down. Count to ten. Think about how to fix this. When I lifted my head, I saw my seat mate. Great. Felix Stubbins sat next to me. When our teacher started lecturing, I considered stomping on his feet beneath the table. But I had to work for my grade in this class — like all my others. Despite letting go in the dining hall, I didn’t want to leave Rapetti and go back to Texas.
My stomach dropped when I realized that I might have screwed that up. Big time.
Felix elbowed me every fifteen minutes or so during class to show me pictures of sexy women doing lewd things with vegetables on his phone. I raised my hand to report him and he blurted out before I could, “No, Amina! I’m not going to let you give me a hand job during class!”
I spent the rest of class sitting outside for my “disruptive behavior”. After math class I had several emails from Dean Leonard demanding my presence in her office. She’d heard about the fight with Katrina... and this was it. I’d finally lose my spot at Rapetti Academy.
Chapter 25
No, White Boy
We always had meeting with Dean Leonard after class when we were in trouble. She sometimes taught a seminar in Ethics, so she would hold her meetings after her afternoon discussion section. Today, Agatha was clearly tired of the bullshit.
Dean Leonard’s face was red. Katrina sat next to me, knees together, slumped back with a scowl on her face. I sat up straight — cotillion straight — and kept my arms at my sides. I couldn’t afford to lose my cool now. I’d probably have to get on my knees and beg Dean Leonard not to kick me out.
“Do either of you young ladies have anything to say for yourselves?”
“It was my fault,” Katrina mumbled, “I pushed her.”
“I pushed her too,” I said, “It was my fault.”
I didn’t know why I didn’t let Katrina take the blame. She had started it. But I couldn’t help thinking about how she’d found her room and how stressed she’d been. I didn’t have to ruin her uniform.
“So you mutually pushed each other? Several reports came in stating that the anti-female slurs ‘bitch’ and ‘whore’ and perhaps even ‘slut’ were used?”
“That was my fault,” Katrina said, “Seriously. Amina has nothing to do with this. Please don’t kick her out.”
“So you can kick my ass again?” I muttered.
Katrina’s scowl gave way to a half-smile.
“Please, Dean Leonard. We’re girls. Girls argue. I... I lost control. And Amina was only defending herself.”
“Hm.”
Dean Leonard stroked her pen.
“I don’t know what to say about this. We have a zero tolerance rule for fighting. However, due to the traumatic incident from the night before and if Miss Grigsby takes complete responsibility for this, I can write this off.”
“I don’t deserve that,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” Katrina said to me before turning her attention back to the dean, “Please, Dean Leonard. Don’t punish Amina. I’ll take responsibility.”
“No more fighting,” Dean Leonard said, which sounded like she was letting us off the hook, “And Amina... let this be the last time you’re in my office with bad news.”
Katrina’s friendship with all the faculty on campus appeared to have a distinct advantage I hadn’t considered — getting out of trouble more easily than getting into it. Dean Leonard shooed us away. Finding out who vandalized our bedroom appeared to be a more important task.
Katrina pushed the door to the dean’s office open, letting me step out first. Once the door shut behind us, she exhaled and turned to me sharply.
“Aren’t you going to say you’re sorry?”
“Yes,” I muttered, “I was. I’m sorry. I... I took it too far.”
Katrina shrugged and said, “Whatever. I might not fit into your skirts, but I can kick your arse. I’ll walk you to the football fields.”
“That’s it, then? We say sorry and we’re all good?”
“Yup,” Katrina said, exhaling, “God wants his children to forgive.”
“This won’t convert me, you know.”
Katrina didn’t seem to care. She shrugged and moved on to her shopping trip. I might have been too unfashionable to attend the shopping trip, but I wasn’t too uncool to hear about it. Katrina linked arms with me as we got to the gym entrance. She wrinkled her nose at the entire concept of being near football boys.
“Have fun. See you later.”
“Are you going back to our room?”
“Heavens no,” Katrina said, “I’ll be out shopping. But the door’s locked and Dean Leonard promises everything will be fine.”
We said goodbye and I spoke to Beckett who assigned me the task of helping the boys record their timed miles. Football guys ran a lot. When I approached the field with my clipboard, Crispin didn’t acknowledge me. But Devin waved and turned red as Felix Stubbins and Noah Klein elbowed him and teased him.
August ran up to me before I got to the field.
“Hey, chlamydia.”
Shit. He’d told them. I wanted to punch his stupid ass in the face. How dare Devin wave at me? Devin laughed again and punched Jack Dyson in the shoulder. He’d told them. The giant red-headed idiot bragged to his football team about giving me chlamydia. I approached the bench and cleared my throat, hoping they’d stop talking and prefer focusing on practice to tormenting me.
Rapetti had a huge game against Inverness Prep and the Scots were beasts. I heard a rumor they trained in kilts.
“Okay,” I said, “Beckett’s sent instructions.”
I read the instructions verbatim, “The boys’ team led by the Captain should start their timed mile from the football fields and run to the boat house and back. Amina will record the times and submit them. I will compare your times and assign your extra-curricular training based on the time you receive.”
I stopped reading and August sneered, “Listen, Chlamydia, did Beckett say what we’re to do after the mile?”
“No,” I snapped, “And call me that again and you’ll regret it.”
The boys snickered. Even Crispin. I didn’t know why it bothered me. We’d agreed to ignore each other. But he’d been happy to leap into my confrontation with Katrina.
“Regret it?” August said, “What could you possibly do to me? I could break you in half.”
But he stepped back, “Alright, lads. Shirts off. Suns out, guns out. We want to give the ladies on this campus something to think about.”
August took his shirt off and threw it at me. The smell made me gag. Jack Dyson laughed and flung his over my head. As I tried to throw the shirts off of me, they were too wet with sweat to fall away. Jack Dyson appeared to be allergic to deodorant or perhaps morally opposed because my eyes stung as my stupid limbs tangled further with his shirt. And more shirts flew at my head.
“Ready, set, go!”
I clicked the timer I held in my hand as I struggled to free myself from the pile of sweaty shirts. August looped around the boys and ran back toward me, shouting, “We’ll have those folded, Hewett.”
They disappeared. I refused to fold their shirts. That wasn’t my job. But I set the water bottles out and waited. A lot of the job was waiting. I sat on my phone as time passed. Four minutes. Before the five minute mark, Crispin soared back toward me. He sprinted to the line on the field and then gasped, falling to his knees and groaning with gratitude. There didn’t appear to be anyone hot on his heels.
“Time!” He barked.
“Four minutes, forty seconds.”
“Fuck yes!”
He groaned and roared like a lion, staring up at the sky. His blond hair stuck to his neck as Crispin dripped in sweat. He rose and grinned when he looked at me.
“I fucking love running, lips”
“Whatever.”
I jotted his time down on the paper. Crispin grabbed water and sat next to me on the bench.
“Did you eat today?” He asked.
“None of your business.”
“We’re doing this again, are we?” He murmured. Goosebumps spread across my forearm. He sounded like he had at the restaurant and that made me... nervous. Tingly. He always made me feel so weird.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Are you pissed because of the Katrina thing?”
“No.”
Crispin poured icy water onto his head and made another annoying boy-grunt. The water trickled over his chest and down his abs. Holy shit. Abs. Crispin didn’t just have abs. Every bit of his chest was perfectly defined. He didn’t have an ounce of fat on him and his muscles seemed unrealistically large for someone that tall and lean.
He didn’t notice me staring. His chest still heaved, desperate for air after his crazy fast mile.
“Great,” he said, “Sorry about ganging up on you. Secret friends, right? Gotta keep up the secret part. Plus, you can handle my brother.”
“I’d prefer him leaving me alone.”
“Wouldn’t we all,” Crispin muttered, “But. Answer my question. Did you eat?”
“Oatmeal. Black tea.”
“No lunch. Plans for dinner?”
“A banana,” I lied.
“That’s not enough,” he said, “You know it isn’t.”
“Your brother’s coming,” I said, pointing to August hurrying in the distance. He wasn’t terribly far behind Crispin, but far enough that I could be convinced that it bruised August’s ego.
“TIME,” August roared.
“Six minutes.”
