Screw My Childhood Sweetheart His Alpha Brother Marked Me First novel Chapter 18

Chapter 18

I kept my head down as I walked towards the entrance, only stealing a few furtive glances to try to pick out the groups. I was hoping for casual friendships. The kind where you sat together at lunch and assemblies but never actually discussed more than homework and the latest gossip.

I needed to find that middle–of–the–road group. The one that nobody paid any attention to because they simply blended. Those were my people.

My gaze caught on a group of girls who stood by the front doors. They all seemed to circle one girl in the center. She was tall and lean, with long blonde hair that looked so shiny she should’ve been in a shampoo commercial. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and laughed.

The sound was meant to be carefree, but I could hear the lie in it. There was a slightly false tinge to the vibration that I recognized because I heard it in my father’s laugh and in my own. I couldn’t help but wonder what the girl was hiding behind that fake laugh.

I turned my focus to the doors, pulling one open. The halls were already filling with people, and I did my best to dodge around them as I moved towards my locker. I breathed a sigh of relief when I reached it without getting lost or knocking into anyone.

I spun the dial on the lock and it popped free. Swinging my backpack around, I unloaded the notebooks and binders I wouldn’t need until after lunch. I pulled out my schedule, scanning it for what felt like the hundredth time. First up was astronomy, then pre–calculus, and finally art. I’d

be holding it together until art. God, I hoped that the teacher was good.

I was so focused on my schedule, I didn’t feel the shift. Typically, I was tuned to that change in tone, always on the lookout for those soft whispers. The ones people thought you couldn’t hear but that were worse than if they’d screamed whatever they were saying.

I stole a quick glance to the side. A group of three girls and two boys were speaking in hushed voices, but every so often, they would all look my way. I turned back to my locker, hoping to hide my red cheeks behind the metal door. I took a steadying breath. They probably didn’t get a

whole lot of new kids around here. They were just curious.

“Her sister was killed in the accident. Can you imagine?” A female voice drifted down the hall.

My breathing picked up, and I scrambled to zip my backpack up.

“I heard it took them hours to get her out of the car. She should’ve died,” another girl said.

I could see them out of the corner of my eye, that same group of girls who’d been at the front of the school. They stared blatantly at me, not caring at all if I noticed. It wasn’t the act itself that bothered me, it was how it made me feel. It was as if their gazes scraped at my skin, leaving

me raw and bloodied.

“That’s awful. You’d never be the same,” a brunette girl murmured.

My ribs tightened around my lungs, cutting off my air supply. I needed out, away from their eyes and words. I slammed my locker closed and hurried down the hall. I dodged people left and right, a few muttering curses in my wake when they dropped a schedule or book.

I hurried farther into the depths of the school, looking for anything that resembled respite.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify