Beautifully Ruined Read online

  “Joey,” Alexia says, her tiny hands reaching out to block my way around her. With every step she makes—mirroring my own, her heels click-clack in front of me as she blocks my path. I can’t make it around her without shoving her to the ground like a rabid animal, and that’s frowned upon in school settings. I should know by now.

  I roll my hazel eyes and grudgingly look to her, glancing up and down her tiny frame because my eyes won’t land. So I study her instead. Her dyed hair perfectly coiffed, perfectly curled and styled about her head, her shirt perfectly smooth against her flat stomach as if it’s been ironed to her, her skirt short enough to make guys look and the teachers barely concerned without doing anything—she’s the girl everyone loves to hate. Even her friends.

  You know what they say, keep your enemies close but your enemies closer. High school was built upon that. Especially teenage girls.

  It’s weird to look at her, to look directly at her harsh and beautiful features, after all that happened over the years. It’s weird to see those deep blue eyes, that cocky all-knowing smile she shines upon the world when she mocks someone. It’s weird to stand in the middle of this hall and try to talk to her like nothing happened, as if her boyfriend didn’t attack me just a few weeks ago. As if what he did didn’t unleash the most horrible demon from its chamber into my life.

  “What do you want, Alexia?” I ask with a sigh, rolling my eyes again just for good measure. What better way to tell her that her presence irks me? Just think of pie, I force myself. Just think of pie. Don’t think about hitting her—don’t think about it because you will actually hit her. For all she’s done to you, you will hit her and you will leave a lovely bruise that will only make you giddy with power until you hit her again. Think of the pie! That’s all I see when I look at her, what Ryder told me. His smug grin—split lips telling the only story playing through my mind the past few weeks.

  There was this bet about you and I decided to take it. These words float through me as I look to her, hating her every time Ryder’s voice enters my mind, replaying the night on a loop in my memory. Alexia’s always hated you. I don’t know why, but she was willing to pay money to see you destroyed. She wanted me destroyed, whatever that means to her. And I was more than happy to oblige, baby.

  Destroyed.

  I was ruined the moment I stepped into her class in third grade. I was this fragile, broken little girl terrified in the shadow. I was further ruined with every hateful thing she did to me. With every try she made to break me more. With every hateful word spoken in my direction, spoken about me, with every rumor spread about me through her lips, I felt the hatred coursing through her, radiating from her in thick, damaging waves.

  Because she didn’t care.

  Because I was nothing but a plaything, an insignificant speck sadly caught in her radar. And nothing made her happier than to watch me suffer.

  And I suffered.

  Every damn day I suffered and she didn’t know she wasn’t making it worse. She was just a continuation of the hell that was my life.

  She didn’t know what I’d been through—she didn’t care. I was nothing but an easy target.

  And Alexia took some demented delight in that.

  Alexia shuffles nervously on her feet, fidgeting with her perfectly manicured hands—tapping her white tipped nails together. The little click, click, click ringing through the halls, letting my mind focus on the sound. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.” She sounds so small, so insignificant—she is to me. Her eyes widen when she looks at me, seeking something, tucking a blonde curl behind her ear.

  Rolling my eyes, because I cannot hit her and it’s officially become habit to do it in her presence, I say, “I’m fine.” Looking over her shoulder, I stare up the empty hallway at the beige double doors closed on an available exit, waiting for someone, anyone, to pass through. No one comes. So, Plan B. “I was heading to class. I have homework to finish, so…”

  “Oh.” She steps back, her eyes going everywhere. “Well, have fun and all that.” I trail, giving her the smallest kindness I can offer.

  “Thanks?” I question, nearly concerned with the conversation we’re having.

  She turns to walk away, heading wherever it is she goes in the mornings, before she turns back, facing me with something clouding her eyes. Something unrecognizable clouding those night eyes of hers. I almost had my chance to run away. “I also wanted you to know I haven’t spoken to him.” Ah, this is about him. “Not since that night, Joey.”

  Her eyes slowly lift to mine, seeking something within me. Pity? Acceptance? Understanding? I won’t give it to her. This isn’t my mess to clean.

  Stepping back, I ask her, “Why are you telling me this?” I could be halfway through my essay right about now. Hell, I could be halfway through future homework with how long this exchange is taking.

  “He’s tried,” she continues, ignoring my question, stepping toward me, her heel clicks against the linoleum. “He’s tried to apologize. He blames the alcohol but that’s…” she trails, taking a deep breath. “That’s just how he is, that’s really how he is. He’s not nice.” She shakes her head, composing her thoughts. “He may have been sweet to you and all but it was a lie. Something he used to make his goal.” The goal you created for him, Alexia. “He’s not the greatest person.”

  I shrug my shoulders, not in the mood to hear any of this right now. “Then why date him?” I never really saw the appeal of Ryder Harrison when he tried to take me out. I turned him down; I tried to turn him down repeatedly but he was a rash that wouldn’t disappear. He only got itchier and itchier.

  Alexia looks away, her eyes focusing on something over my shoulders. “You were with the only acceptable guy in this school. The only catch, really.” She shrugs her shoulders. Thanks for the obvious, Alexia. I knew that. “Zephyr, he really is one of a kind.”

  But how does he play into this? Is it because of his and my friendship that she’s hated me all these years? Is it because of him that I was treated like shit, had rumor spread about me, things done to me? All because of Zephyr? But she dated him. Alexia had him all to herself for two years. She’s the one who let him go.

  I look to her, watching her pull her hand through her hair disrupting the curls, separating them. “Why’d you break up with him?” I ask. The one question that always intrigued me but I never asked. I remember her being so happy with Zephyr. I remember the smug smile she gave me when she turned my way, her arm slung through his, her fingers laced with his.

  I should ask him why he dated her to begin with. But it’s his life, his choices to make, even if some of them are questionable. I just remember the day he walked into my room last year, our sophomore year, telling me she broke up with him.

  “It’s over,” he told me, his brown eyes clouded with sadness. My best friend was breaking before me. Swinging my bare legs from the bed, I rush to his side, wrapping my arms around him as he wraps his arms around me, returning the tight embrace.

  “I’m sorry, Zeph,” I tell him, rubbing my hand up his back. “She’s an idiot.” Something I’ve said about Alexia since I met her, something I’ve said plenty of times to my friends, but I’ve never said to Zephyr since she attached herself to his hip.

  I never understood what he saw in her. Alexia’s a stuck up bitch with a superiority complex and her own minions. But she’s always had her sights set on Zephyr. She finally got her chance starting in eighth grade; she finally sunk her claws into my best friend, rubbing it in my face whenever she could.

  Thanks for the salt in the wound, bitch.

  “I guess,” he replies, tightening his grip around my body.

  He was happy. He was smiling and happy, and I was happy for him. As much as I hated, literally despised his girlfriend, I was happy for him, I was happy that Alexia made him happy. But now she’s broken his heart, now I’m no longer happy.

  The memory is so fresh, so vibrant, it’s as if I’m reliving it, standing before the girl I wanted t
o punch back then. The girl I knew to be the problem.

  Alexia shakes her head. “I didn’t,” she tells me. The words shocking me. That’s not what he said. I remember. I remember that he… he never told me that. He let me assume she broke up with him. He let me believe a lie. The truth sounds weird leaving her lips, like a lie not meant for her to tell. “He broke up with me,” she says quietly. “I always saw it coming. I knew it was coming. I was surprised it lasted so long, to be honest.” She steps closer to me, her designer handbag dangling from her hands. “There was just something about you he loved. I could see it in his eyes.” She slowly shakes her head. “He never looked at me the way he looked at you. You were his world. Always have been. I knew that when we were dating but I refused to believe it. I didn’t want to believe it.” She didn’t want to settle with the fact that someone thought I was better than she was. Alexia couldn’t handle being second best…to me.

  I really don’t get what he sees in you. It makes sense now. Those words. It’s kind of obvious if you pay attention. Alexia never meant Ryder. She meant Zephyr. Now that I think about it, Zephyr has always been there for me, even when he was dating someone else. I was always his top priority. He never cared about breaking plans, postponing dates, or even leaving them while on a date with his girlfriend-of-the-week. I was what mattered.

  How had I never noticed this?

  Maybe I ignored it.

  Now everything is different. I’m not supposed to need him now. He’s not supposed to save me when things get tough. I’m supposed to save myself, I’m supposed to do that on my own. I tell myself I don’t need to need him but it’s getting harder to believe. Every second of every minute, it gets harder to lie to myself, to pass him in the halls, to see his window across the alley and his movements behind the drapes; it’s harder to act as if I don’t notice him when it’s all I do.

  I pretend not to notice him look at me when he thinks he’s being discreet. I pretend not to notice anything he does—his movements, his actions. But it’s hard.

  I look at her, finally hearing her, finally paying attention. “That’s what you were telling me months ago?” I say rhetorically, already knowing the answer.

  “Yeah.” Alexia shrugs, a little nervous giggle leaving her lips before she continues. “I guess I always hated you because of Zephyr. I had a crush on him all through elementary school and when you showed up, he stopped hanging around with me at recess and started spending all of his free time with you.” She shakes out her hair, tucking it behind her ears. “I’ve always been a jealous girl, Joey. I know that’s no excuse—”

  “It isn’t,” I interrupt quickly.

  “—for anything I did to you.” Her eyes plead to me, sadness filling them. I nearly believe her. I have this need for people to understand me, to accept me, and she’s calling that need, poking at this emotion deep within me. I’m not sure if she’s poking at it because she’s genuinely apologetic, her feelings are true, or if this is another game of hers.

  Whatever it is, I can’t take the chance that this is another thing for her to toy with. My emotions have been her putty for so long now; I’m not letting myself trust her.

  I bark out a laugh, amazed at the girl—the Queen Bee—standing in front of me. She’s almost human. Almost…

  “Look, I’m trying, Joey. I’m trying to apologize. I’m trying to right my wrong.”

  “Alexia, there’s too much bad blood here—too many wrongs to right.” I tell her, motioning with my hands in the space between us. “I’m not sure what you could do that would, or even could; change everything that’s happened between us.”

  She reaches a hand for me. “Just let me try,” she whispers, begging me. “Please.” Her eyes begin to water. One tear escaping, rolling down her blushed cheek, no mascara following its trail. She went waterproof, good choice.

  “Try what?” Shrugging, I look around us. Of the students filtering through the doors, none notice us. If they had, they’d wonder what’s going on considering our vast hatred for each other. You can still see how much I despise this girl if you look close enough. I can’t read her well enough, though.

  Looking at her, I fight the urge to tell her there isn’t anything, not a thing she can do. Not really. She’s already ruined whatever chance she had with me even to be considered an acquaintance.

  “Being your friend.” Alexia steps closer to me, those big blue eyes begging for me. “If not that then something else. Anything else. I just… I need you to accept my apology.”

  “Alexia,” I start, breathing deeply. “I graduate at the end of the year. After this, all of this, it doesn’t matter.” I shake my head, pulling my hand through my hair. I forgot to tie it back this morning, so it hangs down, past my shoulders—limp, the top hidden beneath a gray knit beanie. “I accept your apology. If you want my friendship then just show me kindness. Okay?” Take the bait. Take it…

  Alexia smiles. Relief floods through me. “I can do that.” She nods happily.

  “Cool. I’m going to class now.” I mutter, stepping around her, happy when she doesn’t block my path to continue this pointless conversation again.

  “I’ll see you later?” She sounds eager and hesitant at the same time.

  “Yeah, later,” I call over my shoulder, heading to my first period classroom, passing other students in the hall. It’s a lie. I don’t want to see her later but better her hear that than follow me around the building like a lost puppy again. I always wondered about popularity, but this isn’t what I had in mind.

  four

  “I hear you’ve got a reputation around here?” Milo says as he slides into the seat next to mine. I ignore him as I finish the set of problems due in calculus on Monday. I’ve sped through my paper and lab—in a decent twenty minutes. I needed something else to do to pass the time. “You’re a bit crazy, they say.” I’m still ignoring him. “Well, are you going to deny it or shall I believe everything they tell me as true.” He places his head in his hand and smiles to me, waiting for an answer I don’t want to give.

  “Believe whatever you want,” I tell him, tapping my pink pen on the table between us. “I don’t care.”

  “Oh, but I believe you do,” Milo coos, leaning closer. “You don’t seem like the kind of girl likes a lie spread about her.” I shrug. I don’t really care. It’s happened too many times for me to be concerned. They’re always false, every story. Unless someone claims they’ve slept with me, it’s all old news. “But I could be wrong, it does happen on occasion.”

  On occasion? This from the dude who trusts the rumor mill.

  Slamming down my pen, I ask, “What can I do for you, Milo?” My annoyance evident.

  “A name,” he answers, oblivious to the limited amount of life he has if he won’t stop bothering me. I thought we discussed this—this annoyance thing? “You see, you know mine but I don’t know yours. How is that fair?” His smug grin grows wider.

  “It’s plenty fair,” I answer, rolling my eyes. “And how did you find out my seedy dark past without learning my name?” I think someone would have told him my name eventually. Just common knowledge to be like, oh, you mean Joey, the crazy girl? Hell, I’d have said it if I was a nonbiased third party, someone in the halls he was asking about this mysterious girl.

  “That is the joy of high school. I can learn pointless information without learning the important—like your name?” He tips his head in my direction, blonde hair falling before his eyes, but I don’t budge. I like my secrets. No one realizes that, I like to keep things to myself, but when you’re me in a tiny town, a secret can spread very quickly. So, I’m very much enjoying this, enjoying someone not knowing everything about me. “Is this one of those if you know my name, you know too much situations? An, I could tell you that but then I’d have to kill you type thing?” He wags his eyebrows. “If so, I can live with that. You can kill me as long as I can learn your name. What’s your name?”

  “Sure,” I say.

  “Sure?” he as
ks, confusion covering his face. “That’s a… unique name,” he finishes, smiling. “Is it short for something?”

  I laugh quietly. “That’s not my name.” Idiot. I bite my tongue.

  “Thank God, I thought your parents were weird for a moment.”

  If only you knew…

  “You meant—”

  I interrupt, “Yup.”

  “Great!” he announces with excitement. “So you’ll tell me your name?” he asks eagerly, leaning closer.

  But I’m not budging.

  “God, no.” I laugh, tucking my hair behind my ear. “But whatever you want to think, that’s the truth.”

  I watch Milo’s face fall with disappointment. “You’re one tough cookie, you know that?” he tells me as he slumps back in his seat, tugging a textbook from his backpack and slapping it on the desk in front of him.

  “You don’t seem like the cookie type,” I tell him, not really paying attention. He doesn’t respond. Ignoring him, I decide to focus my attention on my homework as I normally do.

  The teacher walks through the door, his eyes turning toward me immediately. “Joey, the counselor wants to see you,” Mr. Cheney announces before his leather bag meets the cluttered top of his desk. “Take your things with you,” he instructs.

  I sigh, gathering everything together and standing, ready to leave this conversation behind. I don’t really enjoy seeing the counselor but I’ll take anything to leave Milo behind.

  But Milo smiles happily, excitedly, leaning back in his seat looking satisfied. “That was unexpected,” He finally mutters. I don’t follow.

  Exhaling, I slap my hand down my thighs and flip my hair over my shoulder. “I know I’m going to regret this, but what? What was unexpected?”