Dear Ava(3)

Eyes flare.

Gasps are emitted.

Fighting nervousness, I inhale a cleansing breath, part of me already regretting this decision, urging me to turn around and run like hell, but I hang tough, fighting nausea. I swallow down my emotions, carefully shuffling them away, locking them up in a chest. I picture a chain and padlock on those memories from last year. I take that horror and toss it into a stormy ocean. There, junior year. Go and die.

With a cold expression on my face, one I’ve been practicing for a week, my eyes rove over the students, not lingering too long on faces.

That’s right, Ava Harris, the snitch/bitch who went to the police after the party, is back.

And I’m not going anywhere.

All I need is this final year, and I might be able to swing a full ride at a state school or even get a scholarship to Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt. My body quivers in yearning. Me at a prestigious university. Me going to class with people who don’t know me. Me having something that is mine. Me making my own road, and it’s shiny and flat and so damn smooth…

My legs work before my brain does, and as I start down the hall, the crowd parts, more students seeing me and pausing, eyes widening.

The air around me practically bristles with tension.

If I were a wicked witch, I’d cackle right now.

My fists clench, barely hanging on to my resolve.

You’re better than any of them.

But inside, my words of encouragement feel hollow.

Piper rushes up and throws her arms around me. “She’s back! My main girl is back! OMG, I HAVE MISSED YOU SO MUCH!”

Seeing her exuberant, welcoming face is exactly what I needed. Pretty with long strawberry blonde hair pulled back with two butterfly clips, she’s been my friend since we had a chorus class together freshman year. She can’t carry a tune, but I love to sing. I had a solo at every single concert at Camden BTN. Before That Night.

Piper is still talking, rambling about what I’ve been doing this summer. Working, I tell her, and she tells me how she went out to Yellowstone with her parents on an awful month-long road trip with her two younger brothers in an RV. I nod and smile in all the right places, and she seems to think I’m okay. Good.

She shoves at her neon pink cat-eye glasses and smiles as she squeezes my hand. “I’m so glad to see you. Also, my parents are insisting you come to dinner soon. It’s been a while.”

Indeed.

“Are you, you know, okay?” she says.

Before I can answer, someone jostles into us, moving away quickly, but not before I hear snitch from his lips.

My purse falls down with the force of his shoulder.

And so it begins.

Helping me get my bag, she turns her head and snaps at the retreating back of the person who bumped into me. “Watch it!” Then, “Jockass!”

Rising up, I crane my neck to see who it was. Red hair, football player: Brandon Wilkes. I barely know him.

She blows at the bangs in her face, schooling her features back into a sweet expression even though her eyes are darting around at everyone as if daring them to say one word against me. “Anyway, I’m glad you came back. We haven’t gotten to talk much, and that is your fault, which is fine. I gave you space like you asked.”

She never did pull punches.

I haven’t called her like I should have, but I needed distance from this place and everyone here. I tried in the beginning, but when she’d bring up school and the football games and her classes and everyday things about the day-to-day at Camden, I felt that pit of emptiness tugging at me, a dark hole of memories and people I didn’t want to think about. Her life went on—as it should have—while I was stuck wallowing in the past.

“But you’re here now.” She smiles, but there’s a wobbly quality to it.

“Yeah.” I give her a wan smile, putting as much effort into it as I can. Her parents were the ones who took me to the hospital last year. Nice people. Hardworking. Not rich. She’s a scholarship student like me and got into Camden because her math and science scores are insane. She lives here in Sugarwood while I commute from the group home. Before I turned sixteen, a nun brought me to school in an old yellow van.

She jumps when she hears her name over the intercom, talking fast as lightning. “Yikes! I need to run. My mom is here. Can you believe I forgot my laptop on the first day? I’m such a ditz! See you in class, ’kay? We have first period together, yes?” She gives me a quick hug. “You got this.”

But, do I?

Truly, I want to run and get back in my car and leave this place behind forever, but then I think about my little brother Tyler. Goals…must stick to them.

Before I can get a word out—typical—she’s gone and bouncing down the hall like Tigger from Winnie the Pooh.

I miss her immediately, feeling the heat of everyone’s eyes on me.

It’s funny how no one really noticed me during my freshman and sophomore year here. Nope. I was the girl who kept her head down and blended in as well as I could, trying to keep my upbringing off the radar…until the summer before junior year when I ran into Chance at a bookstore and he showed interest. Then when school started, I got it in my head to be a cheerleader. Mostly, I told myself it would look good on my college applications, plus I assumed it would take less time than soccer or tennis—but the truth is I did it for him. I wanted Chance and Friday night football games and parties with the in crowd.

Just.

Stupid.

The lockers seem a million miles away as I push past all the onlookers, my hands clenched around the straps of my backpack. Whispers from the students rise and grow and spread like a wave in the ocean.

And of course…

The Grayson brothers are the first Sharks I see, holding court with several girls as they lean against the wall. Knox and Dane. Twins.

I flick my gaze in their direction, keeping my resting bitch face sharp and hard, taking in the two guys, their matching muscular builds, tall with broad shoulders. They may look almost identical, but they’re like night and day. Knox is the cold one, never smiling, that scar slicing through his cheek and into his upper lip, disrupting the curve of his mouth and the perfection of his face. I swallow. Screw him.

I refuse to spend this year afraid.

His lips twitch as if he reads my mind, that slash on his mouth curling up in a twisted movement, and I glare at him.

You don’t scare me, my face says.

He smirks.

Thick mahogany hair curls around his collar and his eyes are a piercing gray, like metal, sharp and intense, framed by a fringe of black lashes. His scrutiny doesn’t miss much and makes me antsy—has since freshman year when I’d catch him looking at me, studying me as if I were a strange bug. When I’d get the guts to boldly look back—Like what you see?—he’d huff out a derisive laugh and keep walking. I’m beneath him. A speck. He as much as said so after our first game last year.



“What do you want?” he says with a sneer as I ease in the football locker room. Cold eyes flick over my cheer skirt then move up and land on the hollow of my throat. It’s not cool enough at night for our sweater uniform so tonight my top is the red and white V-cut vest with CP embroidered on my chest.

“Where’s Chance?”

He stiffens then huffs out a laugh and whips off his sweat-covered jersey along with the pads underneath.

His shoulders are broad and wide, his chest lightly dusted with sparse golden hair, tan from the sun, rippling with powerful muscles, leading down to a tapered and trim waist. He has a visible six-pack, and my gaze lingers briefly on a small tattoo on his hip, but I can’t tell what it is. He isn’t brawny or beefy-looking like one might expect from a guy blessed with his athletic prowess, but sculpted and molded and—

Dropping my gaze, I stare at the floor. I shouldn’t be ogling him. Chance is my guy.

I hear male laughter from one of the rooms that branch off from the locker room, maybe the showers, and I deflate, guessing that’s where Chance is.

Glancing up, I intend to ask him to tell Chance I came by to congratulate him on his two touchdowns, but my voice is frozen. Knox has unlaced his grass-stained pants and is shucking them off. His legs are heavily muscled and taut, unlike the leaner build of Chance. His slick underwear is black and tight, cupping his hard ass, the outline of his crotch—

“Like what you see, charity case? You can look, but you can’t touch.”

Anger soars, replacing my embarrassment. I know I'm just the scholarship girl at Camden, but why does he have to constantly remind me?

“Don't worry about me touching anything. I don’t like ugly.” The words tumble out before I can stop them. I meant his superior attitude, not his face, but I see the moment when he freezes and takes it the wrong way.

He touches his face, tracing his scar while his jaw pops. “Get out. Only players allowed in here.”

I pivot and go for the door, forcing myself not to run. “Asshole,” I mutter.

His laughter follows me.



Rumor is he doesn’t kiss girls on the lips, but no matter how bad that scar screws up his face, he’s still the head Shark nonetheless.

Today, he’s wearing a fitted white button-up, his tie loose as if he’s already annoyed with it. He spends a lot of time in the gym, I imagine, working on that muscular body, maintaining that quarterback status. He holds my gaze for several seconds before dropping his and looking down at his phone.