Heartbreaker Hanson (13 page)

CHAPTER 29

The
day after Ethan’s disappearance was weird. I heard they found him the next
morning, in the school gym tied to a chair. He’d been beaten up, and there was
a note dangling across his chest. The note was huge—on poster-board. It
said:
“I pick on girls—come pick on me!”

I
mentioned he was beaten up, right?

He
also had a blindfold over him, and when he was questioned, he told the school
officials and the
police
(!!!) that
he had absolutely no idea who beat him up or why.

Well,
I didn’t know the who either, but I knew the why. Well … I was pretty sure I
did. Unless he went around picking on a
lot
of girls—but that was unlikely. Things like that got around our school,
fast.

Hearing
the story of Ethan made me shake.

And
feel sick.

It
seemed I had a stalker. A real one. And apparently it wasn’t Creeper Ethan
after all. Apparently. I mean, the dude got tied up … so he wasn’t the one spying
on me.

I
looked across the crowded school hallway and noticed three sets of eyes on
me—no, wait—four. Four sets of eyes on me. All of them were coming
from different directions, standing with different sets of people—the
stoners (Kenny); the football players (Drew); the hockey team (Rider); and then
there was Wade. Wade from Laurie’s party.

I
shut my locker, then looked around again. Drew had his head against his locker,
watching me intently though his football friends were trying to get his
attention. His brow rose as I just stood there, watching him.

He
started to come toward me, but I quickly shook my head. He stopped in his
tracks, wincing a little. Instantly, he thumped his forehead lightly against
his locker, like I was driving him crazy.

I
swallowed, feeling conflicted—as always when it comes to Drew. But it couldn’t
have been him that wrote the note … right? I mean, I’d been with him that
night. The note had been about him (
naughty,
naughty
).

I
leaned against my locker, then dared to peek at Rider. Of course he caught all
that—Drew staring at me, then banging his head against his locker.

With
a smirk, Rider quickly texted me,
“Who exactly is the heartbreaker?”

I
sighed. Okay, it was highly doubtful Rider wrote the note. Like I said, he
doesn’t bother to write girls notes or break into their rooms. He’s too busy
breaking their hearts. Like right now. He has two cheerleaders flirting with
him. And he’s flirting right back. I mean, his eyes keep going to me—but
he’s still smiling and flirting with them. He’s able to multi-task. Break a
bunch of girl’s hearts all at once.

I
notice Daisy (Waitress Chick) watching her fellow cheerleaders flirt with Rider
from across the hallway. She doesn’t seem pleased. In fact, she has a little
frown. But she doesn’t go near Rider—not even close. Apparently his
grand-gesture didn’t go so well, ‘cause when Rider’s eyes distractedly land on
her, she flips him off again.

Ha!

I
look away from that train-wreck and then I’m hit with another one—Laurie.

“Did
you hear what happened to Ethan?” she asks all flabbergasted. Then without
waiting for my answer she gushes on, “Isn’t it creepy? What girl do you think
the sign was about? What girl did he ‘pick on’? Jeez, maybe it’s better you
didn’t go out with him.”

I
roll my eyes. “You think?”

Suddenly
she clutches my arm all breathless-like. “Drew keeps looking over here,” she says
excitedly. “He looks all heartbroken and tortured.”

She
sounds delighted about it.

“I
bet we’re back together within a week.” She smiles as she gushes on, “I’ve
heard that at least three different cheerleaders have asked him to the
dance—he’s turned them all down. Everyone says he seems tortured and
miserable.”

Again,
she sounds excited.

I’m
excited that the bell rings.

“’Bye,”
she says like the world is full of rainbows and lollipops, then she skips off
to her math class.

Meanwhile,
Drew looks miserable.

CHAPTER 30

Did
I mention that guy from Laurie’s birthday party, Wade? Ever since the night of
the party he’s been texting me. A LOT. Like enough to keep him on my radar of
possible suspects that left me the creepy note on my bedroom mirror. So, when
he stopped me in the school hallway after third period and invited me to the
dance, I froze. Then squirmed.

“Um,
I already have a date.”

I
blurted out the lie so fast I was confused. I mean, I hadn’t been
planning
to lie. It just spewed out of
my mouth.

The
thing is (and this is weird, I know), but I suddenly noticed that he is in
super good, awesome shape, and tall. Not bad things, right? Not at all.
Normally. But I suddenly had visions of him being the guy that beat up Ethan.

The
crazy thought had me backing away from him, shaking.

And
ready to bolt.

And
lying about a date.

“Oh,
okay,” Wade seemed disappointed. And hurt. “I just thought we had hit it off at
the party—but then, you’ve been blowing me off ever since that night. I
guess I should have figured it out—you were just using me at the party,
right?”

“No!”
I didn’t know if I should feel sorry for him, or be afraid of him, so I was
just honest with him. “I had fun that night with you. A lot of fun, but I’ve
had a lot on my mind. Tons.”

That
was the truth.
So
not a lie. Still,
the next thing out of my mouth was: “But yeah, I’ve already got a date to the
dance. Sorry.”

I
thought about blurting out that he should ask my friend Kim. At the party she
had kept saying he was cute. All night. But the fear of him being a creepy
stalker stopped me from blurting out the suggestion. I wished no creepy stalker
on anyone. But especially not poor little Kim.

“’Bye
Wade,” I said, then
ran
from him.

CHAPTER 31

After
school Laurie invited me to go shopping with her. “I need a new dress!” she
exclaimed excitedly. Well,
tried
to
sound excited.

She
continued to attempt sounding excited as she told me this cute guy from the
soccer team, Spencer, asked her to Friday’s dance.

“So
I need a new dress,” she said. “Come on—I need to be cheered up.”

I
was all for that. “Okay.”

The
whole time we shopped Laurie talked about Spencer and the dance. So, I was cautiously
hopeful. Maybe she was going to bounce back easier than I’d
thought—though I knew a lot of her excitement was fake. Still, some of it
could
be real, right? (Fingers
crossed.)

Finally
she found the perfect dress. It was gorgeous on her. “It will make every guy at
the dance drool,” Laurie cooed with delight when she had it on.

She
was right, it would. It was perfect.

Unfortunately,
once we accomplished that (exciting) task—finding the perfect
dress—then she had me trapped in her car as she drove around looking for
Drew’s car. We checked his house, and some of his friend’s houses, and anywhere
else she could think of where she might spot it.

We
ended up finding his car parked at Slugger’s, a fifty’s type hamburger joint
where a lot of people from school hang out. (Yes, the place I went last night
with Rider.)

Laurie
wanted to go inside.

“What
if he’s with a girl?” I asked, uncomfortable with the idea.

“What
if he is?” Laurie said defiantly. “We’re only going in to get something to
eat.”

Hesitantly
I followed her inside, knowing this was going to be bad, but Laurie was
determined, so I reluctantly supported her … to the train wreck.

“Hey!”
Drew greeted us as we entered the building. He was sitting at a booth with some
of his friends from the football team and a couple of girls. It didn’t look as
if they were paired off. It looked more like they were all just hanging out
together.

We
grabbed a table far back, and kitty-corner to them, so Laurie could kind of
casually look at the back of Drew’s head every once in awhile.

“He
keeps looking over here,” Laurie smiled.

I
couldn’t see him because my back was to the table.

Laurie
grunted. “That awful cheerleader Bianca keeps looking back here too. She looks
so smug. I hate her. She was always flirting with him—even when we were
together. The skank.”

We
both ordered a hamburger and milkshakes, and we split an order of fries, even
though fries came with our burgers. (These were break-up fries. Necessary.)

While
Drew’s friends got ready to leave, he came over to our table.

“Hi,”
he said taking a seat beside Laurie. “What are you two up to?”

“We’re
eating,” Laurie explained, kind of snippily, yet I could tell she was thrilled
that he came over.

 
“Huh. Well, we’re going to a party over
on Franklin,” Drew said, stealing a fry. “Maybe after you two are done eating
you’d like to come over.”

He
added to me specifically, “Nick’s band is playing there.”

“Is
he really?” My brother sure was in demand these days. “Whose party is it?”

“I
don’t even know,” Drew shrugged with a smile. His eyes looked hopeful, “Are you
going to come?”

“We
might,” Laurie broke in.

“Do
you know where Franklin Street is?” he asked.

“I
think so,” Laurie answered, looking kind of doubtful.

He
gave her directions, though she has GPS, then he apparently could find no other
reason to linger.

“So
you’ll be there?” he asked as he got up from our table.

“Maybe,”
Laurie murmured sounding indefinite, but I knew that she wanted to go. With all
of her lovelorn heart. It was her pride that kept her from racing to the car.

When
Drew was out of earshot, she turned to me excitedly. “What do you think?”

“I
don’t know,” I said trying to be objective. “Maybe you shouldn’t be at his beck
and call like that.”

It
was hard to give her any kind of advice these days for fear of being
self-serving. Still, if a guy breaks up with a girl it doesn’t seem like a good
idea for her to be too convenient for him. That seemed like a
bad
idea.

“Oh,
I don’t mean about the party,” she said. “I’m not going to go to that. I want
to be kind of hard to get, if he’s trying to get me back.” She raised her brow
hopefully, “Do you think he is?”

“Trying
to get you back?”

She
nodded.

I
bit my lip, sadly doubting it.

I
tried to be diplomatic. “I really have no idea.”

‘Cause
well, you never know, right? Boys say one thing, but act quite another. Like
Rider—what was going on with him? Chasing after Daisy, yet being so sweet
to me, and always staring at me, and … Ugh! Stop thinking about him. He’s
obviously a player. Duh.

“Well,
he just invited me to that party,” Laurie pointed out, without giving any
thought to the fact that he had invited me as well. “Why would he want his
ex-girlfriend at a pick-up party? And I swear he was looking back here the
entire time he was eating.”

That
information made me inhale sharply. Again. “Laurie, I don’t know—just
don’t get your hopes up,” I advised gently, kind of concerned.

I
knew how it looked to her, and it was very understandable. Very. But, of
course, I was thinking she was wrong—that maybe he was looking at
me
. But for all I knew, we were
both
wrong. Maybe we were both deluding
ourselves and right this minute he was making out with Bianca.

“What
about Spencer?” I asked to change the subject. “He’s really cute and popular.
And he’ll love you in that dress. He’ll die and go to heaven when he sees you
in it.”

She
sighed, sounding miserable. “I don’t really like Spencer. I just want Drew
back. But to tell you the truth, I don’t think I can get him back this time. He
wasn’t mad at me or anything when he broke up with me. In fact, he was really
nice and sympathetic. You know it’s really the end when the guy’s sympathetic.”

The
rest of the night she would flop from trying to get excited about her date with
Spencer, to moping about being dumped by Drew.

I
was beyond sympathetic, of course. But still, I felt uncomfortable whenever she
would ask me for advice. I was so tempted to tell her what happened with Drew,
but I honestly couldn’t see any good it would do. Well, besides easing my
conscience. But I knew she would be insulted that Drew could like me, Brooke
nobody, better than her. She wouldn’t be able to fathom how such a thing could
possibly happen. I knew she’d be all sorts of bewildered and hurt and would
hate me for it, and hate herself for it even more—dumped for her dumpy
friend. No, she couldn’t handle that.

By
the end of the night, I had pretty much decided Laurie wasn’t the one that
wrote me the creepy note (
another girl’s
boyfriend—naughty, naughty
).

Of
course realizing that couldn’t really give me that much relief because it meant
there was some other crazy out there, and I didn’t have a clue who it was. But
it was definitely a boy—right? I mean, the person
beat up
Ethan.

That
knowledge didn’t make me feel any better.

In
fact, I had chills.