The Stranger Inside (17 page)

Sawyer handed me the note. It was in the same writing as the perfumed note that had been left in his car—the note that said “I know a secret.”

This one said: “
Hey Sawyer, I know something you don’t. Try to get it out of me, k?”

It sounded sort of … slutty. I scrunched up my forehead. “What did she know?”

He shrugged. “I have no idea. But she’s been looking at me weird lately—and coming into the store a lot. And she obviously wants me to ‘get it out of her’ some other way than asking.”

“Duh.”

He grinned. “No, it’s not like that—I don’t think it is anyway. I think she wants money or something.”

 “Why?” I raised my eyebrows, my stomach kind of twisting. “What’d you do?”

He shook his head, like
I have no idea
. “Maybe she’s just playing around.”

In the cafeteria, we got a slice of pizza and sodas, then found the others waiting for us at a table in the back. They were all joking around, talking about classes and weird people in them—and they didn’t mean me. ‘Cause they didn’t know. It amazed me how comfortable I felt around Sawyer’s friends now—almost as though they were my friends too. They were a tight bunch. It was cool being accepted into their group—and I
did
feel accepted, pretty much.

I was still kind of shaky, though. Lost in thoughts of shadows and what happened before pre-calc. I guess I kind of zoned out for a moment because when I looked up, I saw Jeremy watching me sardonically from across the table. He winked.

My heart went spastic.

But just then another blond, not Chloe or the one from this morning, glided over to our table and practically sat on Jeremy’s lap. She played with his hair while she talked with him, then before she left, they kissed good-bye.

“Are you and Regan becoming a thing?” Zack asked as he watched her skim out of the cafeteria. “She’s hot.”

Jeremy shrugged. “Want me to set you up with her?”

Zack looked surprised. “Yeah.”

I cleared my throat. “You really like blondes, don’t you Jeremy?” I was trying to be conversational. He, of course, had no idea how much courage it took for me to do that—to actually talk to him without a direct reason. But I figured I needed to get used to it if he and I were going to be in the same group. After all, it was his group—I was the outsider.

He gave me a teasing smile. “Don’t go bleaching your hair over it.”

“Yeah,” Micah agreed with a snort. “Remember Amber Murry?”

Jeremy groaned with an impish smile. “Don’t tell her about Amber.”

“She was a blond and Jeremy had no interest in her—zero—until she dyed her hair brown, like yours.”

“Not brown—Jodi’s hair’s not brown.” Jeremy drenched his pile of French fries in ketchup, not looking at us as he spoke, but keeping his eyes on his ketchup-to-fry ratio. “It’s reddish-brown, auburn.”

“Anyway,” Micah went on with the story, like
Dude,
whatever
. “After she dyed her hair, she sort of looked like you.
Then
Jeremy was suddenly into her. Big time. For a while. And then he went after Holly Bennett.”

“Oh yeah, Holly Bennett,” Zack piped in, the name obviously ringing a bell. “She looked like you Jodi.”

“She didn’t talk like you though,” Jeremy said, flicking his gaze up to me for a moment, then stabbing his fry in ketchup. “She had a really irritating voice.”

“You always say that.” Sawyer stole one of his fries. “It wasn’t that bad.”

“Well, it wasn’t like Jodi’s.”

“He only dated Holly for two days—
two
days—then he went on to Sara Davis. She looked like you too,” Sawyer said, raising his eyebrows at me, like this info held a lot of meaning, like it aided in getting his earlier point across.

“Yeah, but,” Jeremy paused. He shook his head, like he was thinking about the past and it was strange—even to him. “She–I swear—she tried to talk like Jodi.”

Sawyer grimaced. “Yeah. She was nuts.”

“Well, nuts about Jeremy,” Micah shrugged. “But any girl that likes Jeremy would have to be nuts, huh?” He gave Trista a playful rub on the head.

She just rolled her eyes. “It sounds like Jeremy was the crazy one.” She learned toward Jeremy. “So, why’d you switch to blondes?”

He shrugged. “Because it didn’t hurt so much—they didn’t remind me of Jodi.” No one said anything. Finally, Jeremy gazed up at me, his warm brown eyes tender. He gave a weak smile. “I missed you.”

My heart exploded.

Hearing him say that, I melted. I was suddenly a sopping puddle. Not because of the girl stuff—that was freaky. But that he had missed me. That he said it. It had me ready to cry.

But they had to be putting me on—him, them. All of them. They had to be. Because Jeremy had crushed me. Like a bug. Like I meant nothing to him. He had dumped
me
too—just like he’d dumped those other girls … only it had taken him over a year to do it. Until my mom sent me off to live with Dad. Then he totally stomped on my heart. Mangled it until it was irrecoverable—until there was no way it could function properly. No way I could ever love again.

My voice caught. “You did?” I meant the question to be about him missing me.

Jeremy sat back, watching my eyes, then nodded. “It was a long time ago, though—right after you left. I was really messed up.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Zack smirked. “Not much has changed, huh?”

Jeremy gave a wry smile. “Actually, a lot has.”

As if on cue, to prove his point—Regan, the blonde from earlier slid in the seat next to him. “Hi,” she said, handing him a plate of extra large cookies with M & M smiley faces. “I made these in cooking class.”

Jeremy eyed them, a small smile on his lips but a question in his eyes. “Thanks. There for me?”

“Yep,
all
for you,” she said huskily as her friends tried pulling her away.

“Little self-respect, Regan,” one of the girls said.

 Regan gave her friend a dirty look, then turned back to Jeremy all smiling
I-want-to-lick-your-face
-like. “They’re peanut butter.”

Jeremy winced. He gazed down at the cookies a moment, then raised his eyebrows. “Hey Regan, do you know Zack?”

Zack’s face lit up and he smiled at Regan, like he was thinking
this is my chance
, but Regan gave him a disdainful look.

“I know
Eve
,” she said as her friends pulled her away. “’Bye Jeremy,” she called over her shoulder. “Enjoy the cookies!”

Jeremy waited until she was out of earshot, then said, “Here, you enjoy the cookies.” He scooted the plate to Zack. “I hate peanut butter.”

Hearing him say that caused me physical pain. Back when we were together peanut butter had been our staple—our “special” ingredient—we heaped it into everything, on to everything.

But now Jeremy hated peanut butter.

And he was into blonds.

The bell rang and everyone started heading for classes. I was in a baffled stupor. Jeremy had gone around dating girls that looked like me? Sounded like me? He said he’d been messed up. But why? What did
he
have to be messed up about? He’d dumped me, it wasn’t the other way around.
I
was the one with the stomped on heart.
I
was the one that was messed up.

***

Despite the spooky shadow and being scared out of my wits, the rest of the day went pretty well. Considering.

I was glad Micah and Trista were in my chemistry class. I definitely wasn’t a chem-wiz. I needed all the help I could get.

In class, I took notes like crazy. But it was hard keeping up. The teacher, Mr. Daniels, lectured on and on, non-stop. I wrote frantically, zoning out toward the end. When I came to, I read over my notes and froze, a chill crawling down my spine
.
I want to do your boyfriend
, was scrawled in big, bold print toward the bottom.
Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy.

The bell rang.

“You okay?” Trista asked, when I just sat there, frozen, staring at my notebook.

I jumped. “Uh, what? Yeah, I’m fine.” I got to my feet.

Mr. Daniels came over to the three of us—Trista, Micah, and me. “Problems?”

“Nope, none,” Trista said, pulling me towards the door. A girl was waiting to talk with Mr. Daniels, so he let us go without a further look, but I’m pretty sure I heard the girl call him “Todd.”

I glanced back, thinking that was weird. But Trista pulled me along, giving me a knowing look.

“Steer clear of Mr. Daniels,” Trista warned with a laugh. She was talking low enough that Micah didn’t hear us. He was busy gazing through his notes as he strolled distractedly beside us, somehow avoiding the throng of student traffic without even looking. “We have a lot of perv teachers at our school,” she said. “I’ll make you a list.”

She seemed to be only half-kidding.

I probably would have been more grossed out, but at the time I was in a panic. Now Kenzie was writing me notes in class. And she wanted to have sex with Jeremy.

Great.

CHAPTER 13

Immediately when I got home from school I wrote everything that happened today down in my journal—about the shadow and Kenzie. Every detail. I decided to start doing that—find out what happened right before and after any kind of “loony” episode took place. Discover what triggered them. So I could stop them. I was going to beat this. I was actually hopeful.

I wrote in my journal:
I’ve just got to figure out when Kenzie is coming, so I can snap her away.

***

At Sawyer’s house I could hear the band practicing in the basement, so I went into the house without knocking. Trista was in the kitchen getting a soda. She did a double take when I came in, then smiled. “How was your first day at good old Roosevelt ?”

“Not as bad as I imagined,” I lied. The creepy shadow and Kenzie popping up
were
as bad as I’d imagined, but no way was I going to tell her about that. Or the fact I might spontaneously start chopping up people, myself included. No, I’d save that for another day. “Thanks.” I took the soda she offered, trying to be all friendly and
I’m-totally-normal
-like. So, I opened up and shared things I wouldn’t normally. “It was nice having Sawyer and the rest of you around. Whenever I saw one of you walking down the halls it was comforting, you know? Like I wasn’t totally alone in the huge school of strangers.”

“Yeah, I know exactly what you mean.” She smiled. “It’s nice to belong to a group.”

“Yeah, it is.” I was tempted to just end the conversation there—on a happy note and trot on downstairs, listen to the guys. But I decided to practice my “confiding skills.” Since friends did that—confided things. Not bloody, chopping-out-your-heart things, but things. So, I took a sip of my soda and went on. “It was kind of weird seeing the guys at school, though. I mean around other people. Girls kept flirting with Sawyer.”

“Oh, I know, it’s sick, huh?” She laughed. “Unfortunately, that’s the way it is, though—if you date a guy from The Clutch. They’re considered rock stars or whatever at school. It’s like they have a bunch of sleazy groupies after them. Be glad you’re dating Sawyer, not Jeremy—girls maul him.”

Ouch. Still, I knew it was true. I tried acting unscathed, nonchalant even. “I bet.”

Trista took a sip of her soda. “I guess I should warn you, if you think the girls are bad at school, wait until you see them at parties where the guys perform—they’re unbelievable.”

“Great.” I’d never really considered myself a jealous person before, but then, I’d never had to be. It bit. I didn’t want to have to deal with it. Drama—I had enough of it in my life as it was. No more, thanks.

“Don’t be too worried about it,” Trista said. “Sawyer’s totally into you.” She downed her soda and got another one. “You make a cute couple.”

 Instead of going downstairs to listen to the band, which I was dying to do, I did the friend-thing and followed Trista into the study to keep her company. When I asked her what she was doing, she said she was typing up a paper for Jeremy.

Weird. “You type Jeremy’s papers?”

“Yeah.” She shrugged. “I don’t mind. He helps me in classes too. The band helps each other out.” She sat at the computer and started typing. She was blazingly fast. No wonder she didn’t mind typing for others; she had bionic fingers. “It’s really quiet today,” she said. “Usually there are all kinds of people around for the practices. But most of that was Eve. She always came with a mob of friends.” Trista sighed, content. “Enjoy the quiet while you can. Eve and Zack always get back together.”

I nodded, saying nothing

When Trista finished Jeremy’s paper, we headed down to the basement. But at the bottom of the stairs, I froze. I could hear singing. The voice made my heart jump to my throat. Funny, I’d never thought to ask Sawyer who sang in the band.

I stood frozen on the stairs, listening to the beautiful raspy voice, unable to move.

Trista turned back to me. “What’s the matter? Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” I whispered, my heart pounding in my throat. “That’s Jeremy singing.”

She smiled. “He’s wonderful, huh?”

I swallowed. “Look, I can’t go down there.” I raced back up the stairs.

“Jodi!” Trista followed at my heels. “Wait.”

I didn’t though. I didn’t wait. I ran up to the kitchen and plowed down at the table, resting my head on its hard, solid surface.

“Boy, you’ve really got it bad, haven’t you?”

“What are talking about?” I wished she would go away so I could wallow in my agony alone. Hearing Jeremy sing had caught me off guard. Jeremy played the guitar, he didn’t sing—or so I thought. Obviously, I was wrong. Dead wrong. Jeremy had the voice of an angel, a rock star. No wonder The Clutch was so popular.

“You still love him,” Trista said as she sat down beside me. Her voice was wary. “It’s been all these years, and yet you both still love each other.”