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Prologue

Alona Dare

It was easy enough to sneak out of school. I knew that from previous experience. This time, all I had to do was wait until Mrs. Higgins had led everyone onto the outdoor track and then slip behind the bleachers and walk down to the other opening in the chain-link fence.

Sneaking back in, though … that would be a bitch. But I’d just have to deal with that when I got back. Like always.

I shivered in the cool morning breeze. It was 7:00 a. m. , or a little past, on the first day in May, and it wasn’t nearly warm enough to be out walking around in the stupid thin T-shirt and short shorts they made us wear for gym. At least on the track, the bleachers blocked the wind and the black cinders held some of the heat from the day before. Out here, I had nothing but anger to keep me toasty.

How could she do this to me again? Didn’t she get it? It was never going to happen. There would be no fairy-tale ending for her, not this time. And I was sick of all the stupid phone calls from him asking about her, and the thinly veiled questions about him from her.

I picked up the pace, heading toward the tennis courts. After a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure I’d cleared enough distance between me and the track, I opened my cell phone, which I’d kept hidden in my closed hand to avoid Mrs. Higgins’s wrath, and hit speed dial.

The phone rang on the other end, and I pictured it flashing hopefully in the dark kitchen on the sticky granite counter. She wouldn’t answer. That would defeat the purpose, but she’d know it was me calling. She’d be clutching the upstairs cordless phone to her chest, checking the caller ID, hoping it was him and not me.

I hoped somebody would kill me before I ever became that desperate for someone’s attention. Seriously, it was pathetic. And she was ruining lives. Specifically, MY life. Now, not only would I have to lie again to Mrs. Higgins about why I’d dipped out on class — something I’m not opposed to in the right circumstance for the right reason, but this was neither — I’d also miss meeting up with Chris and Misty, my boyfriend and best friend, before classes officially started, which would require another lie. They only tolerated each other for my sake and would hate it if I wasn’t there to referee. Worse yet, it was Senior Celebration Day, and now Chris’s locker, unlike those of the rest of the senior athletes, would have to remain unadorned until lunch, when I’d have time again to decorate.

Not that she would care about any of that. She never cared about anyone but herself.

By the time the answering machine picked up, I was beyond pissed. I stomped past the tennis courts toward Henderson Street, waiting for the piercing beep. When it sounded, I shouted into the phone so she could hear me all the way upstairs in her nest of tangled bedsheets and crumpled-up tissues. “I know you can hear me, and I can’t believe you’re making me do this again. Don’t you have any pride? He called me, me, not you. Are you sensing a pattern here yet? My God, just get over it already and—”