Page 11 of Forbidden

She’s no one. Ouch!

I was always a no one, but it never hurt or bothered me as much as when I heard Shane say it. I went through the rest of the day in a daze, thinking about his kiss and how he helped me, but that wasn’t all of it, there was the other side of him that was a jerk to me. Sometimes I wanted to hate him just because he seemed to hate me so much, too.

I avoided my usual routes to class. I didn’t want to see him, not after he said I was no one. A crowd had gathered in the glass entryway near the stairway to my classes. Noelle was towards the back of the crowd, away from the glass doors, texting.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“There you are! I’ve been looking all over for you. Didn’t you hear?”

“Hear what?”

A hush went through the crowd as four policemen entered the hall. Between them were Seth and Shane, handcuffed, their faces expressionless. Everything was silent except for the thud of Shane’s boots. Or maybe that was my heart.

As they exited the building, the crowd moved to the glass doors, following them. I pushed my way in front of them and watched as the cops pushed Shane’s head down as he got into the backseat of one of their cars. Seth was placed in the back of another police car.

Neither Shane nor Seth returned to school. Four months later, I graduated with my father and Joanna in attendance. During that time, neither of them said anything about Shane and I didn’t know how to bring him up to ask. No one said anything about him, not even at school. I might as well have made him up; he didn’t exist.

I spent the rest of high school following my usual pattern of looking in the halls for him. It was the least I could do to keep my memory of him alive. Whatever happened to him, it happened because of me. Shane took the fall for me. Maybe he didn’t really hate me.

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