Page 21 of Footlights and Forever

“Hey there Dorothy!” Garrett’s happy but sneering voice sounded from directly behind me.

Oh yeah, that’s why.

Chapter 8

“Everyone’s a nerd inside. I don’t care how cool you are.” - Channing Tatum.

Dylan

“What’s a young unaccompanied lady like you, doing alone in a place like this?” he whispered in my ear as his group of minions slowly descended on the table, filling the other once-unoccupied eight chairs on the table until it was just me and them.

“It’s fine, I’ll just leave.” I started to stand up, but Garrett pressed a hand into the top of my shoulder and forced me back into my seat.

“Don’t be silly.” Garrett gave my shoulder one last violent squeeze before settling back in his own seat. “This prom is just as much for you as it is for us. You should enjoy yourself.”

Maybe if I just accept and give in to whatever they want to do with me, it will be over much quicker.“What do you want, Garrett?” I sighed, suddenly overly exhausted and wishing I would have just stayed home. “I’m literally trying to mind my own business and stay out of everyone’s way.”

“I don’t know if that’s quite true now, is it?” He shrugged his shoulder slightly. “I mean, a little bird told me that you have been spending some sweet quality time with my buddy Austin, is that right?”

My blood ran cold, and my heart began to pound in my chest. “I have been helping him to get his grades up, yes.” I lifted my chin indignantly. “He wants to get into college and needed help with a couple of classes.”

Garrett looked around the table at his sheep, and they all started to laugh lowly. “I think we all know what type of help you like to offer, don’t we, Dylan?” he said, leaning back in his seat and obscenely grabbing and squeezing his crotch.

“What…” I stammered, my heart seizing, and my vision going slightly wonky, fear and panic gripping me tightly.

“Come on, man,” Garrett groaned and squeezed harder, “we know what you have been doing for our buddy. It’s genius. He has been getting his grades up, and you have been getting something else up for him.”

“I haven’t…” I tried.

“We have rooms here at the hotel for our dates tonight, and we don’t wanna bust a nut the moment we get into bed. Maybe you can help us out and take the edge of for us all in the bathrooms?”

The chuckling rippled around the table as the people standing around us gave us all curious looks. I wanted to shout at them to stop listening, that it was all lies and it wouldn’t happen in a million years. “What do you say, Dylan?” Garrett winked. “Want to get the whole football team off?”

I willed the ground to swallow me whole as tears began to well behind my eyes and a slow burn grew in my throat. I didn’t trust myself to speak as I wasn’t not a hundred percent sure if I could say anything coherently right now. I started to stand up again, but Garrett blocked my escape.

“What, are we not good enough for you, Dylan?” he grinned. “Think maybe you can’t handle us all? We can take turns on you, if that helps.” His buddies openly started laughing at me as my face burst into flames.

“I don’t want to…”

“What the fuck is going on?” Austin’s voice, ice cold, sounded from directly behind me. His hands rested gently on my shoulder, his fingertips squeezing the strained tendons.

“Nothing, it’s fine…” I started to say. For god’s sake I just wanted to get out of there and allow the embarrassment to swallow me up.

“I’m sorry, Dylan, but I was talking to Garrett here.” I looked up to see what could only be described as a murderous expression carved into Austin’s normally rugged handsome face. His face was now twisted into something so different that it frightened me a little.

“Hey, we were just fucking with him,” Garrett laughed, his gaze shooting to his friends who hid their chuckles and giggles behind their fists.

“It’s not what it looked like to me,” Austin bit out. “Dylan doesn’t look like you were just fucking with him.”

Garrett shrugged, his feet coming up to the empty chair in front of him, legs crossed at the ankles. “Don’t know what to tell you, buddy.” He pointed a toe at me. “Guess we don’t have the game that you have. Dylan just wasn’t interested in what we had to offer.”

I felt an almost imperceptible squeeze of my shoulder and then all at once the pressure and Austin were gone altogether. Moving forward with what had to be inhuman speed, he reached down and gripped hold of Garrett’s ankle, pulling upward sharply, sending Garrett toppling over backwards. His chair flipped beneath him leaving him to land face down on its underside, the metal bar of the seat crushing into his face.

It was almost as if the music scratched to a halt, when in actual fact the DJ just lowered his set as the entire student body’s attention zeroed in on what looked from the outset like it could be an epic fight between the two hottest jocks in our year. My jaw dropped as I was rendered immobile in my seat as Austin, not done with his onslaught, grabbed Garrett by the back of the neck and hauled him to his feet. Spinning him around like a well-choregraphed dance, he slammed Garrett backwards until he bent backwards at an awkward angle over the round table.

Austin, still holding onto Garrett’s neck, leaned forwards until his face was only inches from his. “What the fuck did you just say?” His voice was cold and harsh, and a shiver raced up my spine.

“Yo, man, get the fuck off me!” Garrett’s panicked voice shrieked, his eyes darting around, likely not taking in the many eyes watching his utter domination.

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